'Designed to keep kids hooked': Common Sense Media weighs in on landmark social media trial

SAN FRANCISCO - Nonprofit organization Common Sense Media on Wednesday weighed in on the landmark trial that could hold social media companies responsible for harms that come to children who use their platforms.

"This first social media addiction trial in California state court is an important acknowledgment of something that we at Common Sense Media have known for well over a decade now: Social media is deliberately designed to keep kids hooked at the expense of their health," CEO James P. Steyer said in a press release. "A raft of research shows that excessive social media use is linked to a host of mental health issues, like depression, anxiety, and eating disorders."

Steyer pointed to a document made public during the discovery phase of the trial, which is being conducted in Los Angeles. In that document, a researcher for Meta, Facebook and Instagram’s parent company, wrote to a colleague that the latter platform ‘is a drug,’ and that Meda ‘are basically pushers.’

Common Sense Media is a San Francisco-based nonprofit founded by Steyer in 2003. The organization reviews and rates media and technology, in order to provide parents with guidelines on what’s suitable for their children. The organization also funds research on the role of media in children's lives, and advocates for education and laws regarding media and education.

The backstory:

At the core of the trial is a 20-year-old identified by the initials "KGM," whose case alleges that her use of social media platforms, including Instagram, YouTube, Snapchat and TikTok, from an early age made her addicted to the technology and amplified depression and suicidal thoughts, as reported by the Associated Press.

TikTok and Snap, which were originally named in the lawsuit, have settled for undisclosed sums. Meta and Google, YouTube’s parent company, are continuing with the trial.

Dig deeper:

Dr. Anna Lembke, the Medical Director of Addiction Medicine at Stanford University, in testimony given last week, stated that Instagram and YouTube are intentionally designed to be addictive products — that features including autoplay, notifications and endless scrolling — keep children from disengaging.

"Social media giants wouldn’t be on trial if they had been proactive about protecting kids in the first place. For too long, they’ve used our kids and society at large as guinea pigs for massive, uncontrolled experiments," Steyer’s statement reads. "We would like to see this trial — and the others that will follow — result in real accountability and change in behavior for the companies that caused an unprecedented youth mental health crisis."

Big picture view:

According to the Associated Press, over 40 state attorneys general have filed lawsuits against Meta, alleging the company is harming children and contributing to the youth mental health crisis by intentionally creating features on Instagram and Facebook that can addict children to its social media platforms. Moreover, TikTok is also facing similar lawsuits in over a dozen states.