FACEBOOK KNEW INSTAGRAM'S NEGATIVE IMPACT_clean

According to a new report, top Facebook officials were aware that Instagram, the popular photo-based social media platform that it owns, can negatively impact mental health, body image, and more for teenagers, particularly teenage girls. Researchers who work for the social media giant found some of the problems were specific to Instagram and not social media as a whole for teens, according to the report in the Wall Street Journal. In a study of teens in the U.S. and the U.K., Facebook found more than 40% of Instagram users who reported feeling "unattractive" traced that feeling back to the platform. The Journal says it has obtained a presentation made by Instagram officials on Facebook's internal message board. One slide from 2019 stated, "We make body image issues worse for one in three teen girls." Another read, "Teens blame Instagram for increases in the rate of anxiety and depression". One presentation said, among teenagers who have experienced suicidal thoughts, 13% of British users and 6% of American users traced suicidal impulses to Instagram. Researchers also found Instagram negatively impacted some teenage boys, including 2019, finding that 14% of boys in the U.S. said Instagram made them feel more negatively about themselves. Although Facebook has taken some steps to potentially reduce negative impacts for teens, such as removing counts of "likes," the company has publicly downplayed Instagram's impacts. Instagram officials said in a statement responding to the Journal's reporting, "While the story focuses on a limited set of findings and casts them in a negative light, we stand by this research. "It demonstrates our commitment to understanding complex and difficult issues young people may struggle with and informs all the work we do to help those experiencing these issues."