Can Social Media Use Impair Cognitive Development in Adolescents?

Summary: Yes, new research shows that specific patterns of social media use impair cognitive development in adolescents.

Key Points:

• In 2021, the Surgeon General of the U.S. published the advisory “Protecting Youth Mental Health,” which identified a mental health crisis among youth and adolescents in the U.S.
• Recent trends showing an increase in youth and adolescent mental health problems mirror the appearance and quick rise of smartphone and social media use, beginning around 2008.
• Previous research links increased overall screen time increased overall social media use with increased presence of anxiety and depression in youth and adolescents.

Social Media Use, Screen Time, and Mental Health

Smartphones and social media appear to be here to stay.

The benefits of each are easy to identify. Smartphones facilitate daily tasks for everyone, from personal and work communication to reading the news to finding important – or trivial – facts and information, everything is easier with a phone with internet access. Social media allows us to keep up with friends and relatives around the country and the world, share pictures, share insights, and share memes that range from absurd and ridiculous to serious and meaningful.

However, the benefits of smartphones and social media are tempered by the drawbacks. Older adults, adults, young adults, and adolescents run the risk of spending too much time engaged in smartphone and social media use. The current consensus is that heavy smartphone and social media use – defined loosely as more than three hours a day engaging with screens and/or social media – can have significant negative psychological and emotional consequences.

That’s why a group of researchers designed a new study to examine what factors associated with social media use might cause, or be associated with, these negative consequences.

Social Media Use and Cognitive Development

Rather than focus on emotional and psychological outcomes, the research team that published the paper “Social Media Use Trajectories and Cognitive Performance in Adolescents” examined the impact of social media use on various aspects of cognition, which are directly associated with mental health.

To answer the question posed in the title of this article – Can Social Media Use Impair Cognitive Development in Adolescents? – the research team formulated a simple hypothesis:

Greater social media use [is] associated with lower cognitive performance in adolescents.

First, they collected data from 6,554 participants in the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development Study (ABCD study) at 3 time points:

• Baseline, ages 9-10, 2016-2018
• Year 1, ages 10-11, 2017-2019
• Year 2, ages 11-12, 2018-2020

The research team divided the participants into three groups:

1. No or very low social media use.

• • This was the reference group against which changes in the next two groups were compared. The no/low group.
    • This group made up 57.6% of participants.
    • This group increased social media use by around 20 minutes per day over two years, after beginning with no reported daily use.

2. Low initial, low increasing use.

• • The low/low group.
    • This group made up 36.6% of participants.
    • This group increased social media use by around 1 hour 20 minutes per day over two years, after beginning with around 5-10 minutes per day.

3. High initial, high increasing use.

• • The high/high group.
    • This group made up 5.8% of participants.
    • This group increased social media use by around 3 hours per day over two years, after beginning with around 30 minutes per day.

At each assessment time point, participants completed the following assessments:

• The Flanker Inhibitory Control and Attention Test, which assesses attention and ability to ignore distractions.
• Oral Reading Recognition Test, which assesses reading decoding skills.
• Picture Vocabulary Test, which examines receptive vocabulary, i.e. words a person understands but may not use often, a standard measure of language and verbal intellect.
• Picture Sequence Memory Test, which examines episodic memory, i.e. memories of specific life events, essential in forming personal identity.
• Pattern Comparison Processing Speed, which measures how quickly an individual identifies differences between two visual stimuli.

In addition, at/after each assessment time point, each participant received a total composite score for all tests. To establish whether social media can harm cognitive development in adolescents, they analyzed data and compared the results from low/low and high/high groups with the data from the no/low group.

We’ll take a look at the results of this study in a moment. To give the data from this study context, we’ll quickly review what we already know about the impact of social media on adolescent emotional and cognitive development.

Social Media Use and Adolescent Mental Health: What We Know Already

First, let’s look at the impact on mental health, which is related to, but distinct from cognitive performance. Information published in the article “Childhood Lifestyle Behaviors and Mental Health Symptoms in Adolescence” indicates the following:

Screen Time and Mental Health Among Adolescents

• Excess overall screen time was connected to:
  • Increased depression
  • Increased stress
• Excess computer time was connected to:
  • Increased depression
  • Increased stress
• Excess time on smartphones was connected to:
  • Increased depression
  • Increased stress

Data from the study “Social Media and Adolescent Health” summarizes what we know about the impact of social media time on mental health, as opposed to screen time alone:

Social Media and Mental Health Among Adolescents

• Excess social media use – over 3 hours a day – can elevate likelihood of mental health problems, including:
  • Anxiety
  • Depression
  • Low self-image
• Adolescent females who use social media more than 3 hours a day and frequently engage in negative self-comparison show increased likelihood of developing:
  • Depressive disorders
  • Unhealthy (i.e. disordered) eating patterns
  • Problems with body image

To summarize, we know that excess screen time and social media use can harm adolescent mental health. But can social media alone ham cognitive development in adolescents?

Let’s see what the study shows.

The Impact of Social Media Use on Cognitive Development

While earlier studies – see the data above – revealed the negative consequences of excess screen time and social media use on mental health, this study approached social media use from a different angle and assessed the impact of social media use on cognitive performance. A high level of cognitive ability is associated with positive outcomes in a wide range of life domains, including but not limited to:

• Academic achievement
• Vocational achievement
• Social relationships
• Overall wellbeing

Based on this information, we can understand why it’s important for parents, mental health provides, teachers, and policymakers to learn everything they can about whether social media use can harm cognitive development in adolescents.

Here’s what the researchers found.

Social Media Use Patterns and Cognitive Development Over Two Years: Pre-Teen to Teen

Compared to the reference group, the No/low group, the low/low group and the high/high group showed the following outcomes at the 2-year assessment point:

• The Flanker Inhibitory Control and Attention Test (Flanker):
  • Low/low group: minimal, non-significant decrease
  • High/high group: minimal, non-significant decrease
• Oral Reading Recognition Test (OORT):
  • Low/low group: small but significant decrease
  • High/high group: minimal, non-significant decrease
• Picture Sequence Memory Test (PSMT):
  • Low/low group: small but significant decrease
  • High/high group: small but significant decrease
• Pattern Comparison Processing Speed Test (PCPST):
  • Low/low group: minimal, non-significant increase
  • High/high group: minimal, non-significant increase
• Picture Vocabulary Test (PVT):
  • Low/low group: small but significant decrease
  • High/high group: significant decrease
• Total composite score, all tests:
  • Low/low group: small but significant decrease
  • High/high group: small but significant decrease

From our perspective, the two most notable results are the scores the OORT (reading comprehension) and the PSMT (episodic memory). With regard to the OORT, the fact that the low/low group showed greater decreases was a surprise: a modest increase over two years had a negative impact on this aspect of cognition. And the decreases in the PSMT raise an alarm: episodic memory is a core component of identity formation, an essential part of adolescent development. Any impairment in this area may have unpredictable downstream consequences, making this an area of real concern for overall adolescent development, cognition, and mental health.

We’ll discuss these results further below.

Negative Consequences of Increasing Screen Time From Pre-Adolescence to Adolescence

In the study we address in this article, the researchers identified how two social media use trajectories – low use and low increase over two years, high use high increase over two years – can harm cognitive development in adolescents.

Here’s how the study authors describe their findings:

“Both low and high increases in social media use throughout early adolescence were significantly associated with lower performance in specific aspects of cognitive function, supporting a prior finding that greater screen time was negatively but weakly associated with adolescent cognitive performance.”

The outcomes related to language knowledge are a red flag. However, the composite scores showing that increased social media use between pre-adolescence and adolescence can result in decreased overall cognitive performance are a warning: even low-level increases in this time period are associated with cognitive deficits. The study authors offer this analysis on that specific outcome:

“The finding that even low levels of early adolescent social media exposure were linked to poorer cognitive performance may suggest support for stricter age restrictions.”

While every child and every family is different, and cognitive trajectories may vary by individual, this study confirms the need for caution among families with emerging teens who want unlimited access to social media. We encourage families to discuss this issue with primary care providers and mental health providers, in order to learn the latest facts and make as informed a decision as possible about both smartphone and social media use for their pre-adolescent and adolescent children.