A new study from UNSW Sydney quietly reframes one of the defining anxieties of modern parenthood: it is not the presence of social media in a young person's life that most threatens their wellbeing, but the age at which they first encounter it. Surveying 365 Australian adolescents in the weeks before a national social media ban took effect, researchers found that those who began using platforms in early childhood carried measurably heavier burdens of anxiety and depression — regardless of whether they held an active account at the time of the study. The finding shifts the moral weight of the c
Age of First Social Media Use Matters More Than Access, UNSW Study Finds
Adolescents who began using social media at younger ages reported elevated symptoms of anxiety and depression.