Young People’s Engagement with Social Media: The Case for Developing Adult Digital Literacy
With recent discussions about potential harms of Instagram, particularly for teenagers, we revisit this 2019 post highlighting the need for relevant adults to become more digitally literate.
It is well
established that young people make extensive use of social media. In the UK,
83% of 12-15 year olds have a smartphone, 99% go online for over 20 hours per
week, and 69% have a social media profile.
It is certainly apparent that social
media is a key resource in the lives of contemporary young people and
is a central space for the development of identities and relationships, as well
as emotional regulation, self-expression, learning and much more. At the same
time, many adults find young people’s uses of social media concerning. The
dominant narratives that surround young people and social media tend to be
associated with risk, and the potential for negative impacts, in
areas including body
image and body dissatisfaction.
The key
challenge is that the contemporary
digital world differs greatly to the childhood experiences of most adults,
and this has inevitably created difficulties for the ways in which policy
makers, schools, health and education professionals/practitioners, and parents
and carers tend to frame and approach the types of support that they attempt to
provide for young people. Many adults report that they are ill-equipped to make
informed decisions about how to engage with young people’s digital worlds.
Equally, many young people report that their teachers or parents rarely provide
support and guidance that is relevant to the dynamic ways in which they use
social media. These points suggest that relevant adults – including teachers,
parents and clinicians - require
access to the latest evidence-based guidance to help protect young people
from risk, and to embrace the limitless opportunities on offer.
The need
for adults to support and guide young people’s uses of social media has
received significant attention in the media and in policy in recent months. The
CMO-England,
the Children’s
Commissioner, The
Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, the Science
and Technology Committee, the APPG
on Social Media and Young People’s Mental Health and the recent Online
Harms White Paper have all recently stressed that young people must
be better supported to engage with social media safely, responsibly and
effectively. Much of the discussion has centred around social media sites
themselves, calling for better regulation and monitoring. At the same time,
schools and parents/guardians have been urged to ensure young people remain
healthy and safe online.
Yet the evidence-base and advice surrounding young people and social media is sparse and contradictory, with concerns recently raised about the scientific quality of current research and whether the existing evidence-base is robust enough to inform policy and practice. Certainly, responses such as the recent knee-jerk bans on time spent on social media and its content could actually be harmful for young people, particularly if social media is space for young people to learn, seek understanding and support.
Yet the evidence-base and advice surrounding young people and social media is sparse and contradictory, with concerns recently raised about the scientific quality of current research and whether the existing evidence-base is robust enough to inform policy and practice. Certainly, responses such as the recent knee-jerk bans on time spent on social media and its content could actually be harmful for young people, particularly if social media is space for young people to learn, seek understanding and support.
In our
research in the School of
Sport, Exercise and Rehabilitation Sciences at the University of Birmingham
we have been working with young people (n=1300+; age 13-18) across the UK to
better understand how they use social media in relation to their health, and to
understand, from their perspectives, how they can be better supported to engage
with social media. The key message from this research is that:
Social media is
a very powerful educative health resource that has considerable significance in
the lives of young people. Most young people experience positive impacts and
are critically aware users and generators of social media. While the
health-related risks of social media should not be excluded, adults must focus
on supporting young people to engage with social media so that they can realise
more of the positive impacts on their health and wellbeing. The health-related
risks of social media should not be ignored, but an action for adults is to
become suitably digital literate so that they can promote positive outcomes and
offer support to young people at times of vulnerability.
Notably,
while much of the discussion in media and in policy has been around developing
young people’s skills to participate in social media safely, the young people
we worked with identified that adults’ skills, knowledge and understanding of
social media must be improved. Very clear gaps were identified between young
people's and adults' understanding and experiences of social media. The young
people reported that adults need to be better informed about the problems of
the current generation, and be more understanding of the positive impacts as
well as the risks. As a result, we co-created with young people digital animated videos and key
guidelines for adults – and these can be accessed here
and used as training or learning resources.
The
important point to make is that social media is a very dynamic environment
where young
people’s physical, social and emotional needs can change rapidly—particularly
through adolescence—and negative impacts can escalate quickly as a result of
the power of the medium and its content. The challenge for relevant adults who
wish to offer support and guidance to young people is to know when young people
are in control of social media, and when it shifts into controlling them.
Therefore, a key and essential step is to focus on adult digital literacy:
Digital literacy
support for adults should aim to help adults to critically evaluate the
relevance of health-related information for their own and young people’s lives,
as well as developing the digital skills to navigate social media sites so they
can understand and offer appropriate support to young people
Further Information
For
further information about the study and to access the guidelines, videos and
academic paper, please click here.
Victoria Goodyear is
a Senior Lecturer in Pedagogy in Sport, Physical Activity and Health at the University
of Birmingham, UK. Her research focuses on role of digital technologies and
social media in young people’s health and wellbeing, and the operation of
pedagogy in digital/online contexts. She is also interested in digital ethics,
participatory digital methods and knowledge translation via digital animated
videos.
Key References
Goodyear,
V.A., & Armour, K.M. (2019). Young People, Social Media and Health. London:
Routledge
Goodyear,
V.A., Armour, K.M., & Wood, H. (2018). Young people’s engagement with
health-related social media: new perspectives. Sport, Education & Society,
iFirst.
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