Students from USC and other schools participated in the USC Hearing and Communication Neuroscience Summer Research Academy.
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Risks faced by teens online vary by platform, study shows
USC researchers and colleagues analyzed data about hundreds of teens’ social media experiences. (Photo/iStock)
Health
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USC Marshall School of Business researchers say new data could help both families and companies keep kids safer online.
A recent study in JAMA Pediatrics describes a pioneering assessment of how different online platforms expose teens to different types of harm.
USC researchers collaborated on the Stanford University-led study with New York University colleagues and analyzed data from 472 teens ages 13 to 17 who participated in USC’s Understanding America Survey.
In the survey, teen respondents reported their use and negative experiences with 20 platforms ranging from Instagram, TikTok and YouTube to email and text messaging.
One of the authors, Ravi Iyer of the USC Marshall School of Business, shared his expert opinion on how social media affects children as part of a recent court case involving Meta. He and coauthor Nathanael Fast, a USC Marshall professor whose research focuses on the intersection of decision-making and technology, shared what the survey uncovered and how the information could help increase online safety for teens.
Q: What kinds of harm are teens facing online, and what were some notable risks or harms seen on specific platforms?
Ravi Iyer: There are three categories of harm measured in the paper that are prominent in online experiences: unwanted/harmful contact, unwanted/harmful content and regretted/excessive usage. Contact harms include unwanted contact and sexual advances, which were found to be most prevalent on Snapchat. Instagram tended to have more content harms, including more unwanted sexual images, more violent/disturbing images, and more content that made teens feel worse about themselves. TikTok was reported as the platform that disrupted sleep most.
Q: The study also compared teens’ offline experiences with similar types of harm. In those comparisons, were there any surprising differences?
Nathanael Fast: It was notable that contact harms were often experienced more in person (e.g. more teens reported being bullied in person than on any platform). But content harms were more prevalent online, where teens reported more unwanted sexual images, more violent images and more content that made them feel worse about themselves, as compared to offline.
Q: How can measuring these risks help teens and families in the future?
Iyer: Measuring these risks can help parents make better choices about which platforms to allow their kids to use. It can also create incentives for companies to compete on safety and better experiences — not just on engagement. Regulators can use this information to ensure that platforms where users report the most harms are held appropriately accountable, leading to reduced risks for everyone.
Ravi Iyer is a technologist and academic psychologist working to improve technology’s impact on society. His work has been featured in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times and more, and he has served as an expert witness on how social media affects children. He is the managing director for the Neely Center for Ethical Leadership and Decision Making at the USC Marshall School of Business.
Nathanael Fast studies the psychological underpinnings of power, leadership, and technology adoption. He is the director of the Neely Center for Ethical Leadership and Decision Making at the USC Marshall School of Business.
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