The study found that children who regularly checked their social media
feed at around age 12 showed increased sensitivity to social rewards
from their peers over time. In contrast, teenagers with less engagement
in social media showed a declining interest in social rewards. While the
study cannot make definitive causal claims about the effects of social
media on the brain, the authors suggest that the findings could
potentially have long-term consequences well into adulthood.
The study was conducted on a diverse group of 169 students from a middle
school in rural North Carolina. The students were split into three
groups based on their reported frequency of social media use: habitual
(checking feeds 15 or more times a day), moderate (checking 1-14 times a
day), and nonhabitual (checking less than once a day). The subjects
received full brain scans at approximately one-year intervals as they
played a game that displayed rewards and punishment in the form of
smiling or scowling peers...<<<Read More>>>...
