被智能手機毀掉的一代，并不存在！

Before You Blame Screen Time For Teen Mental Health Issues, Read This

在你將青少年心理健康問題歸咎于熒屏時代之前，請閱讀以下內(nèi)容

Young people today are growing up in a digital world, and the hours they spend on their smartphones every day has many parents worried. But how justified are the concerns?

如今的年輕人在數(shù)字世界里長大，他們每天花在智能手機上的時間讓很多父母擔心。但這些擔憂有多合理?

Among the public, there's a popular narrative that smartphones are destroying the next generation, causing a surge in teen depression, anxiety, and suicide. Yet despite all the hysteria, there's hardly any solid evidence on whether digital screen time causes mental health problems in youth.

在公眾中，有一種流行的說法是智能手機正在摧毀下一代，導(dǎo)致青少年抑郁、焦慮和自殺的激增。然而，盡管所有的歇斯底里，幾乎沒有任何可靠的證據(jù)表明，屏幕時間是否會導(dǎo)致青年人的心理健康問題。

The reality is, children and teens are not going to stop using social media anytime soon, and a new study suggests maybe they don't need to. Tracking smartphone use in American adolescents, these researchers found increased screen time is not related to worse mental health.

事實是，兒童和青少年不會很快停止使用社交媒體，一項新的研究表明，他們可能不需要停止使用社交媒體。這些研究人員跟蹤美國青少年使用智能手機的情況，發(fā)現(xiàn)屏幕顯示時間的增加與精神健康狀況的惡化無關(guān)。

In fact, in some cases, the use of technology actually reduced feelings of worry and symptoms of depression among participants.

事實上，在某些情況下，技術(shù)的使用實際上減少了參與者的擔憂情緒和抑郁癥狀。

"Contrary to the common belief that smartphones and social media are damaging adolescents' mental health, we don't see much support for the idea that time spent on phones and online is associated with increased risk for mental health problems," says psychologist Michaeline Jensen at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro.

“與人們普遍認為智能手機和社交媒體會損害青少年的心理健康的觀點相反，我們并不認為花在手機和網(wǎng)絡(luò)上的時間會增加心理健康問題的風險。”北卡羅來納州格林斯博羅大學的心理學家Michaeline Jensen說。

For the research, Jensen and her colleagues surveyed more than 2,000 young people, between 9 and 15 years old, at an economically and racially diverse public school in North Carolina. These students were asked questions about their mental health symptoms three times a day and at the end of each day, they reported on their daily technology use.

為了進行這項研究，詹森和她的同事在北卡羅萊納州一所經(jīng)濟和種族多元化的公立學校，對2000多名9至15歲的年輕人進行了調(diào)查。這些學生每天被問三次關(guān)于他們心理健康癥狀的問題，每天結(jié)束時，他們報告他們的日常技術(shù)使用情況。

A year later, a sub-sample of nearly 400 participants had their smartphone use intensively tracked by the researchers, multiple times a day for two weeks.

一年后，研究人員對近400名參與者的子樣本進行了密集跟蹤，一天多次，持續(xù)兩周。

"In our longitudinal study of adolescents followed intensively over time on their mobile devices, we found little evidence to support a linkage, correlational or causal, between adolescents' digital technology usage and mental-health symptoms," the authors conclude.

作者總結(jié)道：“在我們對青少年的縱向研究中，隨著時間的推移，我們發(fā)現(xiàn)很少有證據(jù)支持青少年數(shù)字技術(shù)使用與心理健康癥狀之間的聯(lián)系、相關(guān)或因果關(guān)系。”

Remarkably, the authors even found some benefits of smartphone use. Those young people who texted more, for instance, reported lower levels of depression.

值得注意的是，作者甚至發(fā)現(xiàn)了使用智能手機的一些好處。例如，那些發(fā)短信越多的年輕人，抑郁程度就越低。

"Here, instead, we see that those adolescents who spend the most time on technology creating their own content may instead be enjoying better mental health," the authors suggest.

作者建議：“相反，我們看到那些花最多時間在科技上創(chuàng)造自己內(nèi)容的青少年，可能會享受更好的心理健康。”

The findings enter a mixed bag of results with small effect sizes. While some past studies have found correlations between social media use and subjective well-being, a number of other longitudinal studies have demonstrated no connection whatsoever, or associations too small to hold any meaning.

這些研究結(jié)果混雜在一起，其影響范圍很小。雖然過去的一些研究已經(jīng)發(fā)現(xiàn)社交媒體使用與主觀幸福感之間存在關(guān)聯(lián)，但其他一些縱向研究卻沒有顯示出任何聯(lián)系，或者關(guān)聯(lián)太小，沒有任何意義。

In 2017, for instance, psychologist Jean Twenge authored a widely-read article - adapted from her book - published in The Atlantic. The viral read claimed that the effect of screen activities in her research is "unmistakable", increasing the risk of depression by nearly a third among heavy users.

例如，在2017年，心理學家讓·特溫格(Jean Twenge)寫了一篇廣為閱讀的文章——改編自她的書——發(fā)表在《大西洋》(Atlantic)。病毒式閱讀聲稱，在她的研究中，屏幕活動的影響是“顯而易見的”，在重度使用者中增加了將近三分之一的抑郁風險。

Over the years, however, Twenge's conclusions have been met with skepticism. When Oxford researchers used the same data, they couldn't find such a clear connection at all. Instead, they found a teenager's need to wear glasses was more predictive of mental health issues than the time they spent using digital technology each day.

然而，多年來，特溫格的結(jié)論一直受到懷疑。當牛津大學的研究人員使用相同的數(shù)據(jù)時，他們根本找不到如此清晰的聯(lián)系。相反，他們發(fā)現(xiàn)青少年需要戴眼鏡，比他們每天使用數(shù)字技術(shù)的時間更能預(yù)測心理健康問題。

At this stage, it's just too early to say how technology is impacting the newest generation and their mental health. And focusing on screen time and frequency may be a complete red herring.

在這個階段，現(xiàn)在說技術(shù)如何影響新一代人及其心理健康還為時過早。而關(guān)注屏幕時間和頻率可能會轉(zhuǎn)移注意力。

"The existing literature highlights the importance of measuring both the quality and the quantity of the different types of activities youths engage in online," the authors of the new study argue, "rather than just relying on a gross sum of time spent on screens, which may include potentially beneficial social interactions with close friends alongside likely less beneficial passive viewing of content."

這項新研究的作者認為：“現(xiàn)有的文獻強調(diào)了衡量年輕人在網(wǎng)上從事的不同類型活動的質(zhì)量和數(shù)量的重要性，而不是僅僅依靠屏幕上花費的總時間，這可能包括潛在的收益。”與親密朋友的冷冰冰的社交互動，以及可能不太有益的被動觀看內(nèi)容。”

In other words, the key to understanding the role of technology in mental health could lie in understanding how it is used, not how often.

換句話說，理解技術(shù)在心理健康中的作用的關(guān)鍵可能在于理解它是如何使用的，而不是多久使用一次。

Children these days are socialising more and more online, and keeping them offline could isolate them from their peers. On the other hand, aimless scrolling or hours of video-watching might not be a bad thing to limit, especially if there's school work that needs to be completed.

如今，孩子們越來越多地在網(wǎng)上社交，保持他們的離線狀態(tài)可能會使他們與同齡人隔離開來。另一方面，漫無目的地滾動或觀看視頻的時間可能不是一件壞事，尤其是在需要完成學校作業(yè)的情況下。

The authors suggest that from now on, studies should focus less on screen time itself and more on how we can best educate and support the young people growing up in the digital age.

作者建議從現(xiàn)在開始，研究應(yīng)該少關(guān)注屏幕時間本身，多關(guān)注我們?nèi)绾巫詈玫亟逃椭С謹?shù)字時代成長的年輕人。

"It may be time for adults to stop arguing over whether smartphones and social media are good or bad for teens' mental health and start figuring out ways to best support them in both their offline and online lives," says psychologist Candice Odgers from the University of California, Irvine.

加州大學歐文分校的心理學家坎迪絲·奧格斯說：“成年人或許應(yīng)該停止爭論智能手機和社交媒體對青少年的心理健康到底是好是壞，而是應(yīng)該開始想辦法，在他們的線下和線上生活中為他們提供最好的支持。”