“Being 13:” Inside the Phones & Minds of Teenage Girls Today

AMANPOUR, HOST: The prospect of college is just one of the many challenges facing teenagers today. Social media has changed the way kids interact and behave. Addicted to an online smart phone world. Even those who are not on the platforms are affected. “New York Times” Contributing Editor Jessica

Bennett, followed three 13-year-olds for a year. Witnessing the impact of social media on these girls’ lives. Along with Mitch Prinstein, Chief Science Officer of the American Psychological Association, they join Hari Sreenivasan to discuss the trials and tribulations of being 13 today.

(BEGIN VIDEO TAPE)

HARI SREENIVASAN, INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Christiane, thanks. Jessica Bennett, Mitch Prinstein, thank you both for joining us.

Jessica, let me start with you. This is a fascinating read. You were able to follow three different 13-year-olds and all of their phone activities for a year.

ADDI: Hi. I’m Addi. I’m 13 years old, and I live in Norton Shores, Michigan.

ANNA: I’m Anna. I’m finishing up middle school near Denver, Colorado.

LONDON: Hi, my name is London. I’m an eighth graders in Maryland.

JESSICA BENNETT, CONTRIBUTING EDITOR, THE NEW YORK TIMES AND AUTHOR, “THIS IS 18”: I spent the last year following three 13-year-old girls throughout the course of their eighth-grade year to try to understand what life is like to be a teenager today.

SREENIVASAN: Why did you set out to do this in the first place?

BENNETT: Yes. Well, so I’m talking like a teenager these days because I’ve spent so much time with these girls. You know, for some time, I’ve covered the lives of women and girls. And I’ve always been pretty interested in the static that shows that around the middle school age, girls’ self-esteem tends to drop, and it tends to drop much more significantly than their male peers.

So, this was in the back of my mind as all of these headlines and statistics started coming about girls and teens in general and social media. You know, we were all behind our screens during the pandemic, and suddenly it became very concerning, teen mental health. And we know that 13 is the age at which teenagers are allowed to join social media, according to all these social media companies.

So, we thought wouldn’t it be interesting to try to capture the intersection of this really precarious time in adolescent life and particularly for adolescent girls, and when they are allowed to join these platforms, and what would it look like.

SREENIVASAN: You know, I want to say to the audience, you have the permission from the parents to follow these young women. So, tell me a little bit about the three very different girls that you chose.

BENNETT: Yes. So, it was interesting because this was almost like a dual reporting project because everything that was happening, you were also talking to the parents about. So, they were very involved. So, we had three girls, London who’s in Maryland, Anna who’s in Colorado, Addi who’s in Michigan. Really different, you know, geographically different. Ethnically different. Come from really different families. But the thing they had in common was being this age, in eighth grade, in middle school when hormones are raging. Oftentimes, friendship heights get complicated.

You know, they’re coming into the sexuality. They’re searching for identity. And they’re doing it all with a screen in her hand at all times. And so, their parents had really different rules for them about how much access to phones or social media they could have. But one of the most interesting things was to see that even the girl who wasn’t allowed on social media, Anna, it was impossible to escape because everyone at school was on it. So, it’s not as simple as just taking away your kid’s phone.

SREENIVASAN: Dr. Prinstein, you are the chief science officer of the American Psychological Association, and the organization has issued multiple health advisories. Warnings to different parents about how and when they should be allowing their kids on social media, some of the, sort of, pitfalls of it. When you saw — and you’ve contributed to “The Times'” reporting in this, when you saw Jessica’s piece, what did you think.

MITCH PRINSTEIN, CHIEF SCIENCE OFFICER, AMERICAN PSYCHOLOGICAL ASSOCIATION: I thought it was fantastic, not just because I have a daughter who’s also 13 but — and in eighth grade. But because it’s really breathing life into what the science tells us, you know, time and time again. 13 is maybe the worst time in our lives that we would have our kids spending so much focus on screens. Actually, I should say the second worst time.

The first most important time for brain development is that first year of life, but coming right after that is that year or two as puberty is beginning. We’re starting to see changes in the body. But that means that changes are already started in the brain. And the changes that are occurring in the brain are making us, oh, craving that peer attention, rolling our eyes at our parents, and talking about peers and how much they reenforce us or being scared of getting punished by them.

So, to give them 24/7 access to nonstop, you know, reinforcement through clicking their mouse and searching online, not only is it potentially something that might preoccupy them a lot more than we want. But we’re now starting to learn it actually might change the way their brain grows over the next few years.

SREENIVASAN: So, tell me a little bit about that. What’s scientifically happening in the brain and why is that susceptible during that — this vulnerable period to, you know, what’s happening in the body and so forth? But what is social media doing to the processes that are changing inside our heads?

PRINSTEIN: Yes, so the brain doesn’t mature all at once. It matures region by region. And one of the first regions that changes is an area called the anterior cingulate cortex, which basically is an area filled with oxytocin and dopamine receptors that suddenly multiply. So, we have way, way more of them. That means that we’re craving bonding with other peers and it feels really, really good when we do.

Now, this region is also associated with our addiction to illegal substances, that’s where the dopamine kind of kicks in. But now, we’re seeing that social media is activating it in ways that just don’t parallel the way that kids used to grow up.

So, back when I was growing up, you hung out with your friends then you went home. Maybe you get a phone call with them. Maybe you get some opportunity, you know, playing in the neighborhood but not 24/7 worldwide quantified access controlled by artificial intelligence. That has changed the context in which these brains were not developed to interact with and that’s concerning.

SREENIVASAN: So, Jessica, what’s interesting there is, you know, from what the doctor says, if the dopamine receptors are multiplying, if the kids are getting such a benefit or a positive boost from those connections with friends, in your reporting, you’re also showing that the inverse is also true. It seems that they are taking it much harder during this time, you know, in their lives when there might be an off-line rift in a relationship how it’s playing out online is almost magnified. Explain what happened with one of the teens, kind of, going or maybe all of them going through different kind of relationship issues.

BENNETT: So, a few of the things that played out, you know. There would be a disagreement over something. It would move into a group text. People would start calling each other names. It would then move into Snapchat where disappearing messages would be sent. But not everyone in the group would have Snapchat so they wouldn’t know what the person was saying about them. It would then eventually blow-up, end up in the school counselor’s office, and the school counselor is sitting there saying, this is all I do now. And sometimes it’s so hard to even get to the bottom of these conflicts because the adults in the room, the administrators, the principals, the teachers, they’re not as technological savvy. So, that’s part of this too. You know, watching these girls, and to their credit, they’re very brave to share their stories.

SREENIVASAN: Dr. Prinstein, you know, there are so many different kind of pieces of research that get headlines today and are warnings about social media, the correlations between social media use and self-esteem, social media use and suicide.

“The Economist”, for example, ran some recent studies about that, and it looked like suicide numbers had, kind of, decreased from most groups except for, essentially, I think girls aged between 10 and 19. Now, again, correlation is not causation, and I understand that and I want viewers to know that. But — well, looking at the body of research that’s out there, what can we start to be definitive about saying?

PRINSTEIN: You’re right. I mean, there’s a lot of research coming out. And you know, some of it is not causal, of course, because we can’t experimentally manipulate some kids to use social media more than others and see how they turn out. That would be unethical. But we’re getting what

I call warning signs, enough accumulating evidence to suggest there are some things, at the very least, we need to monitor, talk with our kids about, and pay attention to.

We’re seeing that kids are reporting — and just as we were just hearing in the report, remarkable amount of stress because of all the platforms they have to keep up with. What they’re afraid they’ll miss out on, and how much overload it is to gather all this information at once. The more the kids are reporting what we call digital stress, the more they’re experiencing depression a year later.

We’re seeing effects on sleep and we’re seeing the direct effect between social media use disrupted or delayed sleep, and that is actually changing the size of how brains are growing over time. That’s a pretty clear example of how social media is having this direct effect on the brain. We’re seeing addictive kinds of behaviors. What we, in the science community call, problematic social media use. With kids having tolerance and withdrawal symptoms that interferes with their ability to engage in day-to-day activities. We’re seeing discrimination and cyber hate and just being exposed to that, whether it’s directed to you or not as psychological consequence. There’s a lot more. I should say there’s also positive effects of social media on kids’ development. But it’s not a one-size fits all kinds of situation. Every kid uses social media in different ways and there are different things we need to do to make them all get the best out of it and avoid the worst.

SREENIVASAN: So, Jessica as you point out, banning social media, banning phone use, well, it has kind of different unintended ripple effects that, you know, maybe a parent wouldn’t consider right off bat.

BENNETT: It’s not just cyber bullying or it’s not these really overt and exaggerated things that are occurring. This is like the daily anxiety that exist in the background of knowing that there are 17 messages getting unanswered on your phone. There is a notification from your school to let you know that the quiz that you took today has dropped your grade by two percent. There are news notifications.

You know, one of the girls that I was with, there was a school lockdown when I was with her. And, you know, that’s a sad reality of our teenagers and kids today. But how did everyone find out that that was occurring? It was a notification on the phone.

So, even in some cases, what the school administrators are saying is, you know, we really want to set strict rules about not having phones in class. But oftentimes it’s actually the parents who want to keep track of their kids. And in a straight (ph) situation like that where there’s a lockdown and the parents are finding out about it in that way, you can completely understand why they want to have access to speaking to their daughter by the phone.

So, it’s tricky and seems that it’s not quite as simple when we live in world in which social media and phones and really are all kind of blended into one to just take one device away and think the problem is solved.

SREENIVASAN: So, Jessica, are the parents that you were speaking around these girls, did you see — I don’t know, that kind of trial and error on what kind of policy worked for which girl?

BENNETT: Well, I think they’re trying to figure it out as they go. And I guess what I saw via the most effective was these parents having pretty open and honest conversations with their kids about what they were seeing. Asking really simple questions like, OK, well, how did that make you feel when you saw that? And if it didn’t make you feel good, could you identify what it was about what you just saw that made you not feel good? And I think just like Dr. Prinstein said, mindfulness and understanding your feelings because we all do this, like, we’re swiping along, we’re swiping away, we’re going down rabbit holes. Three hours later you find yourself in a TikTok rabbit hole and you feel terrible about yourself and the world. And we, as far as adults, who can distinguish between reality and misinformation, and sometimes these teens can’t.

SREENIVASAN: Is there a difference in how a teen girl brain versus a teen boy brain is influenced by what’s on these devices and social media?

PRINSTEIN: In some ways, no, not that we can see so far. So, the effects on brain, the effects on sleep on so many different aspects of development that we’ve been talking about, we are not finding differences between boys and girls.

However, we are finding that girls live in a world where already there are unfair, double standard expectations on things like body shape or physical appearance. There’s an unfair, kind of, pressure to succeed in social relationships. And it’s the interaction between social media which is magnifying what might already have been happening and has been happening for decades to women. All line (ph) that might create a particularly toxic combination of experiences for adolescent girls.

So, I would say that if you have a son, I would be just as concerned. But if you have a daughter, you probably want to recognize the unique ways that social media is really poking at some issues that are already presented and pretty unfair ways to girls and women.

SREENIVASAN: So, Jessica, one of the things that was interesting was how social media wasn’t really contained inside the phone. I mean, one of the girls, London — you know, her mom, what was it, she basically allowed her to watch TikTok so that she could learn some of these, kind of, viral dances?

BENNETT: Yes. So, London was not allowed to be on TikTok until her 13th birthday and she had to present a very carefully thought-out case to her mother about why she should be allowed, and they each signed a contract agreeing to specific rules. But once she was allowed on it, she could stream it into the living room through their TV. And I — so I came over to their house and they were dancing in front of the television set and I was like, wait, what is this? Oh, it’s TikTok. You can actually connect it there.

So, there’s that. You know, there are all sorts of ways around having these apps. You can have apps that disguise apps underneath them. You can access TikTok through YouTube from a desk top, from your school computer, like, there are all sorts of ways around. So, I kind of feel like the idea of just not permitting kids without having the conversations about it on these platforms is futile. We just aren’t as good at the internet as they are.

SREENIVASAN: Jessica, you chronicled several, kind of, darker moments as I was reading. But — and I saw a couple of positive ones as well, and the doctor talked about it. I mean, what kinds of positive benefits did you see in the lives of these girls that social media was, kind of, actively functioning on that we shouldn’t discount?

BENNETT: Yes, I mean, I think there’s almost two things, there’s social media and then there’s the phones —

SREENIVASAN: Correct.

BENNETT: — which they’re using to socialize and always. And there are plenty of benefits to this. You know, there were lots of moments of joy. Sharing silly photos. Sharing memes. Like, the way that they communicate in visual platforms is just very different from the way I grew up communicating.

Even on social media, you know, for marginalized communities in particular, oftentimes LGBTQ, you — they can find community in like-minded people there. So, there are real benefits to some of this. And I think that can often get lost in some of the headlines. There were real moments of joy and there were silly moments. And they’re still teenagers, they’re figuring it all out, you know.

I think that the girls were really brave and honest in letting us document even some of the messier, more, as they would say, cringey parts of being a teenage on social media. And they really hope, and I hope, that it can allow others to see something of themselves and maybe take a harder look at it.

SREENIVASAN: I’m sure, Doctor, that you get asked this by every other parent of a 13-year-old that your teenagers might be on school teams or clubs or anything else with. But if you had any, kind of, overarching piece of advice that you think could work universally about both phones and social media, what do you say to parents?

PRINSTEIN: Moderation. You know, I don’t think it’s an all or nothing, kind of, solution. Let your kids on for an amount of time that fits the way they use it and their reactions of their having on it. That’s not one amount of time for everyone. That’s might be a half hour for some kids, and that might be two hours for others.

I think it’s important to talk with your kids about what they’re experiencing on there, absolutely. I’d love for kids to get eight to nine hours of sleep, which is recommended by many different scientific groups. So, you know, there’s some tricky ways, I understand, that parents don’t feel empowered to be able to shut off their kids’ phone on time. And I would say, dig into those parental controls. They’re not as easy as they should be, perhaps, to navigate but dig into them. Parents have a lot more power and gatekeeping ability than a they believe. I’ll say one last thing. We have done all kinds of class courses with undergraduates on this, and what we hear from 19 and 20-year-olds consistently is, I wish my parents had not listened to my begging and pleading when I was 12. Because now all these years later, I am seeing what happens and how dependent and incapable of paying attention and sleeping and exercising or having an in-person conversation. I wish my parents were more comfortable being the bad guy or the bad parent back then, and didn’t acquiesce to my begging and pleading.

SREENIVASAN: All right. From the American Psychological Association, Dr. Mitch Prinstein, and from “The New York Times” Jessica Bennett, thank you both for joining us.

BENNETT: Thanks for having us.

PRINSTEIN: Thank you.

(END VIDEO CLIP)