The Educator's Notebook

featured articles

Teens Give Advice For Social Media Use: To Parents And Each Other
New York Times - 9/20/23

“We spoke to girls from ages 12 to 17 who have participated in programs led by Girls Leadership, a nonprofit that teaches confidence-building and how to use social media responsibly. Here are some of their best pieces of advice for other teens — and what they want adults to know, too.”
Teen Perceptions Of Social Media
Pew Research - 11/16/22

“Majorities of teens credit social media with strengthening their friendships and providing support while also noting the emotionally charged side of these platforms”
Four Styles Of Guiding Students On Social Media Use
Psychology Today - 8/28/22

“It should come as no surprise that parents vary widely in the way they manage their children’s social media use. According to the authors, there are four general approaches parents take when monitoring their teenagers’ social media use.”
YouTube And TikTok Catapult To Top Of Teen Social Media Use
Pew Research - 8/10/22

“YouTube tops the 2022 teen online landscape among the platforms covered in the Center’s new survey, as it is used by 95% of teens. TikTok is next on the list of platforms that were asked about in this survey (67%), followed by Instagram and Snapchat, which are both used by about six-in-ten teens… This study also explores the frequency with which teens are on each of the top five online platforms: YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, Snapchat and Facebook. Fully 35% of teens say they are using at least one of them “almost constantly.””
“A Racial Slur, A Viral Video, And A Reckoning”
New York Times - 12/26/20

“In one sense, the public shaming… underscores the power of social media to hold people of all ages accountable, with consequences at times including harassment and both online and real-world “cancellation.” But the story behind the backlash also reveals a more complex portrait of behavior that for generations had gone unchecked in schools in one of the nation’s wealthiest counties.”

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On The Adolescent Search For Relevance Through Their Online Lives
New York Times - 11/29/19

“When he got home, Rowan would turn on his laptop and sit in front of the glowing screen for hours, or flop onto his bed, his phone hovering above his face. His Instagram feed flashed before him like a slot machine. His most popular account, @Zuccccccccccc, taking its name from Facebook’s chief executive, had 1.2 million followers. If his posts were good, his account would keep growing. If he took some time off, growth would stall. Rowan, like most teenagers on the internet, wasn’t after fame or money, though he made a decent amount — at one point $10,000 a month and more, he said. What Rowan wanted was clout.”
Understanding Linguistic Communities On The Internet. Fascinating.
Baffler - 7/17/19

“By using informal writing to convey the regular dramas of human life, they also started reshaping informal writing into something that could deeply convey the full range of human emotions… This leads to miscommunication, of course, between generations of Internet People… How we talk online is determined by our linguistic community, which in turn is largely determined by where we were when we first encountered social media.”
“Why You Need A Network Of Low-Stakes, Casual Friendships”
New York Times - 5/6/19

"The more weak ties a person has (neighbors, a barista at the neighborhood coffee shop or fellow members in a spin class), the happier they feel. Maintaining this network of acquaintances also contributes to one’s sense of belonging to a community, researchers found.”
Facebook Asks, Answers: “Is Spending Time On Social Media Bad For Us?”
Facebook - 12/15/17

"In general, when people spend a lot of time passively consuming information — reading but not interacting with people — they report feeling worse afterward… On the other hand, actively interacting with people — especially sharing messages, posts and comments with close friends and reminiscing about past interactions — is linked to improvements in well-being… Simply broadcasting status updates wasn’t enough; people had to interact one-on-one with others in their network.”
Nicholas Carr Reports On How Smartphones Impair Cognition
Rough Type - 11/10/17

"A 2015 Journal of Experimental Psychology study found that when people’s phones beep or buzz while they’re in the middle of a challenging task, their focus wavers, and their work gets sloppier — whether they check the phone or not. Another 2015 study, appearing in the Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, showed that when people hear their phone ring but are unable to answer it, their blood pressure spikes, their pulse quickens, and their problem-solving skills decline.”
Deep Data & Narrative About The Surge In Adolescent Anxiety
New York Times - 10/11/17

"The more she looked for explanations, the more she kept returning to two seemingly unrelated trend lines — depression in teenagers and smartphone adoption. (There is significantly more data about depression than anxiety.) Since 2011, the trend lines increased at essentially the same rate. In her recent book “iGen,” and in an article in The Atlantic, Twenge highlights a number of studies exploring the connection between social media and unhappiness. “The use of social media and smartphones look culpable for the increase in teen mental-health issues,” she told me. “It’s enough for an arrest — and as we get more data, it might be enough for a conviction.””
Silicon Valley Insiders Describe How Tech Hijacks Your Attention
Guardian - 10/6/17

"Designers, programmers and tech entrepreneurs from across the world gathered at a conference centre on the shore of the San Francisco Bay. They had each paid up to $1,700 to learn how to manipulate people into habitual use of their products, on a course curated by conference organiser Nir Eyal… [Attendees] might have been surprised when Eyal walked on stage to announce that this year’s keynote speech was about “something a little different”. He wanted to address the growing concern that technological manipulation was somehow harmful or immoral.”
Stunning Data On The Effects Of The Smart Phone On Kids
Atlantic - 9/1/17

"The Monitoring the Future survey, funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse and designed to be nationally representative, has asked 12th-graders more than 1,000 questions every year since 1975 and queried eighth- and 10th-graders since 1991. The survey asks teens how happy they are and also how much of their leisure time they spend on various activities, including nonscreen activities such as in-person social interaction and exercise, and, in recent years, screen activities such as using social media, texting, and browsing the web.”
Harvard Rescinds At Least Ten Acceptances For Obscene Memes
Crimson - 6/4/17

"The description for the official Facebook group for the Class of 2021, set up and maintained by the Admissions Office, disclaims all administrative responsibility for “unofficial groups” and warns members their admissions offers can be rescinded under specific circumstances. “As a reminder, Harvard College reserves the right to withdraw an offer of admission under various conditions including if an admitted student engages in behavior that brings into question his or her honesty, maturity, or moral character,” the description reads.”
Meditation on Technology, Spirituality, And the Modern Attention Span
New York Magazine - 9/18/16

"Since the invention of the printing press, every new revolution in information technology has prompted apocalyptic fears. From the panic that easy access to the vernacular English Bible would destroy Christian orthodoxy all the way to the revulsion, in the 1950s, at the barbaric young medium of television, cultural critics have moaned and wailed at every turn. Each shift represented a further fracturing of attention… And yet society has always managed to adapt and adjust, without obvious damage, and with some more-than-obvious progress. So it’s perhaps too easy to view this new era of mass distraction as something newly dystopian. But it sure does represent a huge leap from even the very recent past. The data bewilder.”
“Screenagers” - A Documentary About Kids And Screens
New York Post - 3/12/16

"I learned that you spend on average 6.5 hours a day looking at screens. As a doctor, I decided I needed to learn the impact of all this screen time on kids. And as a mom, I needed to know what to do.”
On The Sudden State Of Digital Dependency
New York Review of Books - 2/25/16

"Our transformation into device people has happened with unprecedented suddenness. The first touchscreen-operated iPhones went on sale in June 2007, followed by the first Android-powered phones the following year. Smartphones went from 10 percent to 40 percent market penetration faster than any other consumer technology in history. In the United States, adoption hit 50 percent only three years ago. Yet today, not carrying a smartphone indicates eccentricity, social marginalization, or old age.”
Results From Pew’s Teens, Technology, And Romance Focus Groups
Pew Internet - 10/11/15

“Many teens in our focus groups described flirting with a crush by liking their photos or posting a comment on their social media profile. These interactions have their own unwritten – but widely understood – rules. Everything from one’s choice of emoji to the spelling of the word “hey” can carry a deeper meaning.”

admissions

10 Social Media Tips for Student Recruitment
EduGuru - 1/28/14

adolescence

“Being 13: Three Girls, One Year. This Is What It’s Like To Be 13 Today.”
New York Times - 9/20/23

“I wanted to put a face to the alarming headlines about teens and social media — in particular, girls. And to understand one tension: What happens when girls’ self-confidence, which has been shown to drop right around this age, intersects with the thing that seems to be obviously contributing to their struggle? The long-term effects of social media on the teenage brain have not yet been defined, much less proven — which isn’t to say it’s all bad. But adolescent girls have long struggled with depression and anxiety at disproportionate rates compared with their male peers, a reality that metastasized during the pandemic."
Case Study: When Social Media, Adolescence And Schools Go Terribly Wrong
New York Times - 8/17/23

“By early afternoon, somewhere between 300 and 700 students were out of class. The bulk were at the sit-in, but a sizable number were milling around in groups, intoxicated by the intense emotions of the day and the sudden absence of restrictions. Outside, the news vans were lined up in front of the school. A news helicopter circled overhead.”
Four Students At A School Start A Podcast About Social Media Habits
KQED - 5/17/22
Teens Get News From YouTube, But Are Skeptical Of It
USA Today - 8/13/19
Bully Rates Remains Constant, But More Is Online Than Before
Washington Post - 7/16/19

“Twenty percent of students between the ages of 12 and 18 were bullied during the 2016-2017 school year, according to the report from the National Center for Education Statistics, the research arm of the U.S. Education Department. Among those students who faced bullying, 15 percent said they were bullied online or by text, a 3.5 percentage point jump from the 2014-2015 school year.”

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Growing Up Digital: ”Orbiting, Another Thing… To Worry About”
New York Times - 12/8/18

"Digitally observing a prospective love interest, or an ex, online is yet another way that people are confusing each other romantically.”
“Kids Turn To Screens To Cope With A Chaotic World”
Futurity - 8/31/18

“The study also outlines new theory, called sensory curation theory, that posits people use media devices to construct temporary “environments within environments” to create a comfortable sensory space for themselves… “Children for the most part do not get to choose where they eat, sleep, play, or learn. These are some of the only tools they have to modify sensory input,” says lead author Kristen Harrison.”
How A Random Tweet Went Viral — And Offered Insight Into Teen Culture
Huffington Post - 6/28/18

“A lot of people my age (not to sound like I am some uniquely sophisticated teen who is above such stupidity) are really enamoured with the surface level aesthetics of Gatsby — for instance, Gatsby themed parties where everyone dresses up in flapper dresses and suits are super common.”
On How Students Discuss Controversial Topics Online
Social Media in Education - 9/25/17

"I know students have seen or expressed controversial opinions on political and social issues on social media, and I'm not privy to the details. This makes those controversial topics hard to cover in my classroom for a number of reasons. First, we're not all starting from the same point. In terms of what's been posted, some students know more than others, and all of them know more than I do. Second, it means that many of the students have already taken sides on any given issue via those online posts that have already occurred. Most of them know where their classmates stand before anyone has answered a question or offered an opinion in class.”
Teens Have Rinsta (Real Instagram) And Finsta (Fake Instagram) Accounts
Mic - 5/3/17
Parent Perception (n = 1,786) Of How Social Media Affects Children
NPR - 12/6/16
Texting And Driving: Why Kids Do It, And When They Meet The Results
YouTube/AT&T - 8/23/16
Textual Chemistry: Relationship Compatibility In The Digital Age
Time - 2/12/16
Image Overload: Living In The Age Of Instagram and Snapchat
The Conversation - 2/10/16
How To Use Snapchat Like A Pro 13 Year Old
BuzzFeed - 2/8/16
What Apps Do Teens Use? (Survey of 60)
Business Insider - 1/18/16
How Teenagers Feel About Apps On Their Phones
New York Times - 1/1/16
Prosecutors Talk About How To Respond To Teenage Sexting
New York Times - 11/13/15
Comprehensive Survey On Teens, Technology, and Romance
Pew Internet - 10/1/15
British Study Dives Further Into Effects Of Teen Social Media Use
HealthDay - 9/11/15
Is Sexting Just The Latest “Youth Panic” By Adults?
New York Magazine - 8/10/15
The Fortunate Social Media Lives of Teenagers
New York Times - 8/6/15
Stress, Social Media, And Suicide: The Pressure For Perfection
New York Times - 7/27/15

character

There Are No Shortcuts: Facebook, Technology And Character
New York Times - 11/16/18

“Tweeting and trolling are easy. Mastering the arts of conversation and measured debate is hard. Texting is easy. Writing a proper letter is hard. Looking stuff up on Google is easy. Knowing what to search for in the first place is hard. Having a thousand friends on Facebook is easy. Maintaining six or seven close adult friendships over the space of many years is hard. Swiping right on Tinder is easy. Finding love — and staying in it — is hard.”

cognitive science

The Mechanics Of “How Fiction Becomes Fact On Social Media”
New York Times - 10/20/17

"Ideological leanings and viewing choices are conscious, downstream factors that come into play only after automatic cognitive biases have already had their way, abetted by the algorithms and social nature of digital interactions.”

humanities

“TextPlay”: A Drama Told Through Text Messages
New York Times - 9/30/22
Narrative Texts Go Fully Digital: Into Social Media
New Yorker - 6/18/18

“Almost since the start of the smartphone era, film and TV producers have been trying to figure out how to capitalize on our new habit of jumping from one screen to the next. At first, many of these efforts felt like tricks. With “skam,” the multi-platform approach feels organic—after all, the characters themselves are constantly shuttling among YouTube and Instagram and Facebook Messenger.”
Poetry Surges On Twitter in 2016
Wired - 11/22/16

language

How Social Media Platforms Are Driving New Vocabulary
New York Times - 11/19/22
The Emergence of Brand New Words Can Be Tracked On Twitter
Quartz - 7/29/15

reading/writing

Instapoetry (Poetry On Instagram) Continues To Grow — And Spark Debate
New Statesman - 3/6/19

“The quality varies, but there is plenty of comically or offensively banal work to be found on Instagram: genuinely insightful or distinctive work is the exception, not the rule. The same tropes and themes appear again and again: lower-case platitudes in typewriter fonts; earnest insistence of the importance of self-love; writing in the second person; petals, rainbows and coffee stains sneaking on to pages. Most monetise their output by selling merchandise (from Atticus’s wine and Rupi Kaur canvas prints to r.h. Sin’s clothing range) and tour tickets.”
“How Facebook Revived The Epistolary Friendship”
JStor - 2/20/18
On Committing To Read More
Washington Post - 7/21/17

"The tyranny of the urgent crowds in around me. If I yield to that tyranny, my life fills with mental clutter. Boredom, say the researchers, is when creativity happens. A wandering mind wanders into new, unexpected places. When I retire to the mountains and unplug for a few days, something magical takes place. I’ll go to bed puzzling over a roadblock in my writing, and the next morning wake up with the solution crystal-clear—something that never happens when I spend my spare time cruising social media and the Internet."

safety

Social Media Monitoring Companies Start Working With Schools
Wired - 8/20/18

“A Vermont company that provides social media monitoring to schools and other organizations, described business as “definitely booming”… Desmond Patton, a professor at Columbia, believes social media monitoring can work if managed correctly. “I think there’s an opportunity for schools to use this as a way to support people but I would do so with extreme caution.””

social media

“What Social Media Does To The Teen Brain”
New York Times - 9/20/23

“Neuroscientists and psychologists who specialize in the teenage brain put it plainly: Yes, social media is of concern because the rapidly developing adolescent brain may be uniquely vulnerable to what the platforms have to offer. But the science is not nearly as settled as some of the most dire headlines would make it seem."
“How To Safeguard Teens’ Well-Being On Social Media”
Stanford - 8/22/23

“Also, talk about the intention behind having a device. Parents may be rightfully concerned about respecting their teen’s privacy, but it’s normal and expected that you ask questions about what they are doing online. Just as you want to support them with peer relationship dynamics at school, you should have periodic conversations with your kids about phone and social media use because there’s a lot to navigate in those spaces.”
Cal Newport: Do We Need A New Twitter?
New Yorker - 8/16/23
On The Conflict Between Social Media And Our Cognitive Development
Intrepid News - 7/25/23
Social Media Algorithms Harm Adolescents. Lawmakers Want To Address This.
New York Times - 7/18/23

“The bill is a comprehensive attempt to protect young people on social media, prioritizing stronger age verification practices and placing a ban on children under 13 using social media altogether. But there was one provision of the bill that was particularly alarming to this group of students: a prohibition on social media companies using the data (what they watch and swipe on) they collect on kids to build and fuel algorithms that spoon-feed individualized content back to users. These high school students had become reliant, maybe even dependent, on social media companies’ algorithms.”

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The Social Media Experience Is Going Through A Transition
New York Times - 7/15/23
“Students Turn To TikTok For Study Buddies”
EdSurge - 7/13/23

“When VaNessa Thompson wants to truly focus on doing homework for her doctoral classes at Oakland University near Detroit, she gets out her smartphone, props it on her desk, and starts streaming live video of herself on TikTok… One key goal, she and others using the hashtag say, is to try to put social pressure on themselves to stay on task and keep up with studying for a set time period. “It’s holding me accountable,” says Thompson, who has more than 13,000 followers on TikTok.”
Meta Introduces Threads. What Will Become Of Twitter?
New York Times - 7/11/23

“With 100 million people, Threads is quickly surging toward some of Twitter’s last public user numbers. Twitter disclosed it had 237.8 million daily users last July, four months before Mr. Musk bought the company and took it private.”
“How To Wean A Teen Off Social Media”
New York Times - 6/29/23
For Some Students, Social Media Is A Lifeline
New York Times - 5/24/23
“Surgeon General Warns That Social Media May Harm Children And Adolescents”
New York Times - 5/23/23
“Teens Say Social Media Is Stressing Them Out. Here’s How To Help Them.”
KQED - 5/20/23
Tools For Helping Students (And Teachers) Review Their Social Media
Social Institute - 5/18/23
An Epidemiologist Assesses The Social Media Health Crisis
Your Local Epidemiologist - 5/18/23
“Is There Life After Influencing?”
New York Times - 4/11/23
Why Are Countries Trying To Ban TikTok?
New York Times - 3/3/23
TikTok To Develop Parental Controls For Teen Accounts
Reuters - 3/3/23
TeacherTok, Where Teachers Go On TikTok
EdWeek - 2/14/23
BookTok, Where Authors And Readers Meet On TikTok
Literary Hub - 2/13/23
25 Tweets That Changed The World
New York Times - 2/10/23
“Surgeon General Says 13 Is ‘Too Early’ To Join Social Media”
CNN - 1/29/23
How TikTok Captures Attention
LA Times - 1/4/23
On TikTok, Misinformation, And Teenage Attention
EdSurge - 12/7/22

““The TikTok algorithm is designed for doomscrolling,” Volland says. “Being so overwhelmed by the volume of information makes it harder to be able to distinguish high- from low-quality content. It can make us feel more anxious, and we should be cognizant of that for young people who are spending so much time on the platform.””
Does Social Media Need A Full Reboot?
Vice - 11/8/22
Amidst Social Media Mayhem, People Flock To Mastodon
How To Geek - 11/8/22
Is All Social Media Becoming Tik-Tok? Can Moderation Keep Up?
Atlantic - 11/7/22
Wait, What Is Mastodon?
Clive Thompson - 11/6/22
A Slightly Deeper Dive Into Mastodon
Simon Willison - 11/5/22
“How Connected Do People Feel In The Age Of Social Media?”
Gallup - 10/25/22
“More Americans Are Getting News On TikTok”
Pew Research - 10/21/22
Five Approaches To Media Literacy
Social Institute - 10/21/22
Which Emojis Are No Longer Cool To Use, According To Kids
Social Institute - 10/21/22
On TikTok, Instagram, And YouTube
Professor Galloway - 9/16/22
Sharing On Social Media Makes Us Believe We Are More Knowledgable
University of Texas - 8/30/22

“Social media sharers believe that they are knowledgeable about the content they share, even if they have not read it or have only glanced at a headline. Sharing can create this rise in confidence because by putting information online, sharers publicly commit to an expert identity. Doing so shapes their sense of self, helping them to feel just as knowledgeable as their post makes them seem.”
A Fascinating Take On How TikTok Is Unseating Facebook. For Now.
New Yorker - 7/28/22

“Both Facebook and Twitter were built on the same general model of leveraging hard-to-replicate, large social graphs to generate a never-ending stream of engaging content, a strategy that proved to be robust in the face of new competition and incredibly lucrative… This rejection of the social-graph model has allowed TikTok to circumvent the barriers to entry that so effectively protected early social-media platforms like Facebook and Twitter. By separating distraction from social connection, TikTok can directly compete for users without the need to first painstakingly build up an underlying network, link by link. By all accounts, this attention blitzkrieg is working incredibly well.”
Creators Begin Gravitating To Community Groups From Pure Broadcasting
Washington Post - 7/24/22
Short, Text, Check-Ins With Friends Make An Outsize Difference
New York Times - 7/11/22
Is TikTok A National Security Threat? (Again)
Professor Galloway - 7/8/22
TikTok Is The Dominant Force In Bookselling Today
New York Times - 7/1/22
The New Critics And A New Essay Form: The Rise And Decentralization Of Social Media Critics
New York Times - 6/29/22

“One of the most popular genres of videos online is to comment on other videos online. Are they comedians or media critics?”
“How Harmful is Social Media?”
New Yorker - 6/3/22
TikTok Now Has Higher Usage Than Instagram Among Age 12 - 17
CNBC - 11/18/21
Adult Behaviors And Attitudes Towards Twitter
Pew Research - 11/15/21
One Angle Into Facebook’s Impact On Mental Health
Cal Newport - 11/4/21

“This paper, titled “Social Media and Mental Health,” leverages an ingenious natural experiment. When Facebook first began to spread among college campuses in the first decade of the 2000s, its introduction was staggered, often moving to only a few new schools at a time… Using a statistical technique called difference in differences, the researchers quantified changes in the mental health status of students right before and right after they were given access to Facebook.”
Three Ways To Support Healthy Teen Use Of Social Media
KQED - 10/13/21
What Recent Facebook Crises Have Taught Us About Social Media
New York Times - 10/5/21
How To Help Teens Develop Healthy Social Media Habits
New York Times - 9/21/21
Salon Is Closing Comments On Its Articles
Salon - 8/31/21
How Social Media Places Ads For The Toothpaste You Use While Traveling
Twitter - 5/25/21
Social Media Is Now More About “Vibe” Than Narrative Or Personality
New Yorker - 4/26/21
What Is Clubhouse, The Audio-Only Social App?
Wired - 3/17/21
Students Are Pushing Back Against Discipline For Social Media Posts
New York Times - 2/5/21
Kids Now Watch Almost As Much TikTok As YouTube
TechCrunch - 6/4/20
Anger Spreads Among Weak Ties, Joy Among Close Ties
Cornell - 5/5/20
Online Outrage and Call Outs Are Counterproductive
Inc. - 1/24/20

“Or, to put that into everyday language, shouting at people online causes those that witness the fight to think shouting at people online is more OK. But it also tends to make them feel bad for the person being shouted at. Intense outrage actually makes people sympathize for the recipient of that outrage.”
Is The Risk Of Smartphone And Social Media Depression Overstated?
New York Times - 1/17/20
Nicholas Carr Reflects On TikTok
Rough Type - 1/4/20

“The company doesn’t need to build exhaustive data profiles of its users as, say, Facebook does. It just watches what you watch, and how you watch it, and then feeds you whatever video has the highest calculated probability of tickling your fancy. You feel the frisson of discovery, but behind the scenes it’s just a machine pumping out widgets. “TikTok deals in the illusion, at least, of revelation,” New York Times critic Amanda Hess writes. Not to mention the illusion, at least, of egalitarianism, of communalism, of joy. “When I tap the heart on some high school kid’s weird video, I feel a flicker of pride, as if I am supporting him in some way. But all I am really doing is demanding more.””
Instagram Face: How The Internet Is Changing How We Want To Look
New Yorker - 12/12/19

““I think that ten years ago it was seen as anti-cerebral to do this,” [the plastic surgeon] said. “But now it’s empowering to do something that gives you an edge. Which is why young people are coming in. They come in to enhance something, rather than coming in to fix something.””
“Existentialism And Instagram” — Students Reflect
Kappan - 11/25/19
Facebook: Philosophically Designed To Bring People Together, Economically Designed To Drive Them Apart
Brookings - 11/13/19

“To become “We” requires a suspension of human nature’s tribal instincts in favor of a shared future. Such a belief is predicated in part on shared information… Coming together in an environment of shared information—an information commons—is a key component of moving from tribes to the larger Unum. When the algorithms of social media follow the money, they discourage the search for Unum and undermine the communal “We.” By delivering different information to each tribe—in secret—the algorithms keep users online for as long as possible, maximizing ad sales. In doing so, they gnaw away at the heart of “We the people.””
“Instagram Will Begin Hiding Total Like Counts For [Some] Users”
Social Media Today - 11/9/19

“Instagram's hidden like counts test has sparked much debate in the social media industry, with some seeing it as a major win for platform health, and others questioning the impacts it will have on engagement, influencer marketing, etc.”
Is TikTok A National Security Threat? (Or All Social Media, For That Matter?)
Ars Technica - 10/25/19
And Why Are Schools Everywhere Suddenly Making TikTok Clubs?
New York Times - 10/19/19
On Why LinkedIn Doesn’t Court Controversy Like Other Social Media
New York Times - 8/8/19
“Digital Minimalism” And “How To Do Nothing” — On The Attention Economy
New Yorker - 4/29/19
"The Hottest Chat App for Teens Is … Google Docs”
Atlantic - 3/14/19
You Should Know What TikTok Is (Especially In Elementary And Middle School)
Quartz - 3/13/19
Here’s The NYT’s Much Longer Examination Of TikTok
New York Times - 3/10/19
Wait, What Is TikTok Again?
New York Times - 3/10/19
Detailed Study On The Effect Of Quitting Facebook For A Year
New York Times - 1/30/19
Why People Create False Or Alternate Accounts On Social Media
New Statesman - 1/24/19

“Once a behaviour reserved for “weirdos” on Reddit and Tumblr, the alt account has now become a staple for internet users on essentially every platform. But anonymity can be a double-edged sword.”
“People Older Than 65 Share The Most Fake News, A New Study Finds”
The Verge - 1/9/19

"Across all age categories, sharing fake news was a relatively rare category. Only 8.5 percent of users in the study shared at least one link from a fake news site… But older users skewed the findings: 11 percent of users older than 65 shared a hoax, while just 3 percent of users 18 to 29 did. Facebook users ages 65 and older shared more than twice as many fake news articles than the next-oldest age group of 45 to 65, and nearly seven times as many fake news articles as the youngest age group (18 to 29).”
Social Media Has Surpassed Print As US Main Source Of News
Smithsonian - 12/11/18
"To Feel Less Depressed And Lonely, Limit Social Media Use To 30 Minutes A Day”
Quartz - 11/11/18
Teens Now Use Instagram More Than Snapchat
Mashable - 10/22/18
Instagram Creates A Parents Guide
EdWeek - 9/12/18
Common Sense Media Poll: Teens Would Rather Text Than Talk In Person
Quartz - 9/10/18
New York Public Library Makes Novels Readable On Instagram
Hyperallergic - 8/21/18

"Soon-to-come literature includes digital renderings of Franz Kafka’s 1915 novella The Metamorphosis, and 1892 short story The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman.”
A Deep Look At SES Differences In Facebook/Social Media Use
Quartz - 8/15/18

“While only one-third of kids from families with higher incomes said they are on Facebook, Pew reported recently, a much larger share of teens from lower-income backgrounds… said that they still use the platform… A 2015 Pew Research Center survey also found that higher-income teens hang out with their close friends in person at a higher rate than kids from low-income households.”
Tufekci: Five Lessons From The Rise Of Social Media In Political Culture
MIT Technology Review - 8/14/18
More On Risks Of Snapchat Selfie Filters
Vox - 8/10/18

"Edited and filtered photos can exacerbate body dysmorphic disorder, the relentless fixation with a perceived flaw in appearance… “The pervasiveness of these filtered images can take a toll on one’s self-esteem, make one feel inadequate for not looking a certain way in the real world, and may even act as a trigger and lead to body dysmorphic disorder.”
“Snapchat Dysphoria” - The Troubling Desire To Look Like Edited Selfies
Mic - 8/10/18

“A recent study in JAMA pointed out a 13% increase in plastic surgery patients seeking to improve their looks for selfies between 2016 and 2017 because of this phenomenon.”
In 1731 Ben Franklin Offered The Same Apology As Today’s Social Media
Washington Post - 8/8/18

“Franklin had faith that truth would win out over falsehood, if given a fair chance to compete.”
Twitter As The High School We Are All Publicly Experiencing
New York Times - 8/4/18

“The psychoanalyst Erik Erikson once wrote that adolescence is a time when children can be “morbidly, often curiously, preoccupied with what they appear to be in the eyes of others.” …A corollary to Erikson’s observation might be that of David Elkind, another developmental psychologist, who in 1967 wrote about the “imaginary audience” phenomenon in adolescents — the idea that teenagers somehow see themselves as stars of their own productions, believing themselves to be watched by an eager, if sometimes judgmental, public. On Twitter, you actually are living your life on a stage.”
How One Beethoven Tweet Broke Twitter For One Journal
ArtsJournal - 7/26/18

“So 120,000 Twitter followers are rabid Beethoven defenders, outraged someone would take away their beloved music? Unlikely. We post heretical pieces on ArtsJournal almost every day – many far more outrageous than this, and they don’t go viral or provoke such reaction. So why this?”
What Are “Flop Accounts” On Instagram? Why Do Kids Get News There?
Atlantic - 7/26/18
High Social Media Use Linked To ADHD Symptoms
NPR - 7/17/18

“Teens who were high frequency users of seven or 14 digital media platforms were more than twice as likely to develop ADHD symptoms than teens who did not use any media platform at a high frequency rate.”
Unfollow Everyone - Then Follow What Brings You Joy
Anil Dash - 7/13/18
Facebook, Down. Instagram and YouTube, Up. What Teens Use Today.
Pew Internet - 5/31/18
“What Good Is ‘Community’ When Someone Else Makes All The Rules?”
New York Times - 4/17/18
Online Community: Social Poverty In A Time Of Surplus Connection
New York Times - 4/16/18

“It’s not only that heavy social media users are sadder. It’s not only that online life seems to heighten painful comparisons and both inflate and threaten the ego. It’s that heavy internet users are much less likely to have contact with their proximate neighbors to exchange favors and extend care. There’s something big happening to the social structure of neighborhoods.”
Lessons From A 1,600 Person Voluntary Social Media Break
Cal Newport - 3/28/18
Study: “Falsehoods Almost Always Beat Out The Truth On Twitter”
Atlantic - 3/8/18

"The massive new study analyzes every major contested news story in English across the span of Twitter’s existence—some 126,000 stories, tweeted by 3 million users, over more than 10 years—and finds that the truth simply cannot compete with hoax and rumor. By every common metric, falsehood consistently dominates the truth on Twitter, the study finds: Fake news and false rumors reach more people, penetrate deeper into the social network, and spread much faster than accurate stories.”
Great Data On Social Media Platform Usage In America
Pew Internet - 3/1/18

"The median American uses three of these eight social platforms… Facebook and YouTube dominate this landscape, as notable majorities of U.S. adults use each of these sites. At the same time, younger Americans (especially those ages 18 to 24) stand out for embracing a variety of platforms and using them frequently. Some 78% of 18- to 24-year-olds use Snapchat, and a sizeable majority of these users (71%) visit the platform multiple times per day.”
A Shooting At A High School. Students Engage On Social Media
Atlantic - 2/17/18

"In the wake of mass shootings that target adults, usually victims’ husbands, wives, parents, or adult children speak for them. But this is the largest high-school shooting in the social-media age—so it centers on adolescents, who can discuss and understand the tragedy as adults but who are as blameless for it as children.”
“Welcome To The Post-Text Future”: How Social Media Is Changing
New York Times - 2/9/18

"Then there’s the more basic question of how pictures and sounds alter how we think. An information system dominated by pictures and sounds prizes emotion over rationality. It’s a world where slogans and memes have more sticking power than arguments.”
The NYT Explains Snapchat
New York Times - 2/7/18
Teen Girl Gets Lost In Online Persona As Male Sportswriter (Cautionary?)
Deadspin - 11/9/17

"“I wanted to be a sportswriter… but I was young and thought that the only way people would notice me is if I was the stereotypical guy… That slowly led me down a path to some things that I was very uncomfortable doing but didn’t even realize were happening.”
Maybe We Should All Settle Down About Social Media…?
PsychCentral - 11/3/17

"Berryman compares the response or push-back that some people have to social media to a form of “moral panic” such as that surrounding video games, comic books, and rock music.”
The New York Times Shares Their Internal Social Media Policy
New York Times - 10/13/17

"In social media posts, our journalists must not express partisan opinions, promote political views, endorse candidates, make offensive comments or do anything else that undercuts The Times’s journalistic reputation.”
“Controversial Conversations Belong In the Classroom, Not Online”
Social Media in Education - 10/7/17
On Why Kids Have Finstas and Rinstas (Fake And Real Media Accounts)
Quartz - 8/30/17
"A Visual Map Of The Social Media Universe”
Visual Capitalist - 7/19/17
"Why You Need Emoji… The Body Language Of The Digital Age”
Nautilus - 7/6/17

"A case in point is research commissioned by the dating site Match.com in the United States. In the fifth annual Singles in America report, researchers investigated the relationship between emoji usage and sexual conquests—the first survey of its kind to do so. The survey polled over 5,600 singles—all non-Match.com subscribers—whose socio-economic and ethnic profiles were representative of the national population. And results were striking: The more emojis a singleton uses in their digital communication, the more dates they get to go on; further, the more sex they have.”
How Facebook Use Correlates With Well Being
Harvard Business Review - 4/10/17
The Rules Kids Create For Themselves On Social Media (Instagram)
New York Times - 1/5/17
The Anti-Bully: An App For Giving Compliments
New York Times - 12/20/16
Use Of More Types Of Social Media Linked To Anxiety/Depression
Futurity - 12/19/16
People Quit Facebook For A Week… And Feel Better
Discover - 11/16/16
Twitter Creates New Tools To Fight Online Abuse
Atlantic - 11/15/16
Nicholas Carr Chimes In On Allo, Google’s AI Messenger Algorithm
Rough Type - 10/5/16
Violence On Social Media Affects Us Differently Than Reports Of Violence
New York Times - 9/10/16
Explaining Finsta, ‘Like’ Thresholds, And More Teenage Social Media Norms
Social Media in Education - 9/2/16
A Deep Look Into Facebook’s News Feed Algorithm
Slate - 1/3/16
Compulsive Texting Shows Similar Traits As Compulsive Gambling
New York Times - 10/12/15
Does The Internet/Facebook Actually Make Us More Empathetic?
New York Times - 10/9/15
“Social Media Usage: 2005-2015”
Pew Internet - 10/8/15
In Defense of Social Media Tools
Pacific Standard - 10/2/15
No One Types “Lol” Anymore. Now It’s “Haha.”
Facebook Research - 8/10/15
How Often Do Different Age Demographics Take Selfies?
Quartz - 8/6/15
Does More Facebook Use Lead To More Body Image Issues?
HealthDay - 7/27/15
Ways To Talk About Social Media Dilemmas With Kids
Harvard Graduate School of Education - 7/26/15
Exploring Instagram
Atlantic - 7/17/15
Interview With a Researcher on How Kids Use Social Media
Fast Company - 2/18/14
Using Same Methods, Facebook Predicts Princeton’s Demise by 2021
Facebook - 1/23/14
Princeton Research Predicts Facebook Will Decline by 2017
Guardian - 1/22/14
Does Technology Isolate Us? It Seems Not!
New York Times - 1/17/14
By the Numbers: Facebook Usage Down Among Teens, Twitter Up.
Fast Company - 1/16/14
73% of Online Adults Are On Social Networks
Pew Internet - 12/30/13
...But Kids Still Aren’t Leaving Facebook
The Conversation - 12/30/13
Kids Like Facebook Less Than They Used To...
Wired - 12/27/13
10 Tips For Teens For Responding To Cyberbullying [Flyer]
Cyberbullying.org - 1/1/12

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