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I should've known that this article is predicated in Twenge's research. The credulousness with which these findings are approached is borderline infuriating. The obligatory "on the other hand" paragraph comes deep in the piece. npr.org/sections/healt… 
This issue is an example of how NPR's "both sides" journalism fails to inform and, in fact, actively misleads. There's a tremendous amount of research showing this is a much more complicated issue. The story should be framed around those complexities. insidehighered.com/blogs/just-vis…
But rather than deal with the complexities, NPR thinks they've done their job by presenting one POV and then another. This does not fulfill the journalistic mission of conveying truthful and accurate information. It is actively misleading.
You know what else correlates with the rise in depression? The first generation of students who have experienced schooling in the No Child Left Behind Race to the Top era. We have more evidence that school is toxic to mental health than we have for smartphones as a cause.
We had a rash of data come out showing that young people experience significant anxiety around school and future job pressures. Why aren't we focusing on how we've made young people's lives inherently more precarious? insidehighered.com/blogs/just-vis…
80% of Gen Z self-identifies as "worriers," and they're not worried about how they look in a selfie. They have existential fears over their own economic security and the future of the planet in the face of global warming. willowresearch.com/gen-z/
Social media use may likely have detrimental effects, but there is significantly more evidence that it's used as an escape from a world that young people see (with good reason) as fundamentally hostile to their future well-being. I'd be worried too. I am worried.
These are the chapter titles from a section of my book: Why They Can't Write: Killing the Five-Paragraph Essay and Other Necessities, and each chapter deals with some bad thing we're doing to students that increases their school-related anxiety.
The Problem of Atmosphere
