The sense of loneliness is more than doubled among teenagers, a phenomenon that could be linked to the widespread diffusion of smartphones: this is supported by a study recently published in the Journal of Adolescence.
The research examined the period between 2012 and 2018, exploiting the data collected as part of the International Student Assessment Program (better known as Pisa), a three-year survey that investigates the educational level of adolescents in industrialized countries.
Among the questions in the questionnaire, one concerns the “sense of loneliness at school”: in 36 of the 37 nations analyzed it was on the rise. The scholars tried to understand if the increase could be caused by socio-economic factors, such as the level of unemployment, GDP or the average size of households, but found no significant correlation.
“It is surprising that the trend is so similar in so many different countries” – he said Jean Twenge, who teaches Psychology at San Diego State University and she is the lead author of the study – On the other hand, if this trend were caused by smartphones or electronic communication, a worldwide increase is exactly what one would expect to see. “
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Communication via smartphone and, in particular, through social media and messaging apps, has established itself among the youngest in different periods depending on the country (in the USA, South Korea, Sweden and Denmark, arrived sooner than elsewhere), but in general it can be said that from 2012 onwards almost every teenager owned a mobile phone.
According to the researchers, privilege virtual relationships over flesh and blood ones, weak ties compared to closer ones, the cold light of a screen to the clamor of the changing rooms, would have locked 15 and 16 year olds in a bubble, increasing the risk of depression and mental disorders. Even the meetings in person would have lost their luster: the phubbing, that phenomenon whereby we dedicate ourselves to checking notifications, ignoring each other, is always lurking.
The teenagers from Anglo-Saxon countries, the Slavs and the Baltic and Latin American countries are worse off. And U.S? It will be for the greater aptitude for interpersonal relationships, it will be that we are simply more caciaroni, us Italians, along with French, Spanish and others, we are instead in the lower part of the ranking.
The study would seem to confirm what was reported by other researches and various reports: memorable, in this regard, the scene of the documentary The Social Dilemma, in which a teenager uses a hammer to take back his mobile phone, breaking the case in which his parents had locked him up.
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The deleterious effect of the smartphone in the school environment also seems to be confirmed by decisions like that of the French government, which two years ago banned the use of mobile phones in elementary and middle schools. Although in this case the motivation was more related to the decrease in concentration in the lessons, than to the greater degree of perceived loneliness. In Italy, a group of deputies from the 5 Star Movement this year presented a bill for cure smartphone addiction of children and adolescents.
The complicated relationship that young people have with mobile phones is therefore a very topical question, even if there is no unanimity of views on how to deal with it. A bit for the very nature of the theme: is it really possible, for example, to accurately measure the perceived level of loneliness? But also a bit why this relationship is constantly evolving and it can be affected by external circumstances, such as the pandemic.
Moreover, the data used in the study of Journal of Adolescence stop at 2018: there are no surveys on what happened later, but it is reasonable to assume that home insulation and the remote teaching have not improved the situation. Closing adolescents even more in their solitary technological bubble.
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