Instagram is toxic: Facebook knows it but tries to contest the allegations 🤨

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Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, TikTok and the list goes on. Most of us are registered on at least one social network. They allow us to communicate with our loved ones, to interact with the world, to share our passions. Despite the promise of bringing people together, these networks are not without their flaws, and the more time passes, the more evidence we have of their negative impact on mental health, especially for young people.

Instagram is toxic for young people and Facebook knows it 😡

It’s not uncommon for companies to conduct surveys on their own products to see what impact they have on their customers. Facebook conducted one for Instagram and the Wall Street Journal was able to get its hands on the results. These are not very pleasing and are even damning for Facebook. In the documents of the study, we can read that Instagram « worsens the problems with the body for a third of young girls ».

Conducted on a panel of girls in the U.S. and the U.K., this study found the following:

• « 32% of teenage girls said that when they felt bad about their bodies, Instagram made them feel worse. »
• « More than 40% » of young internet users who say they find themselves « unattractive » explain that these complexes started when they first started on the platform
• 30-51% of young people surveyed explain that Instagram makes them feel like they have to create a perfect image of themselves
• 42% of respondents feel like they don’t have enough money and 33% feel like they have too few friends.

And it doesn’t stop there, because many of those surveyed said they had suicidal thoughts after using the application. This phenomenon would affect 13% of British users and 6% of American users surveyed.

Wall Street Journal – “Teen Mental Health Deep Dive”,

These different results show how social comparison is taking even more of a toll on social networks. The worst part of this story is that Facebook has known about this since 2019. Even if measures like deleting likes have been taken, it seems more like air-breathing.

Facebook tries to challenge the results of its own study 🤨

As usual, Facebook is trying to play the transparency card, after compromising information has been revealed. We still remember that Mark Zuckerberg’s company tried to hide the most shared article on its platform, because it was fake news. (Read the article here).

According to Facebook, Instagram would not be toxic. To support its statement, the company chose to contextualize the studies by arguing that the methods used did not allow to produce statistical lessons.

But this excuse does not pass. Indeed, the Wall Street Journal has published other documents just as damning that are the opposite of what Facebook claims. Ouch

And you, what do you think about social networks and their influence on our daily life ?

Sources : Journal du Geek, 01net, The Wall Street Journal