Publications by Justice and Gender Based Violence Research Initiative - ��

Review of Current Trends in LGBTQ + Youth and Social Media: Implications for Mental Health, Identity Development, and Civic Engagement

2025-01-27T14:48:11-05:00

This review looks at current trends in the effect of social media use on mental health, identity development, and civic engagement for LGBTQ + youth during the post-pandemic period, when online engagement has significantly increased. It explores both risks and benefits associated with this shift and offers recommendations for clinicians and future research in this evolving landscape.

There is an intricate relationship between the harms and benefits of social media use and developing adolescents. While some research suggests that social media use and overuse is associated with negative outcomes such as depression and anxiety, many recent studies have found that, for LGBTQ+ youth in particular, social media may be a necessary safe space they have for representation and community building, especially when absent in their physical world. It is important to look at the nuances behind social media use motivations and adolescents’ intersectional identities when understanding and developing personalized interventions for mental health.

This review looks at how LGBTQ+ youth have used social media since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic to increase their own agency and build community through developing their own safe spaces online. LGBTQ+ youth’s hidden and intersectional identities might isolate them within their home and community environments, which must be considered when thinking about controlling adolescent social media use. Ongoing research should look into the relationship between social media use and LGBTQ+ adolescent mental health at a more granular level, rather than just LGBTQ+ vs. heterosexual peers, to further tailored interventions.

Youth Co-designing More Positive Digital Ecosystems: An Action Research Journey via a Youth Advisory Board

2024-12-29T14:51:47-05:00

Much of the current media messaging consists of alarmist headlines that perpetuate a protectionist mentality on the dangers lurking on social media. There is a tendency to “pass the buck” on who is responsible for “saving” our youth from their digital worlds: social media platforms go unchecked from government oversight, parents expect the social media companies to prevent harm, educators want parents to guide their youth, etc.

How about learning from youth as “under-appreciated experts” who can be tapped to improve youth wellbeing? The motivation of the researchers is to elevate youth’s experiences (a.k.a. “youth centeredness”) in future endeavors that involve their digital ecosystems. In this chapter, they illustrate a research-and-action case study framed in positive youth development terms, offering a concrete documentation of how to engage youth in equitable and meaningful ways in the co-design of their own digital wellbeing.

Child care tradeoffs among Massachusetts mothers

2024-12-29T13:51:47-05:00

In the U.S., licensed child care is funded through a mostly private market, constraining the supply of accessible high-quality care. Combine this with variable parental needs and preferences and it is easy to see how alignment is not always achievable. Lower-income families in particular face constraints in securing care that is strong on multiple care dimensions of affordability, quality, and availability when, where, and for whom they need it.

Some parents confront forced choices or tradeoffs among aspects of care. This study aimed to understand the tradeoffs parents make in selecting the best care arrangements for their family.

Between October 2019 and January 2020, the researchers interviewed 67 mothers in Massachusetts whose child(ren) had not yet started kindergarten. They worked to understand the ways in which tradeoffs occurred and the implications of those tradeoffs by asking about mothers’ initial preferences and needs when first considering child care options relative to the choices they made.

They found that 1) tradeoffs occurred along the multiple dimensions of care, 2) mothers used strategies to mitigate the consequences of tradeoffs, 3) tradeoffs varied in level of severity, 4) the more accessible the care, the less severe the tradeoff, and 5) tradeoffs varied in meaningful ways. These findings underscore the utility in applying a tradeoffs lens to assessing child care policy and practice in furtherance of equitable solutions.

Understanding Adolescent Self-esteem and Self-image Through Social Media Behaviors

2024-11-15T11:21:20-05:00

This article argues that in understanding self-esteem and self-image in adolescence, it is imperative to keep in mind normative adolescent identity development and how adolescents present themselves to society in the online world as well as their online interactions on social media.

Adolescents may use social media accounts to emotionally regulate self-esteem and self-image which may be related to their levels of anxiety, depression, and loneliness, with studies showing that social media can either positively or negatively affect self-esteem.

As a normative part of adolescent social comparison seeking, adolescents may build their self-esteem and self-image through social feedback, accepting or rejecting interactions with online peers. As society is more focused on female physical appearance, appearance-contingent self-worth is found more frequently in females.

Selfies, a social media form of self-portraiture, have become a powerful means for self-expression in adolescents, identifying with idealized figures toward their own separation-individuation from primary parental figures.

Rather than making sweeping generalizations about negative outcomes related to youth social media use, in clinical practice it is important to consider intersectional identity factors of a particular youth when assessing impacts of social media on self-esteem.

The parental pay gap over the life cycle: Children, jobs, and labor supply

2024-11-15T11:17:26-05:00

Women earn less than men, and that is especially true of mothers relative to fathers. Much of the widening occurs after family formation when mothers reduce their hours of work. But what happens when the kids grow up?

To answer that question, the researchers estimated three earning gaps: the “motherhood penalty,” the “price of being female,” and the “fatherhood premium.” When added together, these three produce the “parental gender gap,” defined as the difference in earnings between mothers and fathers.

They estimated (log) earnings gaps for college graduates born around 1960 using longitudinal data from the NLSY79 and from the LEHD-Census that track respondents from their twenties to their fifties.

As the children grow up and as women work more hours, the motherhood penalty is greatly reduced. But women, especially mothers, seem willing throughout their working lives to trade lower pay for various amenities, such as working in firms with management practices that are less penalizing of career interruptions or of shorter work schedules. Fathers, however, manage to expand their relative earnings gains as their children age, particularly among those working in time-intensive jobs, irrespective of work hours or firm fixed effects. The parental gender gap in earnings remains substantial over the family lifecycle.

Understanding ‘Post-Pandemic’ Family Child Care Providers: Survey of New Entrants and Those Who Left the Field

2024-11-13T14:08:17-05:00

Senior Research Scientist Wendy Wagner Robeson, Ed.D., collaborated with Kimberly Lucas, Ph.D., Professor of the Practice in Public Policy and Economic Justice at Northeastern University, on a study of the experiences of family child care providers in Massachusetts in order to better understand which government policies can help them survive and thrive.

With funding from the Massachusetts Early Childhood Funder Collaborative, Robeson and Lucas conducted a survey and focus groups with those who have become licensed home-based child care providers since 2020 and those who have recently left the field.

Their overarching goal was to understand how the Massachusetts Department of Early Education and Care (EEC) and other statewide partners can strengthen and improve recruitment and retention experiences for family child care providers as we emerge from the pandemic.

Based on their key findings, Robeson and her team made a series of recommendations for EEC and other key actors in the early childhood ecosystem. These recommendations include better communication and provision of business support and digital literacy support, development of mentoring programs, and the cultivation of trusting relationships with licensors.

The study is unique in seeking to understand the experience of family child care providers at this moment in time. The results can serve as the foundation for future insights to inform the early childhood policy landscape in Massachusetts and nationwide.

The Saturation- and Dose-Dependent Effects of a Teen Sexual Harassment Prevention Program: Findings from a Randomized Controlled Trial

2024-03-27T10:11:39-04:00

Using a randomized controlled trial, the researchers investigated changes in both sexual harassment (SH) perpetration and victimization of 2104 middle school students in New York City who received divergent saturation and dosage levels of Shifting Boundaries, an SH prevention program, which was represented by the length of the program. They assessed the saturation effect of the program by comparing the outcomes across respondents from 26 schools in which there were varying percentages of students enrolled in the program.

The data suggested that, overall, the program was effective in reducing sexual harassment victimization but achieved a null effect against respondents' SH perpetration and that neither the length nor the school-saturation level of the program exerted a significant effect on SH perpetration. Although the data indicated a significant difference in SH victimization between the treatment and control group, when comparing subgroups who received treatment with divergent saturation and dosage levels, no statistically significant difference was identified.

These results suggested that the program effect was not contingent on the portion of students in a school who enrolled in the program, nor was it contingent on the dosage.

Association Between Social Media Use and Substance Use Among Middle and High School-Aged Youth

2024-03-11T14:05:58-04:00

The purpose of this study was to identify whether different aspects of social media use were associated with substance use among middle- and high school-aged youth. Participants were recruited from four northeast U.S. middle schools and invited to complete an online survey in fall 2019 and fall 2020.

The researchers found that seeing a social media post about drugs/alcohol in the past 12 months was significantly associated with higher odds of ever using alcohol, cannabis, e-cigarettes, and multiple substances. The total number of social media sites ever used was significantly associated with higher odds of ever using cannabis, cigarettes, e-cigarettes, and multiple substances. Checking social media every hour or more was significantly associated with higher odds of ever using alcohol. A higher problematic internet use score was significantly associated with higher odds of ever using cannabis, e-cigarettes, and multiple substances.

These findings support the need for substance use prevention and social media literacy education and screening to begin early, ideally in elementary school, before youth are using social media and substances.

This study was supported by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute for Child Health and Human Development under award number R15HD094281-01. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health.

Sexual Minorities and Loneliness: Exploring Sexuality through Social Media and Gender–Sexuality Alliance (GSA) Supports

2024-03-11T14:03:25-04:00

In this study, the researchers examined online and offline social supports for sexual minority adolescents, underscoring the understudied developmental period of early adolescence and the mental outcome of loneliness.

LGBTQ+ youth reported significantly higher levels of loneliness compared to their heterosexual counterparts. To understand potential sources of social support while youth explore their sexual identities, the researchers compared the experiences of LGBTQ+ youth at both ends of the loneliness spectrum. Gaining knowledge about their sexual orientation from LGBTQ+ organization websites, participating in gender-sexuality alliances, and using TikTok or Instagram were associated with lower levels of loneliness. Providing social support to online friends was associated with lower loneliness; however, receiving online support was not associated with lower loneliness. Furthermore, proactive social media engagement such as posting uplifting content, joining online communities, or raising awareness about social issues were associated with lower levels of loneliness.

These results provide guidance on specific youth behaviors and online communities beyond a focus on screen time, while highlighting the continued need for social support to ameliorate loneliness, such as gender-sexuality alliance networks.

Parental Monitoring of Early Adolescent Social Technology Use in the U.S.: A Mixed-Method Study

2024-01-24T10:51:44-05:00

In this study, the researchers surveyed 248 U.S. parents of early adolescents about their media monitoring behaviors, the family context, and perceptions of their children’s problematic internet use. The results revealed that restrictive parental monitoring (including rules and limits of time or content) of adolescents’ digital media use was associated with children’s problematic internet use. However, active monitoring (efforts to promote critical thinking of the media by discussing central themes, character choices, and implicit messages of content) and deference monitoring (intentional avoidance of restrictions, often in an attempt to showcase parental trust in children’s decision-making) were not associated with early adolescent problematic internet use and were associated with family contexts.

Qualitative interviews with a subset of 31 parents revealed that while most parents reported restrictive behaviors, multiple techniques (e.g., active, surveillant, and deference) were also leveraged when navigating children’s online behaviors. Parents tended to converge on the same types and reasons for restrictive monitoring, whereas for other approaches the reasons behind their decision-making were quite different.

The implication of this study is that parental media monitoring behaviors during early adolescence are rapidly evolving and not confined to a single strategy. Understanding the family dynamics and parental involvement in adolescents’ digital media use remains critical in preventing children’s problematic behaviors and promoting positive online behaviors.

Research reported in this publication was supported by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development of the National Institutes of Health under award number 1R15HD094281-01 and Children and Screens: Institute of Digital Media and Child Development. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the National Institutes of Health.

Publications by Justice and Gender Based Violence Research Initiative - ��������