Participants were measurably happier and less anxious.
But, disappointingly, not by a huge margin:
Perhaps this is due to the fact a significant number of users switched to less harmful online platforms and didn’t stop using their phones.
Or perhaps there is actually something more sinister. My real concern with this study is the involvement of Meta.
We actually have evidence that Meta halted internal research about social media:
Would you study tobacco and have tobacco companies involved?
Would you study obesity and have Coca-Cola involved?
I don’t want to sound like a conspiracy theorist, but could Meta actually bully/bribe Stanford in order to change the figures?
That’s because they end up going to other social media sites thinking their experiences would be enriched. To truly be off from social media, you need to stop interacting in all of it. That includes places like Reddit and Lemmy.
Because you can’t say you’ve stopped social media just because you deleted your Facebook while turning around and still using Instagram or Lemmy or whatever. You’re still using it.