Y’all, this is one of those articles worth reading right quick. The title is… well, bad. They were looking more at the “quality” rather than quantity of social media usage. The findings were more about the reinforcement of the user’s state rather than social media itself being bad. Sure, the algorithm will push things, but your algorithm is primarily gonna push what it needs to keep you engaged with itself, and what you engage with will be influenced by your state of mind/mood. If you’re already depressed, you’re probably gonna reinforce that via the algorithm. Same deal with positive outlooks. Neuroplasticity and all that.
The researchers also bring up a good point about calling into question the recommendation to limit the amount of time on social media with the idea of mitigating the negative effects. Much like [alcohol] prohibition in the US, a ban on social media usage does nothing to teach us a more wise and healthy approach, nor is it something realistic for the general population.
In fact, if we practice abstention in such a way, those that would use it for malignant purposes would make it worse. I think a good example of that is cryptocurrency. Crypto isn’t inherently bad, but boy did it get super maligned by any left-leaning space. There are plenty of useful things we could do with crypto, especially now with the hostile behavior of many currency-issuing states, but since crypto was mostly abandoned by leftist spaces, scams, commodification, speculation, and other hyper-capitalist bullshit abounds in the crypto space.
Do we really want to cede the further development of social media to malignant dickheads via unwitting abstention? Or will we take the time to actually learn how to wisely approach the tools we have right in front of us?
Howabout this:
All social media algorithms that direct content flow to users are required to be open source, in perpetuity, at least for viewing, so that actual unbiased folks can audit them. Maybe make a new liscense class for this, if need be, so companies can still own the code, but it just has to be publically reviewable.
Would you install blackbox code on your pc?
Well, would you let a blackbox determine what information is fed into your own brain?
Mandate systemic transparency.
In today’s episode of “fucking obviously, duh,”… fine-tuned digital brainwashing algorithms do in fact have generally ‘bad’ effects on the human mind.
Some say they may even be addictive and habit forming!
More at 11!
Social media has the power to do so much good: connecting people across the globe, enabling the sharing of information across language barriers and in circumvention of government censorship, and more. But because the world is run by greedy power-hungry pigs, we can’t have social media without it being exploited to the furthest extent possible in the name of profit. The mental health of the public is not even a secondary concern - it is completely disregarded in favor of squeezing further growth out of a saturated market for a service that should be both simple and free.
Yet no one wants to leave social media.
I left it last year and feel so much better. No FB no Whatsapp, no Insta, no Tictok, no nothing.
You’re on a sm rn….
Lacks self-awareness, along with everyone upvoting them lol.
Self awareness is very challenging, you will always have blind spots.
Yes, and… it’s a skill that needs to be practiced. We don’t call it out as a skill, we don’t recognize it as a skill, and we don’t tell others that they need to practice it. So we get stupid shit like people saying they don’t do social media, on social media.
The world would be a much better place if we prioritized self-awareness as a universal skill.
What is that?
There are lots of us that wanted to leave and did. There are lots that want to and can’t find the will power to do so. It’s definitely addictive. It was hard for me to quit, I have an addictive personality, but I’ve also given up drinking and smoking entirely without councilors or pharma aids. I think it’s time we regulate it like a dangerous addiction until there’s a change to how the algorithms function, which may be never.
water is wet, fork found in kitchen
cat found on keyboard
Why isn’t methodology discussed anymore? How were their conclusions reached? That was always a big part of newspaper reporting back before the internet. Methodology is important. Without it, conclusions are as useless as any other “polling” data. It may be in the linked article but I look to the post only for good, or incomplete, information. I don’t click on the links.
You had me in the first half.
You’re not wrong, but this is a press release from a university about research. They’re not going to dig into methodology when they want to toot their own horn.
Reading the abstract and introduction (full article is pay walled), it was a pilot study using EEG. Normally similar studies have participants self report using a survey. Sample size was 60 people which seems reasonable given they had to hook up each person to an EEG. Demographics are a bit skewed based on gender and age, but as a pilot, that probably isn’t that big of a deal.
I’m not seeing anything egregious, and it was published in a peer reviewed journal. I would treat this as a single data point and wait for other researchers to replicated it and prod at the methodology more.
… that’s kind of silly. The methodology is indeed in the article. Why would you expect the internet to behave the same way as a newspaper? If you care about the methodology of the study, why wouldn’t you just read the article anyway?
However, I do think you at least have a point about how these aggregate feeds work in relation to how information is presented/understood. The post here is a good example of the title being a woefully inadequate descriptor of it’s content, despite being generally ‘fine’. People would probably draw inaccurate conclusions upon only reading the title, but like, we’re already pretty aware of this phenomenon by now, aren’t we?
Again!
IDK how many times I’ve seen similar headlines. But it’s a lot.A simple google search shows me more than 5 studies already on the first page.
I’m shocked! SHOCKED! Well…
No shit!
