ANU Discovery: Social media has a negative impact on teenagers' life satisfaction.

Image source: Jack Fox/ANU

The latest results from Australia's largest youth survey show that social media is having a negative impact on the life satisfaction of Australian high school students.

The study found that non-binary students who frequently use social media had the lowest life satisfaction. Meanwhile, the life satisfaction of male or female users of TikTok, Reddit , and Twitch was lower than that of users who did not use these platforms.__k3

Image source: Generation official website‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍‍

Led by the Australian National University (ANU), the latest round of data from the 10-yearGENERATION studyinvestigated the impact of frequently using certain social media platforms on life satisfaction levels among 10th and 11th grade students across Australia.

Participants were asked to rate their life satisfaction on a scale from 0 to 10, ranging from "completely dissatisfied " to "completely satisfied ".

Chief researcher, Professor Ben Edwards from the Australian National University, introduced: "The average life satisfaction score of respondents was 6.21 (out of 10 ), with males having the highest life satisfaction at 6.5 , and young people identified as non-binary having the lowest life satisfaction at 5.2 ."‍

Image source: Generation official website

"We know that young people face many challenges that may affect their life satisfaction, but we found that using many mainstream social media platforms is associated with poorer life satisfaction.Non-binary young people who frequently use Twitter/X have higher life satisfaction. Meanwhile, among all genders, Facebook users have higher life satisfaction than non-users. "

"The use of Reddit and Discord is associated with the worst life satisfaction among males, while females are associated with TikTok."

Image source: Generation official website

The study found that 98% of participants reported frequently using at least one social media platform, and nearly one-fifth (18%) of young people post or share social media content at least once a day.

GENERATONstudy also asked Australian young people about their life plans after graduation, including whether they intend to go to university or join the Australian Defence Force (ADF).

The recently released Universities Accord report recommends that 80% of the Australian workforce should have higher education qualifications by 2050 .

Researcher Jessica Arnup from the Australian National University said: "Our research shows that almost one in ten young people have raised their university aspirations compared to when they were in 10th grade, and now their goal is to go to university.

"However, 12% of respondents said they no longer wanted to go to university when they were in 11th grade compared to 10th grade. Disabled students, students from disadvantaged or remote areas, and students whose parents did not go to university are more likely to lower their aspirations for higher education qualifications when moving from 10th to 11th grade."

Image source: Generation official website

"What we should all be concerned about is that these factors are still barriers to young people realizing their potential."

The study also found that approximately 20,000 15-year-olds across Australia intend to join the Australian Defence Force after high school. More than half (57%) of them are boys, while only 2% of non-binary students expressed interest in joining the Australian Defence Force.

GENERATIONstudy began in 2022 and will last for ten years. It aims to reflect the collective experience of Australian young people transitioning to life outside of school by tracking the growth of more than 3,500 high school students from about 300 different schools across the country.

Image source: Generation official website

Led by the Australian National University (ANU) in collaboration with the Australian Council for Educational Research (Australian Council for Educational Research) and the Social Research Centre (Social Research Centre), and funded by the Commonwealth, state, and territory governments, the "GENERATION"study will track the same group of Australian young people until they are 25 years old.

To learn more about the GENERATION study's findings,visit online at:

https://generationsurvey.org.au/