Join the Cyber Policy Center on May 20th from 1PM–2PM Pacific for Adding Nuance in the Debate on Adolescent Social Media Use and Mental Health with Drew Cingel, Associate Professor and Graduate Advisor for the Department of Communication at UC Davis. It will be moderated by Jeff Hancock. 

Stanford affiliates are invited to join us at 12:40 PM for lunch, prior to the seminar.  The Spring Seminar Series continues through the end of May; see our Spring Seminar Series page for speakers and topics.

About the Talk:

In this talk, Dr. Drew Cingel will discuss and present recent studies aimed at understanding the nuance in how adolescents' mental health is uniquely affected by social media use. His talk will touch on individual differences in use, cultural differences in use, and differences based on algorithmic recommendations. Overall, this talk will shed light on the adolescents that are susceptible to both positive and negative effects of social media use on mental health, with implications for ongoing policy discussions.

About the Speaker:

Drew Cingel (PhD, Northwestern University) is an Associate Professor in the Department of Communication at the University of California, Davis, and a member of the Human Development Graduate Group. He is the Director of the Human Development and Media Lab. He studies the interaction between human development and media effects. He is particularly interested in understanding how facets of child and adolescent development influence media choice and the effects of exposure to media, including the areas of social media use on adolescent mental health and social-emotional development, children’s learning from media, including television and tablet computers, and the influence of media on child and adolescent moral development. His work has been published in journals such as the Journal of Communication, Communication Research, New Media & Society, Media Psychology, and Human Communication Research, among others. He currently serves as Chair of the Children, Adolescents, and Media division of the International Communication Association, and is Co-Editor of Media Psychology.