Screen time limits alone won't fix social media harm, global experts warn

A group of global health experts has concluded that telling parents to limit their children's screen time, or asking young people to exercise restraint on their own, will not solve the damage that social media is causing. The real problem, they argue, lies in how the platforms themselves are built and how the companies that own them make money.

The Lancet published a series of papers on this question in early October, drawing on research across nearly 2,800 studies and the lived experiences of six young adults who served as advisors to the project. Jay Shaw, a Canada Research Chair in responsible health innovation at the University of Toronto and one of the paper's authors, framed the issue plainly: the way we talk about technology's impact on health as a matter of personal choice misses the point entirely. The real drivers of harm are the design decisions and business models of the tech companies themselves.

Those companies, Shaw explained, profit by keeping people on their platforms as long as possible and by collecting detailed information about user behavior—what people like, what they share, what they return to—all of which feeds advertising systems. The infinite scroll, the algorithmic recommendations, the AI chatbots that surface tailored content: these are not accidental features. They are engineered to be difficult to leave. For many young people, the result is a kind of compulsive use that persists even when it stops feeling good.

The research documented real harms. Depression, anxiety, sleep disruption, and reduced physical activity were all linked to problematic digital media use in the umbrella review. There were also documented benefits—a sense of well-being, educational access, connection across distance—but these emerged primarily from moderate, intentional use. The pattern of engagement mattered as much as the time spent.

Tech companies have long countered claims of mental health damage by saying the evidence of direct causation is insufficient. The Lancet authors acknowledged that establishing cause is difficult, but they argued that the sheer scale of digital media's presence in young people's lives, combined with the fact that some are more vulnerable to harm than others, justifies what they called "precautionary public health action." That means government regulation and fundamental changes to how platforms operate—shifting the responsibility for safety from families and individuals to the companies and governments that shape the digital environment.

Canada has two pieces of legislation moving through Parliament that Shaw said get this logic "pretty much exactly right." Bill C-34, the Safe Social Media Act, and Bill C-36, the Protecting Privacy and Consumer Data Act, would restrict social media access to people 16 and older and establish a Digital Safety Commission to oversee tech companies. Critically, the bills would allow exemptions for platforms that demonstrate "adequate safeguards" for children—a mechanism designed to incentivize companies to actually make their services safer rather than simply comply with a ban. Australia has already imposed age restrictions on social media. Dozens of other countries, including Canada, are considering similar moves.

Yifan Zhou, a 30-year-old Canadian who participated in the advisory group, spoke to both sides of the issue. She acknowledged that social media connects people across distances and provides educational access. But she has also listened to young people describe the loneliness that comes from reduced in-person connection, the anxiety triggered by constant comparison to others' curated lives, and worse. She has a family member who was a teenager when they were targeted by online predators—an experience that went on for years partly because the young person felt ashamed and did not know it was wrong. "They also didn't know that it wasn't the way it's supposed to be," Zhou said, "but the kind of regulations and also the education and a lot of things weren't in place."

Dr. Michael Cheng, a psychiatrist at the Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario, sees the addictive patterns and mental health consequences regularly in his practice. He noted a telling shift in what young people ask when they are admitted to the hospital. Years ago, they wanted to know when visiting hours were or when they could call their parents. Now, the first question is often whether they can keep their cellphone. Cheng, who was not part of the Lancet series, said there is growing global consensus on the problem. "I remember 10, 15 years ago, those that were concerned, it felt like we were yelling and crying into the wind," he said. "Maybe the pendulum will swing back towards a safer side when we can design safer technologies."

Zhou expressed cautious optimism. The release of the Lancet papers gave her hope, and she sees young people increasingly taking agency in shaping their own digital futures. Change is possible, she believes, even though technology has developed far faster than regulation.