JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:
As we mentioned earlier, the big question at the heart of the Meta lawsuit is whether the company designed its platforms in a way that risks addiction by young users. And there is some debate about social media addiction. So we asked health correspondent Rhitu Chatterjee to explain it to us. Hey there.
RHITU CHATTERJEE, BYLINE: Hey, Juana.
SUMMERS: So, Rhitu, what's the answer? Can you be addicted to social media?
CHATTERJEE: Well, I put that question to Dr. Petros Levounis. He's the head of psychiatry at Rutgers Medical School, and here's what he said.
PETROS LEVOUNIS: There is a group of people, a small group of people, who already exhibit symptoms of addiction, constantly thinking about social media, spending a - tremendous amounts of time engaging with social media.
CHATTERJEE: And other symptoms can include, you know, knowing that too much time on social media is unhealthy for you but not being able to cut back, or you cut back but have withdrawal symptoms. However, I should add that social media addiction is not an official diagnosis as defined by the American Psychiatric Association, at least not yet. But pediatricians and child and adolescent specialists I've spoken with say they are seeing more and more young people with symptoms of social media addiction.
CHATTERJEE: Rhitu, do we have a sense of what percentage of young people are affected?
CHATTERJEE: So researchers are starting to get a better handle on this for youth in recent years from some large-scale studies. I've interviewed several researchers who study social media use among young people, and one of them is pediatrician Dr. Jason Nagata. He's at the University of San Francisco.
JASON NAGATA: Among even 11 to 12-year-olds, so these are preteenagers, a quarter say that they spend a lot of time thinking about their social media apps or planning use of social media apps. One in 5 say that they're using social media apps to forget about their problems. And 1 in 6 say that they try to use social media apps less, but they're not able to.
CHATTERJEE: And, you know, Nagata and his colleagues have also documented some of the risks of addictive social media use in young people.
NAGATA: Young people with addictive social media use had greater depressive and attention problems, suicide behaviors, sleep disturbance and substance initiation one year later.
CHATTERJEE: And Nagata also says that he and his colleagues have found links with poor cognition and memory down the line.
SUMMERS: I mean, Rhitu, I'm just thinking about this from the perspective of parents and people who care for kids. How can they help kids become less hooked on social media and all those other screens?
CHATTERJEE: So firstly, experts like Nagata say we need to have laws and regulations in place to prevent social media companies from having addictive features in their apps. But he says there are a couple other things parents can do that can make a big difference. As the American Academy of Pediatrics suggests, you know, have a family media plan. Sit together with your kids and decide when and how much screen time everybody in the family will use. And keep devices out of mealtimes and bedrooms, and B, help kids replace that screen time with other fun in-person activities. And, you know, all of this has to be a collective, collaborative effort for families.
SUMMERS: That's NPR's Rhitu Chatterjee. Thanks so much.
CHATTERJEE: My pleasure.
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