Dear prof. Gray, this hypothesis is worth investigating, but at the moment the evidence you provided is much weaker than the one supporting the social network hypothesis that you so easily dismissed. And what if students feel more stressed because of the lack of sleep induced by smartphones that in turn make them more susceptible to scho…
Dear prof. Gray, this hypothesis is worth investigating, but at the moment the evidence you provided is much weaker than the one supporting the social network hypothesis that you so easily dismissed. And what if students feel more stressed because of the lack of sleep induced by smartphones that in turn make them more susceptible to school failures? The emergence of common core is parallel to the diffusion of smartphones so it is hard to disentangle the effect of one vs the other. But in other nations depression is increasing and so is school stress, but without any high stakes test. Quite a puzzle. Is maybe paranoid parenting in the West playing a role? Or the three things at once?
Giovanni, I know that many people believe there is strong evidence about the SM hypothesis, but please read my Letter # 45--https://petergray.substack.com/publish/posts/detail/146150888?referrer=%2Fpublish%2Fposts-- in which I go through the arguments presented by Haidt and show the weakness of each. In fact, much research shows that depression, anxiety, and suicide did NOT increase in most countries--including the entire EU--as smartphones and social media became prevalent. I also suggest reading reviews of this theory by the people who actually conduct research on smartphones and social media--such as Candice Odgers (arguably the leading US expert in this area. --https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-024-00902-2
Dear prof. Gray, thanks for the answer. To my knowledge depression and anxiety did increase in european countries too. In addition there are multiple lines of evidence from many different disciplines that suggest that smartphones has an effec5 and so far I think the smartphone argument is quite robust. More, for the moment, than the school stress hp, if taken alone. Best.
If evidence shows that suicide rates are lower during months/on days without schooling, i.e. when children have more time for smartphone and social media usage, doesn't that rather support Peter's hypothesis? Which pattern would one expect to see if the main cause was smartphones and social media?
This per se is not evidence of a causal link, it is a correlation that suggests a causal link. I am not dismissing the hp, but at the moment the fact that social media play a role is much more robust. I have the impression that these two factors are important. As I said, such type of school anxiety is on the rise everywhere in the West, with or without common core or high stakes testing or difficult tests to get to prestigious universities.
That's right, it's just correlation. So, here is another hypothesis: when young people have so much school pressure and don't get their core needs satisfied there, they go somewhere else, where something "takes care of them" (that something, social media, is designed to be addictive, I know). When they are so deprived of feeling their autonomy, relatedness and competence, they loose the ability to use social media as a tool, mastering it, instead of subordinating themselves. This hypothesis links together school pressure, social media dependency and mental health deterioration (in short: school pain => smartphone addiction).
The "opposite" hypothesis would be: because of smartphone addiction, young people have issues keeping up with the school agenda, so they get school pressure, and their mental health deteriorates. Or in short: smartphone addiction => school pressure/pain.
For the second hypothesis, one would still need to find the cause why many young people cannot withstand the addictive part of social media/smartphones.
Both movements might be plausible. Wrt the phone part, brain development make it hard to resist addictions, to adults but especially to kids. Data on depression and suicides should be granular enough to exploit the staggered adoption of common core to explore the anxiety hp.
Dear prof. Gray, this hypothesis is worth investigating, but at the moment the evidence you provided is much weaker than the one supporting the social network hypothesis that you so easily dismissed. And what if students feel more stressed because of the lack of sleep induced by smartphones that in turn make them more susceptible to school failures? The emergence of common core is parallel to the diffusion of smartphones so it is hard to disentangle the effect of one vs the other. But in other nations depression is increasing and so is school stress, but without any high stakes test. Quite a puzzle. Is maybe paranoid parenting in the West playing a role? Or the three things at once?
Giovanni, I know that many people believe there is strong evidence about the SM hypothesis, but please read my Letter # 45--https://petergray.substack.com/publish/posts/detail/146150888?referrer=%2Fpublish%2Fposts-- in which I go through the arguments presented by Haidt and show the weakness of each. In fact, much research shows that depression, anxiety, and suicide did NOT increase in most countries--including the entire EU--as smartphones and social media became prevalent. I also suggest reading reviews of this theory by the people who actually conduct research on smartphones and social media--such as Candice Odgers (arguably the leading US expert in this area. --https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-024-00902-2
Dear prof. Gray, thanks for the answer. To my knowledge depression and anxiety did increase in european countries too. In addition there are multiple lines of evidence from many different disciplines that suggest that smartphones has an effec5 and so far I think the smartphone argument is quite robust. More, for the moment, than the school stress hp, if taken alone. Best.
If evidence shows that suicide rates are lower during months/on days without schooling, i.e. when children have more time for smartphone and social media usage, doesn't that rather support Peter's hypothesis? Which pattern would one expect to see if the main cause was smartphones and social media?
This per se is not evidence of a causal link, it is a correlation that suggests a causal link. I am not dismissing the hp, but at the moment the fact that social media play a role is much more robust. I have the impression that these two factors are important. As I said, such type of school anxiety is on the rise everywhere in the West, with or without common core or high stakes testing or difficult tests to get to prestigious universities.
That's right, it's just correlation. So, here is another hypothesis: when young people have so much school pressure and don't get their core needs satisfied there, they go somewhere else, where something "takes care of them" (that something, social media, is designed to be addictive, I know). When they are so deprived of feeling their autonomy, relatedness and competence, they loose the ability to use social media as a tool, mastering it, instead of subordinating themselves. This hypothesis links together school pressure, social media dependency and mental health deterioration (in short: school pain => smartphone addiction).
The "opposite" hypothesis would be: because of smartphone addiction, young people have issues keeping up with the school agenda, so they get school pressure, and their mental health deteriorates. Or in short: smartphone addiction => school pressure/pain.
For the second hypothesis, one would still need to find the cause why many young people cannot withstand the addictive part of social media/smartphones.
Both movements might be plausible. Wrt the phone part, brain development make it hard to resist addictions, to adults but especially to kids. Data on depression and suicides should be granular enough to exploit the staggered adoption of common core to explore the anxiety hp.