
Facebook's mental health problem - kelukelugames
https://medium.com/@katikrause/facebook-s-mental-health-problem-9c48374c1bd8#.b26037nu2
======
anderskev
This narrative seems to keep popping up. Depression is not Facebook's problem
any more than it is Budweiser's problem, or Ben & Jerry's problem. People who
suffer from depression have unhealthy relationships with a myriad of things
because it distorts your worldview.

IMO, this is more a case of social media bringing deeper problems to the
surface than social media being the actual cause.

~~~
robotkilla
> more a case of social media bringing deeper problems to the surface than
> social media being the actual cause

I think its a combination of both. You draw a parallel between social networks
and budweiser. Alcohol worsens depression and I believe social networks do as
well. Whether or not they CAUSE depression is a totally different matter of
course.

> depression... distorts your worldview

I think this should be up for debate as well. Even though I've echoed this
sentiment myself, as someone with depression I'm starting to suspect that my
own is brought on due to a very accurate understanding of the world. I've been
painfully aware of my own and my family's place in the world (lower-middle-
class) since I was a kid. My own and my family's mortality is another thing
that makes me extremely depressed if I allow myself to think too deeply about
it. Wars, world injustices, the ultimate meaninglessness of life... I've been
thinking about all of this since I was around 5 years old. That's not a
distorted worldview, its reality.

I think a lot of my own depression stems from the inability to block out all
of the negative things in my life. Once I started meditating, stopped
following the news so closely, got rid of my repressive religion, stopped
letting lack of funds ruin my day (partially by blocking out all advertising),
deleted my social networks and got into an excellent sleep routine I've been
able to manage my depression and I feel a lot better.

~~~
pfortuny
I think rather than being a "very accurate understanding of the world", it
might be characterized as a "very acute understanding of the world without
pleasurable inputs." At least that is the way I perceive my own feelings (I am
a fellow sufferer).

Sleep and "news deprivation" have both been very helpful to me as well, as has
meditation.

~~~
J-dawg
Thank you for this comment.

> very acute understanding of the world without pleasurable inputs.

This sums it up perfectly. It's also what makes depression so dangerous. When
you're at your lowest point you don't feel like you have a distorted worldview
at all. You feel like you're seeing the world perfectly clearly. Of course,
you're actually not. You're blocking out all the wonderful stuff that actually
makes life worth living.

Blocking out news and advertising wherever possible has helped me too. And
yes, this included quitting Facebook.

------
exelius
I have noticed a pretty strong trend among my friends on Facebook: many are
active users through their 20s, then they hit 30 and it's radio silence except
for wedding / baby photos. My news feed is also nearly 50% advertisements at
this point. This has led me personally to disengage with Facebook, and I feel
many of my friends have done the same. If I were more isolated or vulnerable
though and craving a human connection, it could seem as if all my friends were
abandoning me.

I wonder to what extent Facebook's advertising algorithms (which dilute the
content/ad ratio of news feed items) are capable of driving depression. If
their algorithms are bumping posts from friends in favor of ads, your news
feed feels more "cold". I'm guessing that at least a small percentage of
Facebook's users are unaware that the news feed is generated by an algorithm,
and that your friends may be saying / sharing things that are not shown to
you.

Are Facebook's algorithms capable of influencing the happiness of its users? I
don't have a good answer for that, but it does seem plausible.

~~~
J-dawg
I experienced the exact same thing as I got into my 30s, as well as a huge
increase in posts appearing in my newsfeed just because a friend 'liked' it.
So I'm suddenly seeing the wedding and baby photos of people I've never even
met. It just felt creepy and weird, like I was intruding on people's private
moments.

I think this is because, as you say, people maintain radio silence apart from
major life events. When someone posts one of these major events, everyone else
feels like they _have_ to hit 'like' out of a sense of loyalty, which
propagates these posts much further across the graph. These are the only type
of posts I've seen that routinely get 100+ likes.

I actually think this could be a factor in the downfall of FB, as it develops
its own social norms (e.g. "I must always 'like' any photo of a female hand
with an engagement ring on it, despite the fact it looks identical to every
other one"). The number of likes a post receives is now completely divorced
(pun intended) from the inherent quality of the post, so the like button no
longer works as an upvote system.

~~~
exelius
> so the like button no longer works as an upvote system.

I don't think it ever worked as an upvote system. I think that many users have
that expectation, but Facebook has never really used "likes" alone to
determine news feed placement.

But I agree, I think this social phenomenon combined with ad blockers (which
effectively block Facebook's data feed into what sites users visit outside of
Facebook) will lead to significant downward revenue pressure on Facebook.
There's not really anything competitive yet; but advertising doesn't feel like
a viable model long-term.

------
jnbiche
> The World Health Organisation estimates there are 350 million people
> suffering from depression globally, and that by 2020 it will be the second
> most widespread disease in the world.

>This is shoddy statistics, but: 350 million people is one quarter of
Facebook’s global user base.

Admitting that you're using shoddy statistics doesn't somehow excuse it. You
can draw absolutely zero conclusions from those two data.

~~~
sokoloff
Exactly.

(Though technically, you _can_ conclude that at least 75% of Facebook's global
user base is _not_ suffering from depression.)

~~~
andreasvc
No you cannot. If being a Facebook user is highly correlated with being
depressed, the figure could be considerably lower. See Simpson's paradox. If
you take a subset of a dataset, you can find the opposite trend or a
completely different mean compared to the whole population. This is because
the subset can have particular features causing it to be not representative of
the whole population.

~~~
voxic11
Can you elaborate? It seems like simple logic, if 300 million people out of
the total population of humans have depression and Facebook has 1200 million
users. Then at least 75% of its user base must not be depressed. Because if
any more then 75% were depressed then there would be more then 300 million
people with depression.

~~~
will_brown
I doubt this is what the parent comment was suggesting, but...

~10% profiles are fakes/bots

x% are duplicates

x% are created as business profiles

FB has more fake profile than 186 out of 196 countries actually have people,
in fact all but the top 10 countries by population. Therefore, more than 75%
of FB users (distinct from profiles) could suffer from depression.

------
usmeteora
As someone who got rid of facebook in 2013 and has not gone back:

I may not have scientific evidence but I think alot of us could say it feels
like an addiction, and even is something we don't want to do but do anyways,
it makes us less happy but we still do it, it distracts us from work but we
still do it, it robs of of intimacy but we still do it. I don't know about
scientific research but that sounds like an addiction to me. THAT, is why
social media is dangerous.

Do you have goals in life? Is social media effecting your goals and the people
around you? Then limit it or get it out of your life.

I also think it plays into depression for a lot of people because:

1\. People cherry pick what they want to share so you are not getting an
accurate representation, and thus youre comparing all of your life, the cherry
picked and non cherry picked to theirs, which will inevitably lead to
dissapointment. They will show their photos of their trip to France but not
that they fight almost every night or have not done their dishes in a week.
They will post pictures of sushi but not how eating out all the time is
racking up their credit card debt. Maybe you should stay at home and save
money and maybe they are destroying their financial lives, but yet you still
feel inadequate for not having as exciting of a life? That doesn't sound
healthy..

2\. It's a stalking website for insecure people and people who do not have the
courage to engage or care enough to maintain a real relationships but want to
keep tabs on you. Why would someone who never interacts with you in real life
want to keep tabs on you? Try to that answer that quesion. Does it lead to
anything good?

Now ask yourself why do YOU need it? Do to those same things to other people?
To feel better about yourself? Why do you have so many selfies? Who are you
trying to impress? What are you trying to prove to other people? What are you
trying to prove to yourself?

I'll admit when fb first came out it was fun, before relatives and employers
and ads came onto it. It was a way to get invited to college parties and wake
up the next morning and laugh with your roomies as you scroll through pics and
remember what happened the night before. It was NOT about relationship pain,
being forced to announce to the whole world when something happens to you or
you break up, hating other people and ways to engage in infidelity, or
bragging about how many tens of thousands of dollars you spent on your wedding
photographer, but lets be honest with ourselves, now it is.

SOME ANECDOTAL STUFF:

For some people its reddit. my ex boyfriend was so addicted to reddit we could
be in the middle of a crisis, or on one such occasion I was discussing the
pros and cons of a long distance job that would require one of us moving or
living apart and thus him doubling his rent expenses, things I would assume he
would be inherently interested in and he was browsing reddit on his phone the
whole time. its like, nothing was more important than reddit. Sometimes its
just about maturity and respect. He would stay up late at night and complain
about not getting sleep because he couldn't stop browsing reddit.

It even affected our intimate life. I'm not a controlling girlfriend, and I
respect if other people have different opinions or boundaries for what is ok
with their boyfriends to do or not do, but I didn't really care he looked at
porn. But over time amateur stuff on reddit became an obsession and anytime I
did not feel comfortable doing something he would try to say well other girls
do it on here. Well I'm not them.

How am I supposed to beat the collective satisfaction of the entire internet
or even compete with it? There will always be a prettier, more successful girl
with better photoshopped selfies and a shorter skirt on facebook you are
friends with, than me. There will always be a girl on the internet willing to
do something in bed I'm not willing to do. So accept me for who I am or get
over it and move on. (The long end to that story is I did have to dump him
because this kind of stuff ended up destroying our relationship and now he is
incredibly depressed and I get emails from him about how its "eating him away
inside" regarding the state of our relationship when it ended. Yup, thats
right social media distorted his ability to properly value what was standing
right in front of him and as a result he lost what really mattered to him,
wow, sounds like an addiction to me.)

But the truth is with that attitude nothing will ever satisfy you, so the more
you do it, the more of a drug it is the more you need it the more it's never
enough, the more the person your dating seems somehow subpar to the collective
standards of all the other people you browse or look at or are "friends" with
on facebook while forgetting that as individuals all of those people have
flaws and limitations and after a year of living with them will probably
dissapoint you in some ways as well, and the less the people around you in
your real life will be able to satisfy you.

I got rid of facebook in 2013 after I broke up with my ex, because everyone in
our friends group didn't want to talk to either of us about how we were doing
or help, they just wanted to see when we would change our relationships status
so they could talk about us behind our back. The second I did guys that had
not spoken to me in months or years were suddenly texting me like hey whats
up. Really?

That's when I realized the people who actually care about you don't need your
facebook profile. People who need your facebook profile are people who want to
talk poorly of you and compare you to other people and judge you and keep
track of when you can be of use to them, relationship wise or otherwise. What
a pointless network it's devolved into.

Since I got rid of facebook the week we broke up, my life has gotten so much
better. I'm focused on MY life, not anyone elses, and when I accomplish
something its for ME. I don't have anywhere to post it or brag about it so you
have to ask yourself what really motivates you in life? If impressing other
people has anything to do with it then social media is probably going to aid
in that toxic thought process you have an influence your behavior in a way
that may ultimately be harmful to you.

My real friends which is maybe 5 or 6, some who live across the country still
remember to call me on my birthday even though fb does not remind them. People
I was not that close to or I didn't think I would ever be friends with stepped
up and really reached out to me and helped me get through a hard time, people
i least expected and they are not toxic or gossipy and they are not checking
my facebook to laugh about me behind my back.

If a guy or really anyone at all ever wants to get to know me, he has to
actually walk up to me and start a conversation, or is going to meet me
through mutual friends, REAL friends, not friends scheming to hook people up
on facebook, and before the conversation he doesnt kno w 1\. how old i am
where i went to school who i am dating who im friends with what i looked like
on my summer vacation last year...

so all of my relationships friendships or otherwise feel much more organic and
it weeds out people who can use information about you to manipulate you or
mirror your interests fakely to get close to you.

~~~
tdkl
> I'll admit when fb first came out it was fun, before relatives and employers
> and ads came onto it. It was a way to get invited to college parties and
> wake up the next morning and laugh with your roomies as you scroll through
> pics and remember what happened the night before. It was NOT about
> relationship pain, being forced to announce to the whole world when
> something happens to you or you break up, hating other people and ways to
> engage in infidelity, or bragging about how many tens <snip>

Yep, this paragraph nails it. It all became serious business.

------
pouria3
This is great. There is a fundamental problem with social media: There is no
self growth. It is all about researching other people. You end up learning
more about others and nothing about yourself. A feedback loop back towards
your self growth is missing

~~~
andrewflnr
I wonder if "encouraging self growth" is a slightly more actionable design
goal for social media sites than "embracing the messiness of human life",
whatever that's supposed to mean.

------
FussyZeus
"That I wasn’t able to perform for social media anymore. I used to go through
life mentally composing tweets and spotting photo opportunities for Instagram.
That was unthinkable now. The mere thought caused so much anxiety that I could
barely unclench my jaws."

Yeah that's called addiction. Sweet Christ people actually do that? I post on
Facebook very occasionally and it's usually bitching about something relating
to code or just posting a picture of something cool. I don't even invest
enough in this stuff to call it "composing" without feeling a little weird
saying that.

------
snthd
Is there a decent open decentralised alternative to using facebook events.
Maybe something pump.io based?

That part of facebook contributes value to my life - I'd quite happily ditch
the rest of it.

------
robotkilla
I didn't read the article as I'm too busy at the moment, but I keep seeing
these types of posts pop up on HN and thought it might be worth throwing in my
0.02.

I've long quietly suffered from depression. I didn't bother to make this known
to friends or family. I didn't want people to think of or treat me
differently. I didn't want to go on medication and knew if I revealed my
suicidal thoughts that people would look at me differently and probably force
me to go on medication.

Several years ago I went through some really rough experiences -- divorce,
loss of religion, family shunning, all at the same time. This hit me
incredibly hard, but I buried my depression in constant recreation, work and
alcohol. That's not to say I became or am an alcoholic - I'm not. I go for
months without touching the stuff sometimes... but I began frequenting bars
for a while on a near nightly basis.

Several years prior to that I also caved and started using social networks -
twitter, facebook and instagram. Eventually my depression won out and started
to show through. I couldn't stop complaining about everything in real life,
but more so on social networks.

When I hit peak depression I felt like I was also losing my mind... and it
showed in my facebook / twitter posts. As I feared my friends started viewing
me differently. I got dumped by my GF because of my depression and inability
to seek help (this was made known to me on her exit). That caused me to go on
medication and then things got really bad.

The shit the doctor put me on had me thinking really crazy and I made plans to
kill myself, which I obviously backed out of (not a ghost lol).

Eventually I went off the pills and got my head strait and I recently got a
fulltime job and have been living with a new wonderful GF who understands
depression for a couple of years now.

One of the biggest things that helped was near complete seclusion -- I noticed
that the pressure (and worse - feedback) on facebook was crushing me. Often I
would get mocked or would draw the ire of some of my "friends" for some of my
crazy / emphatic posts. Rather than trying to understand me or help, these
people turned on me. Interestingly these were people I know in real life (I
had a rule that I would only friend people who I considered real life
friends). When I deleted my facebook account for the first time, I gave
warning and got at least one "good riddance". These were from adults in their
30s by the way.

Instagram was no better. I kept it around for way too long. I would get almost
no likes on my photos or the same mocking comments (from different people than
the FB posts). Then my "friends" started following my girlfriend and would
like her photos, but would skip mine over, or they would like photos I posted
of her art but would ignore my work. That could have been completely innocent
and coincidental of course, but in my depressed state it felt like a judgment
of myself.

I ended up deleting everything -- fb, twitter, instagram, gmail, yahoo, my
phone number... i left it all behind and after a couple of months have felt
like my old self.

I know this is all anecdotal, and its possibly a coincidence that my
depression became more manageable after dumping all my accounts. I also know
that social networks didn't CAUSE the depression, but they absolutely kept me
locked in my head and in a moment in time that I need to move past. Deleting
them seems to have helped and I have no intention of going back.

------
amelius
Here's a nice social experiment: what would happen if all users were required
to post their bank balance along with their status updates? All those nice
vacation pictures have to be financed _somehow_...

By the way, I just unfollow all of my friends by default, so I don't have to
read their status updates when I just want to check out some events.

------
thegayngler
I know many may not think SUZE ORMAN is right on everything but she used to
always say "People who feel less than spend more than". Facebook may be
thinking the same things as this would help their advertisers.

------
darkerside
> Which begs the question: Have the researchers ever actually used Facebook?

I take it from tone that the author expected an obvious point to hit home
here. It completely flew over my head. Anyone else pick up on it?

~~~
vanderZwan
> _Stalk acquaintances and compare your life to theirs, and bang, here comes
> depression. Dotingly check on your friends and family, and you’ll be happy._

My best guess is that Facebook's interface and presentation can encourage one
over the other. It's biased to show success stories, so I'd say it is more
leaning towards the former.

------
johann28
The same can happen with many things on the internet. Reddit, Youtube etc.
It's not specific to facebook.

------
kelukelugames
It's more Twitter than Facebook for me, but same problem.

