Loneliness affects people of any age, but rates are higher among teenagers. Are social media and smartphones making the problem worse?
One in 6 people worldwide are affected by loneliness, and the percentage is highest among 13- to 17-year-olds (20.9%), according to the latest report by the World Health Organization’s Commission on Social Connection. Teens who reported feeling lonely were 22% more likely to get lower grades in school, the report also found.
Some experts point to smartphones as a main culprit for the uptick in loneliness, but past research shows that owning one isn’t necessarily the issue—kids using their phones to be active on social media is what can result in mental health problems. For example, being unfriended on social media or getting bullied for posting a picture online could lead to feelings of depression or anxiety.
Rates of loneliness have increased since the pandemic, the WHO researchers found. Teenagers are spending less time hanging out with friends in person than they did a decade or two ago.
Loneliness “has really serious impacts,” said Alana Officer, who worked on the report and is the unit head on demographic change and healthy aging at WHO. It can harm both physical and mental health, she said, and it reduces life expectancy.
In a conversation with Education Week, Officer discussed the role technology plays in loneliness and youth mental health. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
What affects 13- to 17-year-olds the most—loneliness or social isolation?
Social isolation is that objective state of when you have few relationships or few social interactions with others. It’s something easily counted and quantified—how many friends you have, how many times you see them, etc.
Loneliness is a much more subjective state. It’s more of a distressing [experience]—people report a painful experience that arises from this disconnect or this discrepancy between the social connections that you do have and those that you want or you feel like you really need.
If you look at the differences between those two forms of social disconnection in younger people, the report shows that young people are most affected by loneliness. There’s about 21% of teenagers aged 13 to 17 who report experiencing it—that’s 1 in 5. That’s pretty high, and then this number steadily decreases with age—down to 11.8%—when you get to people who are 60 and older.
But if we look at social isolation, it looks like older adults are, in fact, more affected than adolescents.
Why do you think loneliness is such a big issue for young people?
I think there’s insufficient research, really, in terms of the topic. We just talked about the fact that adolescents have higher rates of loneliness but lower rates of social isolation. They tend to have more frequent social interactions, for example, at school or with their peers.
But what seems to be driving the high rates of loneliness in younger people is a sense of dissatisfaction with the quality of the relationships that young people have—an unmet expectation in terms of what they’re looking for from their peers.
What role do you think technology plays in all of this?
[Social media] might reduce the quality and the quantity of the in-person interactions that people have. We know that when you’ve got excessive use of digital platforms, they might replace more face-to-face interactions, which we know are really essential for healthy social development.
There’s evidence that says that frequent use of social media can increase the likelihood of social isolation and loneliness and can lead to things like unhealthy social comparisons, maybe exposure to misinformation. You might see more modeling of more negative behavior [like] cyberbullying that replaces the real-world interactions that kids and adolescents can have. And that’s more of a problem, I think, for adolescents with poor social skills or social anxiety.
There’s also things [called] “phubbing,” where people [who are physically in the same space] are being ignored because people are using their phone rather than interacting [with each other]. That has an impact on the quality of those relationships.
Other negative impacts that we know of are depression and anxiety, poor self-esteem and body image, disrupted sleep, fear of missing out on stuff so you keep engaging [online] and [have] fewer face-to-face interactions, but also the harmful interactions that people can have online as well.
The potential positive benefits of social digital technologies is that it can strengthen existing relations. When you use them to connect with your friends or family, they can help reinforce those bonds. We know that sometimes for children with disabilities, for example, [social media] can provide a mechanism whereby they can connect, feel supported, and feel a sense of belonging. So that’s really positive—building new communities.
And it’s also fantastic for removing geographical barriers. It can expand your social network and it means that you can have support across distances.
What safeguards can be put in place in schools to improve the mental health of students?
We didn’t look that much in terms of school setting, but I think from our side, it’s [asking schools], are digital technologies needed for education? Do they play an important role within the education process, within school settings? And I think the question is, if they do not, then why are they there?
There are many schools that have no phone policies within their school, and that seems a reasonable approach until they can evaluate what are the benefits and harms within those educational settings.
But I think really it’s a matter of understanding what’s our purpose in education and what are the tools needed to be able to educate young people.
I think we’re going to get a lot more evidence of this going forward. But I think educators and teachers and school directors need to be asking questions around, what do these tools bring to that education process? And then families, they have to ask different questions around digital technologies and social media access.
