The DOI matches its Crossref record; 48 of the 49 references it cites were found in a registry or an index; none of the 38 sources its claims cite is checked for support yet.
There Is No Evidence That Associations Between Adolescents’ Digital Technology Engagement and Mental Health Problems Have Increased
Open accessPublished version of a preprint
Abstract
Digital technology is ubiquitous in modern adolescence, and researchers are concerned that it has negative impacts on mental health that, furthermore, increase over time. To investigate whether technology is becoming more harmful, we examined changes in associations between technology engagement and mental health in three nationally representative samples. Results were mixed across types of technology and mental health outcomes: Technology engagement had become less strongly associated with depression in the past decade, but social-media use had become more strongly associated with emotional problems. We detected no changes in five other associations or differential associations by sex. There is therefore little evidence for increases in the associations between adolescents’ technology engagement and mental health. Information about new digital media has been collected for a relatively short time; drawing firm conclusions about changes in their associations with mental health may be premature. We urge transparent and credible collaborations between scientists and technology companies.
Overview
AI snapshot
Written from the paper’s full text.
TL;DR
Across three large nationally representative samples, the paper finds little evidence that associations between adolescents’ technology engagement and mental health problems have increased over time. Results were mixed by technology and outcome, with some associations decreasing and one increasing, but changes were very small.
Key findings
- In 2017, technology–mental health associations were generally weak, ranging from zero to about 0.15 SD; in YRBS, males at average device use reported suicide planning with 9% probability versus 11% at 1 SD above the mean (difference 2%, 95% CI [1.6%, 2.7%]).
- No consistent increase over time: social media use became more strongly associated with emotional problems, but depression’s association with social media and TV decreased; no credible changes were detected in five other associations, and no changes differed by gender.
- Where credible changes occurred, they were smaller than 0.01 SD per year; GAMs explained less than 3% of variance and indicated only two nonlinear changes: social media–emotional problems and TV–depression.
Methods
- Analyzed three nationally representative datasets—Monitoring the Future, Understanding Society, and Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System—with a combined 430,561 participants, restricting to ages 10–15 where possible.
- Outcomes included depression, conduct problems, emotional problems, and suicidal ideation/behaviour; predictors included TV viewing, social media use, and digital device use.
- Estimated Bayesian models with year (centered at 2017), technology use, and their interaction, plus sex interactions; US models included random intercepts, YRBS used Bernoulli/probit models with random item parameters, and sensitivity analyses used generalized additive models.
Limitations
- The paper states that between-person associations cannot support causal claims, that no covariates were included due to lack of strong theory and cross-dataset heterogeneity, and that self-report technology use is biased and noisy.
- The paper states that newer technologies have a shorter observation window, making firm conclusions premature, and that the work may conflate between- and within-person associations or different levels of analysis.
- Evident from the text: most analyses are cross-sectional except Understanding Society, and the study relies on self-reported mental health and technology use rather than objective usage data.
Model-written summary. Check it against the paper before relying on it.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Verification
Claims the paper makes
35 Own result · 22 Not checked yet · 19 Own interpretation · 9 Own method · 3 No basis given
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Interestingly, no credible changes were detected in the relationship between suicidal ideation and behaviour and either social media or television.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Results
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
- The authors state this as an assumption: Any change over time in the technology–mental health association was linear over the study period.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Emotional problems were also related to both technologies, but suicidal ideation and behaviour was reliably associated only with social media.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Results
plaincorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: unclear — It is unclear whether the paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“The relationship between social media and TV, and conduct problems had remained stable, as indicated by the estimated parameters narrowly centered on zero.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Results
hedged- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
- The authors state this as an assumption: Any change over time in the technology–mental health association was linear over the study period.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Critically, most models indicated that the (nonlinear) technology-mental health relationships had not changed over time as suggested by model comparison using AIC (Figure 3, bottom right)”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Relaxing the linearity assumptions
hedged- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“However, in line with the previous linear models, the GAMs that included year and technology use, but not their interaction, still only explained less than 3% of variance in the outcomes (Figure 3, bottom left).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Relaxing the linearity assumptions
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: unclear — It is unclear whether the paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“There were notable differences in associations across the different mental health outcomes and technologies (Figure 2, top panel).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Results
plaincorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: unclear — It is unclear whether the paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“The association between emotional problems and social media had increased, but their association with TV had remained stable.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Results
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
- The authors state this as an assumption: Any change over time in the technology–mental health association was linear over the study period.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Conduct problems were positively related to both TV and social media, whereas depression’s relation to both was practically zero.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Results
plaincorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: unclear — It is unclear whether the paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Emotional problems were also related to both technologies, but suicidal ideation and behaviour was reliably associated only with social media.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Results
plaincorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: unclear — It is unclear whether the paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Depression’s association with social media and TV had decreased over time.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Results
plaincorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
- The authors state this as an assumption: Any change over time in the technology–mental health association was linear over the study period.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Conduct problems were positively related to both TV and social media, whereas depression’s relation to both was practically zero.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Results
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: unclear — It is unclear whether the paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Notably, even the greatest magnitudes of these parameters did not exceed 0.01 change in standard deviation units, suggesting that changes, if any, were very small.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Results
hedged- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
- The authors state this as an assumption: Any change over time in the technology–mental health association was linear over the study period.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“We partially replicated previous findings whereby individuals who use more technology are likely to report higher mental health problems”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
hedgedcorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: unclear — It is unclear whether the paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“However, this decline was found for both television and social media”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
plaincorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Technology associations with conduct problems and suicidality were relatively stable over time.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Social media’s relations with emotional problems had slightly increased”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
plaincorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: unclear — It is unclear whether the paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“In all three cases where parameters’ uncertainty intervals excluded zero, the relations were smaller than 0.01 standard deviation units per year”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
plainn = 3- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“we first studied the technology associations specific to 2017, and found that technology uses were weakly associated with higher levels of most mental health problems, apart from depression.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
plaincorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: unclear — It is unclear whether the paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“whereas the association between social media use and emotional problems had become a slightly more linear trend over time (Figure 3, top panel).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Relaxing the linearity assumptions
plaincorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: unclear — It is unclear whether the paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“From these eight models, we found one clinically relevant self-reported mental health outcome, depression, for which the links to technology use had become consistently less negative over time.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
plaincorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Most importantly to the present investigation, there was no consistent change over time in technology’s relations with mental health.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
plainn = 3- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“but television’s had not.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Further, we only found one case whereby social media’s relation with mental health had become more negative over time”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
plaincorrelationalSingle case- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“As is observed in Figure 1, there was an initial long period of relative invariance in TV’s relation to mental health”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
plaincorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Finally, we did not find any differences in the time courses between girls and boys.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: unclear — It is unclear whether the paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“The association between TV viewing and depression had generally become slightly more prominently an inverted U-shaped function over time”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Relaxing the linearity assumptions
plaincorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: unclear — It is unclear whether the paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“There were only two associations, between social media use and emotional problems, and between television viewing and depression, that had changed in potentially nonlinear ways according to the GAM model comparisons (Figure 3, bottom right).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Relaxing the linearity assumptions
hedgedcorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: unclear — It is unclear whether the paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“For example, males using an average amount of digital devices reported planning for suicide with a 9% probability, and males who were 1 standard deviation above the mean on device use endorsed the item with a 11% probability, leading to a small difference (2%, 95%CI [1.6%, 2.7%]).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
plaincorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
In the paper
“concerns about digital technologies are best understood to follow a pattern of societal apprehension that waxes and wanes as novel forms of entertainment and social technologies are invented and gradually adopted by young people (Orben, 2020).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Abstract
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites Orben, 2020
plaincorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: unclear — It is unclear whether the paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A conclusion the paper draws from its own results — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Therefore, we have not learned how existing technologies’ effects change as new technologies emerge and are adopted by young people.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Abstract
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
In the paper
“there is little good evidence that technology use causes decreases in mental health (Dickson et al., 2019).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Abstract
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites Dickson et al., 2019
hedgeddirect- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
None of the sources cited for this claim have been checked yet.
In the paper
“In secondary data analyses, these problems are compounded by a general lack of adherence to consistent standards (Weston et al., 2019), which threatens the validity and robustness of reported associations, as the many choices leading to a reported analysis can engender misrepresentative estimates (Orben & Przybylski, 2019a).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Understanding Digital Harm
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites Weston et al., 2019
- Not checked yetcites Orben & Przybylski, 2019a
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: unclear — It is unclear whether the paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
None of the sources cited for this claim have been checked yet.
In the paper
“when fears emerge about a new technology, worries about previous technologies are largely abandoned without an agreement on—or good data indicating—whether, why or how the previous technologies were or were not harmful (Grimes et al., 2008; Orben, 2020).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Abstract
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites Grimes et al., 2008
- Not checked yetcites Orben, 2020
plaindirect- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
The paper states this without a source or data behind it here, so there is nothing to check it against. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“there are few or no tests of whether the effects of previous technologies, such as those of watching television, actually increased or decreased as society’s attention shifted to the possible harms associated with more recent technologies, e.g. playing video games.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Abstract
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
In the paper
“However, technologies, and their uses, are not static. The contexts and ways in which digital technologies are used are themselves in flux, with different platforms and technologies gaining and losing popularity within an adolescent’s social group (Boyd, 2014).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Digital Dynamics
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites Boyd, 2014
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A conclusion the paper draws from its own results — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“our results suggest that just as the ways in which young people use technology is changing, so too may its relations with mental health change, but this change is not well characterized as technology becoming either better or worse.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
hedged- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
In the paper
“Nevertheless, previous studies have found that covariates tend to render related associations smaller (Orben & Przybylski, 2019b)”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites Orben & Przybylski, 2019b
hedgeddirect- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A conclusion the paper draws from its own results — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“In sum, even after relaxing assumptions about linearity—in both the relations between technology use and mental health, and how they have changed over time—there was little evidence to suggest that there has been drastic change in the associations over time.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Relaxing the linearity assumptions
hedged- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
In the paper
“Previous studies have shown that, in the case of subjective well-being scales, effects of about a half standard deviation are required for people to subjectively experience change (Anvari & Lakens, 2019).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites Anvari & Lakens, 2019
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A conclusion the paper draws from its own results — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“suggesting that the magnitudes we report are overestimates of the true associations.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
hedgedcorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A conclusion the paper draws from its own results — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“The argument that fast-paced changes to social media platforms and devices have made them more harmful for adolescent mental health in the past decade is, therefore, not strongly supported by current data either.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A conclusion the paper draws from its own results — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“but unlike longitudinal within-person data, these findings do not directly afford a causal claim that technology use is responsible for variation in mental health.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A conclusion the paper draws from its own results — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“we studied changes in adolescent technology use’s relation to mental health, and found that, overall, there was little to no evidence showing that technology is becoming more negatively associated with mental health over time.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
hedged- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A conclusion the paper draws from its own results — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“In the context of technology use-mental health associations that ranged between zero and 0.15 in 2017, a yearly linear change of 0.01 is unlikely to translate to meaningful changes in associations outside the statistical model.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
hedgedn = 3- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A conclusion the paper draws from its own results — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“In light of this, the exact magnitudes of the relations observed here are unlikely to provide accurate estimates of any underlying causal relations between technology use and mental health, if any exist.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
hedgedconditional- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
- Rests on an assumption: No suitable theory specifying causal relations between variables currently exists.
A conclusion the paper draws from its own results — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“In those terms, our parameter estimates that ranged from zero to about 0.15, are not likely to indicate practically meaningful associations with mental health.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
hedged- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
- Rests on an assumption: Large samples probably cause even tiny associations to have confidence intervals that exclude zero.
What the paper did — it cites no source for this, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“In addition to the complexities in determining causal relations, the self-report nature of the current data presents unique problems.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: unclear — It is unclear whether the paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
What the paper did — it cites no source for this, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“First, we studied the between-person relationships between technology use and mental health.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
plaincorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
A conclusion the paper draws from its own results — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“so we did not obtain strong evidence that the relation between television watching and negative mental health outcomes was unique in waning over long periods of time.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
- It may state two separate claims as one. 24
- Probably not a substantial claim. 20
- The quote only partly states this claim. 1
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“We also investigated whether changes in technology’s relations with mental health described in the bottom panel of Figure 2 were moderated by sex, but none of the estimates were credibly different from zero, suggesting that any changes—or lack thereof—over time were not different between boys and girls.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Results
hedged- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: unclear — It is unclear whether the paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
It may state two separate claims as one.
- The authors state this as an assumption: Any change over time in the technology–mental health association was linear over the study period.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“The association between emotional problems and social media had increased, but their association with TV had remained stable.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Results
plaincorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: fails — The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim. The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
- The authors state this as an assumption: Any change over time in the technology–mental health association was linear over the study period.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“These cross-sectional between-person relationships are shown in Figure 1, which suggested that changes in the relationship over time were plausible, but likely to differ between outcomes and technologies.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Results
hedgedcorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: unclear — It is unclear whether the paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
It may state two separate claims as one.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Those analyses replicated the above results, with the only exception that the 2017 TV – suicide association’s 95% CI just excluded zero ([0.001, 0.026]; see online analysis supplement).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Results
plaincorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: unclear — It is unclear whether the paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
It may state two separate claims as one.
- The authors state this as an assumption: Any change over time in the technology–mental health association was linear over the study period.
- The authors state this as an assumption: Relations between technology use and mental health were linear, and any changes in those relations were linear.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“As can be seen in Figure 3 (top panel), the technology use-mental health relations were complex and generally curvilinear.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Relaxing the linearity assumptions
plaincorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: unclear — It is unclear whether the paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
It may state two separate claims as one.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Unexpectedly, both social media’s and television’s associations with depression, on the other hand, had decreased.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
plaincorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: unclear — It is unclear whether the paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
It may state two separate claims as one.
A result the paper reports from its own data — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“because the observed patterns in the current study were contradictory to each other, and not conceptually replicated across the other related outcomes”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
It may state two separate claims as one.
In the paper
“the observed associations are typically based on between-persons correlations, which make determining causality and directionality difficult, and are susceptible to the influence of confounding observed or unobserved variables (Ophir et al., 2020).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Understanding Digital Harm
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites Ophir et al., 2020
plaincorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
It may state two separate claims as one.
None of the sources cited for this claim have been checked yet.
In the paper
“Currently, the literature suggesting a negative link between digital technology engagement and mental health is decidedly mixed and grounded on suboptimal methodologies and data (Dickson et al., 2019; Odgers & Jensen, 2020).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Understanding Digital Harm
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites Dickson et al., 2019
- Not checked yetcites Odgers & Jensen, 2020
boostedcorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
It may state two separate claims as one.
None of the sources cited for this claim have been checked yet.
In the paper
“Studies that have adopted more systematic approaches to estimating associations between well-being and technology engagement have shown that the resulting relations depend on gender, arbitrary analytic choices, and the exact variables included in the analyses (Bjerre-Nielsen et al., 2020; Jensen et al., 2019; Kreski et al., 2020; Orben et al., 2019).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Understanding Digital Harm
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites Bjerre-Nielsen et al., 2020
- Not checked yetcites Jensen et al., 2019
- Not checked yetcites Kreski et al., 2020
plaincorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
It may state two separate claims as one.
The paper states this without a source or data behind it here, so there is nothing to check it against. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“because researchers have assumed that technology effects are fixed, at least two time-dependent changes have evaded systematic testing.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Abstract
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
It may state two separate claims as one.
The paper states this without a source or data behind it here, so there is nothing to check it against. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Yet little attention is paid to how a given technology’s effects might shift over time, as affordances expand, or the underlying business models drive designers to change how adolescents use them.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Abstract
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: fails — It may be too vague to check against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: fails — The paper may give no reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim. It may be too vague to check against evidence. The paper may give no reason why it holds.
None of the sources cited for this claim have been checked yet.
In the paper
“but this argument has since been refuted (Drummond et al., 2020; Ferguson et al., 2020).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Abstract
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites Drummond et al., 2020
- Not checked yetcites Ferguson et al., 2020
plaindirect- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: fails — The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim. The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
In the paper
“the visually stimulating characteristics of comic books and television were implicated as factors predisposing adolescents to maladjustment and antisocial behaviour (Wertham, 1954).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Abstract
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites Wertham, 1954
plaindirect- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: fails — The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim. The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
None of the sources cited for this claim have been checked yet.
In the paper
“Literature reviews by academic, medical, and policy collaborations have highlighted both the low-quality evidence in this space and the need for a longitudinal perspective (Appel et al., 2020; Hawkes, 2019; Viner et al., 2019).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Understanding Digital Harm
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites Appel et al., 2020
- Not checked yetcites Hawkes, 2019
- Not checked yetcites Viner et al., 2019
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim. It may state two separate claims as one.
None of the sources cited for this claim have been checked yet.
In the paper
“most of this literature is limited by its use of self-reports of technology use, which are known to be biased and noisy indicators of true amounts of engagement, and lead to inaccurate estimated relations between health and well-being (Johannes et al., 2020; Parry et al., 2020; Scharkow, 2016; Shaw et al., 2020).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Understanding Digital Harm
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites Johannes et al., 2020
- Not checked yetcites Parry et al., 2020
- Not checked yetcites Scharkow, 2016
boosteddirect- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: unclear — It is unclear whether the paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
It may state two separate claims as one.
In the paper
“the early twentieth century saw dime novels blamed for eliciting mania and risk taking (Furedi, 2015).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Abstract
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites Furedi, 2015
plaindirect- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: fails — The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim. The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
In the paper
“the immersive nature of radio dramas was thought to make young listeners vulnerable to ill health, sleep loss, and anxiety (Preston, 1941).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Abstract
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites Preston, 1941
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: fails — The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim. The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
None of the sources cited for this claim have been checked yet.
In the paper
“Technologies are often considered as unitary causes of change in society, through a process called technological determinism, and academics therefore rarely treat them as dynamic when trying to understand their effects on young and vulnerable people (Grimes et al., 2008; Orben, 2020).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Digital Dynamics
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites Grimes et al., 2008
- Not checked yetcites Orben, 2020
plaindirect- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: unclear — It is unclear whether it could be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
It may state two separate claims as one.
What the paper did — it cites no source for this, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“19,190 (con-duct) and 19,184 (emotional problems) 10 to 15-year olds rated their agreement on a three-point scale from “Not true” to “Certainly true” to at least one of these items, which indicated moderate reliabilities (alphas .62 and .69, respectively).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Methods > Outcomes
hedged- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: fails — The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim. The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
A conclusion the paper draws from its own results — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“The magnitudes of these relations were within the ranges of previous findings (that have mainly ignored differences between years), and are generally considered to be very small.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Results
plaincorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: unclear — It is unclear whether the paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
It may state two separate claims as one.
In the paper
“recent analyses and reviews have shown a trend whereby individuals who report greater technology engagement tend to also report higher levels of mental health problems, but the factors underlying these cross-sectional relationships still remain poorly understood (Appel et al., 2020).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Understanding Digital Harm
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites Appel et al., 2020
plaincorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim. It may state two separate claims as one.
A conclusion the paper draws from its own results — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Information about new digital media has been collected for a relatively short time; drawing firm conclusions about changes in their associations with mental health may be premature.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Abstract
hedged- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim.
What the paper did — it cites no source for this, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Outcomes in the MTF and US datasets showed low item-level missingness (complete responses: MTF = 95%, US = 96%); missing item values were ignored in computing the scale means.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Methods > Outcomes
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: fails — The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim. The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it. It may state two separate claims as one.
What the paper did — it cites no source for this, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Rows of data where the sex variable was missing were excluded (MTF: 4%, US: 0.02%, YRBS: 0.3%) to allow using sex as a moderator in our analyses below.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Methods > Explanatory variables
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: fails — The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim. The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
A conclusion the paper draws from its own results — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“These shifts have the potential to shape differences over time in user motivations and the associations between technology engagement and mental health, and could therefore cause certain technologies’ effects on mental health to increase or decrease over long periods of time.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Digital Dynamics
hedgedconditional- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: fails — The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim. The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it. It may state two separate claims as one.
What the paper did — it cites no source for this, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“380,924 8th and 10th graders responded to at least one item on the scale, whose items provided good reliability (alpha = .85).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Methods > Outcomes
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: fails — The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim. The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
None of the sources cited for this claim have been checked yet.
In the paper
“the addition of so called dark patterns—features that are designed to manipulate users to e.g. purchase items (Singer, 2016)—and attention demanding features that undermine users’ psychological autonomy could serve to magnify negative impacts of social media, whereas tools that empower or connect users in new ways could do the opposite and promote health and well-being (Lewis, 2017; Solon, 2017;”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Digital Dynamics
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites Lewis, 2017
- Not checked yetcites Solon, 2017
- Not checked yetcites Verduyn et al., 2017
hedgedconditional- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: fails — It may be too vague to check against evidence.
- Load-bearing: fails — The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim. It may be too vague to check against evidence. The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it. It may state two separate claims as one.
A conclusion the paper draws from its own results — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Overall, there was very little evidence for an increase in the negative associations between technology and mental health over time, and some evidence to the contrary.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Results
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
It may state two separate claims as one.
- The authors state this as an assumption: Any change over time in the technology–mental health association was linear over the study period.
- The authors state this as an assumption: Relations between technology use and mental health were linear, and any changes in those relations were linear.
A conclusion the paper draws from its own results — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“material changes in how technologies affect individuals and societies may therefore not be marked by an obvious stepwise shift between two successive forms of technology, say from radio to television. Instead, more subtle advances within a single technological milieu might drive profound changes.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Digital Dynamics
hedgedconditional- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: fails — It may be too vague to check against evidence.
- Load-bearing: fails — The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
- Based: fails — The paper may give no reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim. It may be too vague to check against evidence. The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it. The paper may give no reason why it holds.
What the paper did — it cites no source for this, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“We focused on three large nationally representative datasets, from the United States and United Kingdom, with pertinent variables on adolescent mental health and technology engagement, and a combined total of 430,561 participants.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Methods > Study design and participants
plainn = 430,561- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
It may state two separate claims as one.
What the paper did — it cites no source for this, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“We also did not include covariates in our models for two reasons.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim.
What the paper did — it cites no source for this, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“In addition, it is important to note that this work, along with previous literature on this topic, to some extent risks conflating between- and within-person associations and causal mechanisms.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
hedged- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: fails — It may be too vague to check against evidence.
- Load-bearing: fails — The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim. It may be too vague to check against evidence. The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
A conclusion the paper draws from its own results — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Nevertheless, the observed patterns of change — the increased association between social media use and emotional problems, and decreased association between technology engagement and depression — hint at the changing roles of emerging technologies in young people’s lives and underlines the scientific value of considering a more dynamic picture of their associations with mental health.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
hedgedcorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: fails — The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim. The paper’s conclusions may not depend on it. It may state two separate claims as one.
A conclusion the paper draws from its own results — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“showing that if effects are changing over time, this change is better characterized as a slow drift rather than a rapid shift.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
plainn = 3- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
The quote only partly states this claim.
None of the sources cited for this claim have been checked yet.
In the paper
“some longitudinal studies have found the opposite, whereby mental health problems predict smartphone use, rather than phone use predicting mental health problems (Bado et al., 2020), or found bidirectional relationships (Orben et al., 2019).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites Bado et al., 2020
- Not checked yetcites Orben et al., 2019
hedgeddirect- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: unclear — It is unclear whether the paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
It may state two separate claims as one.
None of the sources cited for this claim have been checked yet.
In the paper
“In studies of this topic, self-report measures of technology use are consistently biased and are not highly correlated with objective use (Johannes et al., 2020; Parry et al., 2020; Scharkow, 2016).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites Johannes et al., 2020
- Not checked yetcites Parry et al., 2020
- Not checked yetcites Scharkow, 2016
plaincorrelational- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
It may state two separate claims as one.
A conclusion the paper draws from its own results — it cites no other source for it, so there is none to check. The quote shows it is in the paper.
In the paper
“Overall, the ideas that technologies we no longer worry about are becoming less harmful or that technologies we worry the most about now are becoming more harmful were not supported in the data we analysed.”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
plainn = 3- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: passes — It can be checked against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
It may state two separate claims as one.
In the paper
“First, the selection of covariates should be guided by a strong theory that specifies the causal relations between variables (Rohrer, 2018).”
§ There is no evidence that associations between adolescents’ digital technology engagement and mental health problems have increased > Discussion
What the sources say
- Not checked yetcites Rohrer, 2018
plain- Asserted: passes — The authors put it forward as true.
- Checkable: fails — It may be too vague to check against evidence.
- Load-bearing: passes — The paper’s conclusions depend on it.
- Based: passes — The paper gives a reason why it holds.
Probably not a substantial claim. It may be too vague to check against evidence.
The authors state this as an assumption.
Any change over time in the technology–mental health association was linear over the study period.
“We adopted the simplifying assumption that any change to that relationship had been linear over the time frame studied.”
The authors state this as an assumption.
Relations between technology use and mental health were linear, and any changes in those relations were linear.
“In our focal analyses we assumed linear relations between technology use and mental health and assumed that any changes to those relations would be linear.”
The authors state this as an assumption.
Social media and similar digital technologies could have increasingly negative mental health effects over time because of their dynamic nature.
“Therefore, it remains a reasonable, yet untested, assumption that their possible negative influence on mental health could be magnified over time by virtue of their dynamic nature.”
The paper relies on this without support.
No suitable theory specifying causal relations between variables currently exists.
“Currently, no good candidates for such a theory exist, and it was not our purpose here to offer one.”
The paper relies on this without support.
Large samples probably cause even tiny associations to have confidence intervals that exclude zero.
“because the large sample sizes are likely to make even small relations’ confidence intervals exclude zero”
The paper relies on this without support.
Understanding of social media and digital devices is constrained by how recently they appeared.
“In the context of older technologies, such as TV, our knowledge of social media and digital device use is necessarily limited by their comparatively brief existence.”
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
In the citing paper
“For instance, few existing studies feature longitudinal time frames and account for additional demographic factors, particularly race/ethnicity and sex [12, 75, 76].”
From Screen time and mental health: a prospective analysis of the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) Study (2024) · cites this paper as [76]
Citations
Cites
lavaan : An R Package for Structural Equation Modeling
Rosseel, Y. (2012) · Journal of Statistical Software · doi:10.18637/jss.v048.i02 · Cited by 27,955 · cited 1×
“We further investigated the robustness of our results with respect to analysis strategy by estimating analogous structural equation models in which each mental health outcome was treated as a latent variable indicated by the items discussed above (Rosseel, 2012).”
MethodGeneralized Additive Models: An Introduction with R
Wood, S. N. (2017) · doi:10.1201/9781315370279 · Cited by 13,852
Data Analysis Using Regression and Multilevel/Hierarchical Models
Gelman, A., & Hill, J. (2006) · doi:10.1017/cbo9780511790942 · Cited by 13,597
brms : An R Package for Bayesian Multilevel Models Using Stan
Bürkner, P.-C. (2017) · Journal of Statistical Software · doi:10.18637/jss.v080.i01 · Cited by 9,476 · cited 1×
“All models were estimated within the Bayesian framework using minimally informative priors (see online analysis supplement); we report posterior means and quantiles as parameters’ point estimates and credibility intervals (CrIs; Bürkner, 2017; Carpenter et al., 2017).”
MethodStan : A Probabilistic Programming Language
Carpenter, B., Gelman, A., Hoffman, M. D., Lee, D., Goodrich, B., Betancourt, M., Brubaker, M., Guo, J., Li, P., & Riddell, A. (2017) · Journal of Statistical Software · doi:10.18637/jss.v076.i01 · Cited by 7,754 · cited 1×
“All models were estimated within the Bayesian framework using minimally informative priors (see online analysis supplement); we report posterior means and quantiles as parameters’ point estimates and credibility intervals (CrIs; Bürkner, 2017; Carpenter et al., 2017).”
MethodYouth risk behavior surveillance-United States, 2017
Kann, L., McManus, T., Harris, W. A., Shanklin, S. L., Flint, K. H., Queen, B., Lowry, R., Chyen, D., Whittle, L., Thornton, J., et al. (2018) · MMWR. Surveillance Summaries · doi:10.15585/mmwr.ss6708a1 · Cited by 2,502 · cited 2×
“YRBS is a biennial survey of ninth to 12th graders in the United States and has been conducted since 1991 by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (Kann, 2018).”
MethodGoodman, R., Ford, T., Simmons, H., Gatward, R., & Meltzer, H. (2000) · British Journal of Psychiatry · doi:10.1192/bjp.177.6.534 · Cited by 1,818
Miech, R., Johnston, L. A., O'Malley, P., Bachman, J., Schulenberg, J., & Patrick, M. E. (2005) · doi:10.3998/2027.42/146530 · Cited by 1,771
Twenge, J. M., Joiner, T. E., Rogers, M. L., & Martin, G. N. (2018) · Clinical Psychological Science · doi:10.1177/2167702617723376 · Cited by 1,705 · cited 1×
“Depression was measured in the MTF data set with six items that have been used in previous research (Miech et al., 2020; Newcomb et al., 1981; Twenge et al., 2018), although not always in a consistent manner (Orben & Przybylski, 2019a, see especially Supplementary Table 6).”
MethodIt's complicated: the social lives of networked teens
(2014) · Choice Reviews Online · doi:10.5860/choice.51-7042 · Cited by 1,607
Research works printed but not linked: 3
- Furedi F., 2015, History Today, 65, 46
- Viner R., 2019, The health impacts of screen time: A guide for clinicians and parents
- Wertham F., 1954, Seduction of the innocent
Cited by
Sorted by citations
Problematic Social Media Use in Adolescents and Young Adults: Systematic Review and Meta-analysis.
Shannon, H., Bush, K., Villeneuve, P. J., Hellemans, K. G., & Guimond, S. (2022) · JMIR Mental Health · doi:10.2196/33450 · Cited by 593
“In order to thoroughly understand the direct implications of problematic social media use, longitudinal studies could aid in providing more causational conclusions, as cross-sectional methodology is limited in its ability to draw conclusions beyond correlation [62].”
BackgroundKeyes, K. M., & Platt, J. M. (2024) · Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry · doi:10.1111/jcpp.13864 · Cited by 253
Understanding Social Media Literacy: A Systematic Review of the Concept and Its Competences
Polanco-Levicán, K., & Salvo-Garrido, S. I. (2022) · International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health · doi:10.3390/ijerph19148807 · Cited by 199
“It is important to note that the use of social media is not negative in itself as it can increase social capital, foster friendships and reduce feelings of loneliness; however, it depends on the user’s characteristics and how the different platforms are used [28,29].”
BackgroundNagata, J. M., Al-Shoaibi, A. A. A., Leong, A. W., Zamora, G., Testa, A., Ganson, K. T., & Baker, F. C. (2024) · BMC Public Health · doi:10.1186/s12889-024-20102-x · Cited by 103
“Additionally, investigating these potential moderators may improve the identification of at-risk populations and aid in the development of more targeted interventions [51, 76].”
BackgroundFirth, J., Torous, J. B., López‐Gil, J. F., Linardon, J., Milton, A. C., Lambert, J. D., Smith, L., Jarić, I., Fabian, H., Vancampfort, D., et al. (2024) · World Psychiatry · doi:10.1002/wps.21188 · Cited by 109
“…a large-scale epidemiological research 12 synthesized data from reviews, meta-analyses and cohort studies to assess digital technology’s correlation with depression and anxiety, and a robust analysis of these relationships in adolescents was conducted across multiple national datasets 13 .”
Background
Metadata
- Authors
- Vuorre, M., Orben, A., & Przybylski, A. K.
- Affiliations
- University of Oxford (GB)
- MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit (GB)
- Corresponding author
- Przybylski, Andrew K.
- Venue
- Clinical Psychological Science
- Publisher
- SAGE Publications
- Published
- 2021-05-03
- Volume
- 9
- Issue
- 5
- Pages
- 823-835
- ISSN
- 2167-7026 (ISSN-L)
- 2167-7034
- PMC
- PMC7614449
- OpenAlex
- W3136028244
- Semantic Scholar
- aba7fff55e4a1ac69300cbe379f3dcc4c0a2f8ae
- Cited by
- 158
- References
- 49
- Citations by year
- 2026: 26 · 2025: 30 · 2024: 32 · 2023: 39 · 2022: 21 · 2021: 9
- FWCI
- 34.99
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- hybrid
- doi.org
- Locations
- Clinical Psychological Science (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
- PsyArXiv (OSF Preprints) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
- PsyArXiv (OSF Preprints) (submittedVersion)
- Apollo (University of Cambridge) (submittedVersion)
- Apollo
- Funders
- Economic and Social Research Council (ES/T008709/1)
- Hou Family Foundation
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Impact of Technology on Adolescents
- Social Sciences › Education › Child Development and Digital Technology
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Child and Adolescent Psychosocial and Emotional Development
- Keywords
- adolescent mental health, social media use, depression, emotional problems, temporal trends, gender differences
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
A language model drew the claims from the paper on 2026-10-08, under version 3 of the claim definition (model deepseek-v4.1-flash, prompt extract-v3).
A second model labelled each claim on 2026-10-08 (model jev-1.13-20260917, definition revision gold-guideline-v0.2).
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
