Pew Research published a new study that provides insights into global opinions about social media and its impacts. The research found that a rising number of people now believe that social media platforms are harming democracy.
Based on a 37-nation survey, the data found that in every nation, sentiment around the impact of social media has declined since 2022, when Pew last conducted this survey.
Pew said that sentiment about social media’s impact is particularly negative in the U.S., where 64% of adults say social media is bad for democracy.
The data also showed that people in wealthier nations are more likely to believe that social media has a negative influence.
Yet, the data also showed that 55% of respondents believed that social media overall had a positive impact on democracy, with young adults in particular more likely to view social platforms as beneficial.
That’s particularly interesting in relation to another survey report published by Pew Research, which showed that 82% of Australian adults supported restricting access to social media for kids.
As the graphs show, the older the audience, the more likely they are to view social media bans for teens as a positive, reflecting the broader consensus around the negative impacts.
An argument can be made that social media has stoked more societal division, with engagement-driven algorithms helping to amplify argumentative, emotion-inducing posts, some of which have compelled people into changing or deepening their political ideologies.
The data in Pew’s report could also underline why more teen social bans are inevitable, since the majority of the voting public appears to support teen social restrictions.
Similar studies in the U.S., the U.K., France, Italy, Norway and Sweden all show that the majority of adults support teen social media restrictions.
Maybe that’s a good thing, based on the broader consensus that social media is having negative impacts.
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