IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ces/epofor/v26y2025i04p63-67.html

Social Media and Mental Health: The Role of Algorithms and Regulation

Author

Listed:
  • Alexey Makarin
  • Simona Mandile

Abstract

Key Messages:Causal research consistently shows – across platforms, methods, and time periods – that social media is harmful for mental healthPromising remedies include helping parents coordinate restrictions on children’s use, for example, through school smartphone bansOther proposals include disabling addictive features for broader segments of the population and enforcing greater data transparencyRegulators should nevertheless proceed with caution, since social media generates large consumer surplus, only partially explained by addictive behavior

Suggested Citation

  • Alexey Makarin & Simona Mandile, 2025. "Social Media and Mental Health: The Role of Algorithms and Regulation," EconPol Forum, CESifo, vol. 26(04), pages 63-67, October.
    • Handle: RePEc:ces:epofor:v:26:y:2025:i:04:p:63-67
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.ifo.de/DocDL/econpol-forum-4-2025-makarin-etal-mental-health.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Jean Twenge & David G. Blanchflower, 2025. "Declining Life Satisfaction and Happiness Among Young Adults in Six English-speaking Countries," NBER Working Papers 33490, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Leonardo Bursztyn & Benjamin Handel & Rafael Jiménez-Durán & Christopher Roth, 2025. "When Product Markets Become Collective Traps: The Case of Social Media," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 115(12), pages 4105-4136, December.
    3. Arenas-Arroyo, Esther & Fernandez-Kranz, Daniel & Nollenberger, Natalia, 2025. "High speed internet and the widening gender gap in adolescent mental health: Evidence from Spanish hospital records," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 102(C).
    4. Marta Golin, 2022. "The effect of broadband Internet on the gender gap in mental health: Evidence from Germany," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 31(S2), pages 6-21, October.
    5. Donati, Dante & Durante, Ruben & Sobbrio, Francesco & Zejcirovic, Dijana, 2025. "Lost in the net? Broadband internet and youth mental health," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 103(C).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Jacob N. Shapiro, 2024. "Instrumenting the Online Information Environment," The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, , vol. 715(1), pages 38-59, September.
    2. Fernández Guerrico, Sofía & Tojerow, Ilan, 2025. "The Effect of Broadband Internet on Mental Health-Related Disability Insurance Claims," IZA Discussion Papers 18130, IZA Network @ LISER.
    3. Guy Aridor & Rafael Jiménez-Durán & Ro'ee Levy & Lena Song, 2024. "The Economics of Social Media," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 62(4), pages 1422-1474, December.
    4. Ojha, Manini & Gupta, Sagnik Kumar & Dhamija, Gaurav, 2025. "Rewiring Gender Norms: Causal Evidence on Internet Exposure and Justification of Intimate Partner Violence," GLO Discussion Paper Series 1696, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
    5. Likun Mao & Sarah Grace See, 2025. "Early Exposure, ICT Use, and Teenage Well being Outcomes," CHILD Working Papers Series 121 JEL Classification: I, Centre for Household, Income, Labour and Demographic Economics (CHILD) - CCA.
    6. Gupta, Sagnik Kumar & Ojha, Manini & Dhamija, Gaurav, 2025. "Banking on Connectivity: Internet Exposure and Women's Financial Autonomy," GLO Discussion Paper Series 1697, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
    7. Arenas-Arroyo, Esther & Fernandez-Kranz, Daniel & Nollenberger, Natalia, 2025. "High speed internet and the widening gender gap in adolescent mental health: Evidence from Spanish hospital records," Journal of Health Economics, Elsevier, vol. 102(C).
    8. Ingar Haaland & Christopher Roth & Stefanie Stantcheva & Johannes Wohlfart, 2024. "Measuring What Is Top of Mind," CEBI working paper series 24-10, University of Copenhagen. Department of Economics. The Center for Economic Behavior and Inequality (CEBI).
    9. Beknazar-Yuzbashev, George & Jimenez-Duran, Rafael & Simonov, Andrey & Mateusz Stalinsk, Mateusz, 2026. "Social Media Advertising Loads as Prices," The Warwick Economics Research Paper Series (TWERPS) 1602, University of Warwick, Department of Economics.
    10. Sofia Amaral‐Garcia & Mattia Nardotto & Carol Propper & Tommaso Valletti, 2024. "Information and vaccine hesitancy: The role of broadband Internet," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 33(9), pages 1936-1948, September.
    11. Edmonds, Eric V. & Mukherjee, Priya & Prakash, Nikhilesh & Prakash, Nishith & Sabarwal, Shwetlena, 2025. "Talk Therapy and Human Capital in Adolescence: Evidence from a Low-Resource Setting," IZA Discussion Papers 17884, IZA Network @ LISER.
    12. Katharina Bettig & Valentin Lindlacher, 2025. "Involuntary Changes in Commuting Distances: Effects on Subjective Well-Being in the Era of Mobile Internet," CESifo Working Paper Series 11784, CESifo.
    13. Alexander Yarkin, 2025. "Home-Country Internet and Immigrants' Well-Being," AEA Papers and Proceedings, American Economic Association, vol. 115, pages 432-437, May.
    14. Leonardo Bursztyn & Rafael Jiménez-Durán & Aaron Leonard & Filip Milojević & Christopher Roth, 2025. "Non-User Utility and Market Power: The Case of Smartphones," NBER Working Papers 33642, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Karina Colombo & Elisa Failache & Martina Querejeta, 2025. "High-speed internet and socioemotional wellbeing in adolescence and youth," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 38(1), pages 1-29, March.
    16. Leonardo Bursztyn & Matthew Gentzkow & Rafael Jiménez-Durán & Aaron Leonard & Filip Milojević & Christopher Roth, 2025. "Measuring Markets for Network Goods," NBER Working Papers 33901, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    17. Juan S. Morales & Anne E. Wilson, 2025. "Partisan Conflict on Social Media: Empirical Evidence and Policy Challenges," EconPol Forum, CESifo, vol. 26(04), pages 52-57, October.
    18. Maurizio Pugno, 2024. "Creativity, well-being, and economic development: An evolutionary approach," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 34(1), pages 205-225, January.
    19. Kang, Songman & Son, Hyelim & Song, B.K., 2023. "The effect of housing price inequality on mental health," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 85(C).
    20. Xinxin Ma, 2023. "Internet usage and the income gap between self‐employed individuals and employees: Evidence from China," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 27(3), pages 1509-1536, August.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ces:epofor:v:26:y:2025:i:04:p:63-67. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Klaus Wohlrabe (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/cesifde.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.