2.4M person study: Internet use boosts, not hurts, well being
nature.com
nature.com
I'm not seeing how they accounted for the fact that people with access to the Internet are more likely to have access to other things that would improve life satisfaction such as food security, quality health care, social and economic safety nets, education, and leisure time. I would imagine factors such as these play a bigger impact than the Internet on a person's well being.
"The researchers controlled for factors that might affect Internet use and welfare, including income level, employment status, education level and health problems."
The linked paper has a section on Covariates that explains the methodology used to control for factors such as income.
Really, the math isn't any harder than what's necessary to land a rocket screaming along at mach 8 or reverse a couple terabytes of voltage readings into a nice clean volumetric medical image.
This is definitely evidence, but I do share the OP's concerns around controls and would regard this finding as somewhat likely to be biased by the kinds of people who both a) have internet and b) are willing to respond to a really, really long poll.
"In turn, this suggests that the contributions of internet access and use on well-being were independent of the covariates we selected for, and thus might indicate causal relations. (Although we highlight the evidence here for causal claims is less than thin.)"
I think it would be more useful, especially on a forum known to have a strong opinion on a topic, to establish alternate theories that match these observations and independence relations.
I'm not convinced that this study proves what is claimed.
He is not.
The study shows ～X
I am never wrong
Therefore, the study must be wrong.
However, I find it to be extremely unlikely that the design of this study is sound. I'm not convinced that the scientific community even knows what all of the variables that determine your level of well being are, much less having the ability to account for them in a study like this.
As I have repeatedly stated elsewhere in this thread, in regions of the world with pervasive Internet access there are many, many factors that lead to increased well being, and conversely, in regions of the world without pervasive Internet access there are many, many factors that lead to decreased well being.
This study has accounted for some of the obvious variables here, but certainly not all of them.
If you can't provide concrete debunks then your complain is nothing but hot air.
[0] - https://tmb.apaopen.org/pub/a2exdqgg#s2
[1] - https://web.archive.org/web/20220319202108/https://news.gall...
Per your links they accounted for just 6 variables, not nearly enough to make the stated conclusion with any confidence:
> In addressing our second research question, our aim was to approach the independent contributions of internet access and use on well-being. To that end, we adjusted for plausible (and available) covariates in our models that might otherwise mask or bias any independent contributions of internet access on well-being or create spurious associations. We chose six variables to represent such potentially confounding factors that have been previously considered important in the literature on well-being (): the respondent’s income (e.g., ), educational (), work (), and relationship statuses (), their ability to meet basic needs for food and shelter, and whether or not they reported having health problems ().
It’s fine to disagree, but at least write a sentence to say why. If you can’t say why, then just take it as an interesting anecdote.
This was an observational study.
"“The study cannot contribute to the recent debate on whether or not social-media use is harmful, or whether or not smartphones should be banned at schools,” because the study was not designed to answer these questions, says Tobias Dienlin, who studies how social media affects well-being at the University of Vienna. “Different channels and uses of the Internet have vastly different effects on well-being outcomes,” he says."
The current HN title ("2.4M person study: Internet use boosts, not hurts, well being") seems a bit of a stretch with regard to causation.
I think I did ok in that regard, but as you say the two sentences could themselves overstate things. But I figured any more edit would get into the discouraged editorializing
I was wondering about the overall effect for young folk and women in particular. It seems like the effect is fairly narrow and not what I would expect.
I also wonder if the effects from substantial social media interaction could be teased out.
Yeah, this is what I was thinking as well. The internet absolutely has a positive effect on my life. Finding out which store I need to go to, how to do simple home repairs, how to start a garden, maps, ordering groceries (we've got 4 young children; grocery pickup is a life saver).
And on the other hand, social media is terrible for me. There's just something about doom scrolling that's hard to give up because it's the perfect way to kill dead time.
But if we asked you right after you got in a doom scrolling sadness argument, you'd probably hate it.
Too many of these studies are based on self-reporting; I feel that we need something more to really get correct answers.
I have never used Tiktok, haven't used Facebook since 2014 and Twitter wouldn't be worth using if I was sent a monthly check in the mail.
People just txt me and those that don't have my number, don't have my number for a reason.
Of course, I am missing out on what my cousin's ex wife is having for lunch. This is a feature though and not a bug.
It just says in the past week. Most folks I know use the internet a little bit each and every day, even if they aren't being social. Banking, playing a single player game (after logging into playstations network, of course), reading news, watching a show or movie.
I do think it does more good than harm though especially with people who may otherwise not have many organic opportunities at social interactions.
But why on earth is that comparison worth examining as evidence that the internet is good for wellbeing in the west?
This seems like a confounding variable just because platform popularity all by itself tends to be the end of a decent platform, social network or otherwise.
The problem, to me, isn't that TikTok or Twitter or Whatever exists, it's that they're in the control of monopolists and not of the users, and to the maximum extent possible these companies have loaded these tools with expertly constructed dark patterns designed to stultify and distract users away from self improvement and into self indulgence.
Because those tools are often not a good fit for human sociability? "More and faster" is not always better, though it's a tempting metric for technology people because it's oversimplified and easily quantifiable.
I don't agree with your assessment. I think there are fundamental problems with these tools not caused by "monopolists" or "dark patterns." One that easily comes to mind is the dysfunction that comes from people being separated from in-personal social feedback and other kinds of regulatory practices.
You seem to be describing a situation in which the person is not _choosing_ to use these tools. In which case, it doesn't seem like the tool that's the problem, but a corporation using it inappropriately.
Which, again, is the result of the labor market being monopolized. If this practice is as deleterious as you suggest, then why put up with it, unless you don't have a realistic choice. So, I actually think you've precisely made my point for me.