Given that self-esteem impacts adolescent identity development, examining the role of social media and its impact on self-esteem is important in terms of highlighting how it may both build self-esteem in some and harm others.
Key points
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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.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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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.
Introduction
A key factor in youth well-being during adolescence is self-esteem, which is shaped by an individual’s social environment. Positive social interactions with others are associated with higher self-esteem. One of the most prominent changes during this developmental period is the adoption of new social technologies throughout early (age 10–14) and late (15–19) adolescence. In this article, self-esteem and self-image during the adolescent years in the digital age will be discussed concerning several interrelated factors, including social media influences, normative developmental stages, peer influence, loneliness, online self-presentation, social comparisons, narcissism, contingent self-worth, and body image.
The rise of social media in adolescence
The prevalence and impact of social media on today’s youth, especially adolescents, cannot be overstated. Recent data from a survey conducted by Pew Research Center in 2023 show that platforms like YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, and Snapchat are widely used by teens. In recent years, there has been a notable increase in screen time among teens and tweens according to Common Sense Media in 2021. For example, during school hours, the app categories that took up the highest proportion of time were social media (32% of smartphone use during school hours), gaming (17%), and YouTube (26%). What is particularly concerning is the rise in social media use among children aged 8 to 12, despite age restrictions. YouTube is the platform most commonly used by teens, with 95% of those ages 13 to 17 saying they have ever used it. Two-thirds of teens report using TikTok, followed by roughly 6-in-10 who say they use Instagram (62%) and Snapchat (59%). Much smaller shares of teens say they have ever used Twitter (23%), Twitch (20%), WhatsApp (17%), Reddit (14%) and Tumblr (5%). Gender differences are also evident, with teen girls engaging more on platforms like TikTok, Instagram, and Snapchat, while boys lean toward YouTube, Twitch, and Reddit. TikTok use is particularly more common among black teens and among teen girls. The survey reveals that many teens find it challenging to give up social media and report both positive (feeling connected, expressing creativity) and negative (feeling overwhelmed, peer pressure) experiences. Importantly, these findings emphasize the need to delve deeper into how social media affects the self-esteem of youth, especially teens who are already at risk or dealing with mental health challenges because they are both more likely to have negative experiences with social media and value the benefits of social media, like finding resources, community, or support.
Self-esteem, self-presentation, and normative adolescent identity development
Perhaps the most widely accepted definition of self-esteem stems from Rosenberg who defines self-esteem as one’s subjective view of oneself. Recent psychologists have further elaborated the definition of self-esteem by underlining the differences between self-esteem and similar concepts such as self-evaluation. Adolescent self-esteem presents itself across various domains of self-worth including athletic, academic, social, and physical characteristics of oneself. A systematic review revealed that social media promotes adolescent identity development by satisfying their need for relatedness, competence, and autonomy. Vogel and colleagues conceptualize self-esteem as both a mostly stable trait that develops over time and a fluid state that is responsive to daily events and contexts. Social media influences adolescent identity development in different ways. Adolescents tend to experience social pressure, the Fear of Missing out or FOMO, or negative peer feedback which may harm the formation of their identity and negatively impact self-esteem. In a study by Quatman and Watson, assessing 10 measures of self-esteem among 545 adolescents in the 8th, 10th, and 12th grade, the researchers found that boys scored higher on global self-esteem and almost all other domains of self-esteem than girls. In fact, research finds that during adolescence, self-esteem drops twice as much for girls compared to boys. Some explanations offered for the significant drop in self-esteem for girls include biological and cognitive changes as well as larger societal expectations for women. In a study by Adams and colleagues, the researchers found that African American participants were more likely to report high self-esteem than European American participants and Hispanic participants. The researchers hypothesized that African American participants may have exhibited higher levels of self-esteem because of a strong ethnic pride and sense of community.
Online self-presentation is the process in creating an outward-facing self-concept in adolescents, a key developmental task during the adolescent period. Self-concept refers to one’s overall perception of oneself, including one’s memories. Self-presentation behaviors promote self-concept formation by inviting public feedback on one’s exploratory self-presentations that then may result in the desire to maintain, adjust, or escape from that presentation. Besides being an entertainment tool (scrolling/watching content on Instagram, Tiktok, etc), social networks allow users to construct electronic profiles for themselves in which they can provide details about their lives and experiences, post pictures, maintain relationships, plan social events, meet new people, make observations of others’ lives, fulfill belongingness needs, and express their beliefs, preferences, and emotions. Adolescents who focus on attaining positive and realistic possible selves are generally more likely to report higher levels of self-esteem than those who focus on negative or unrealistic selves. When adolescents present themselves via social media before developing a stable self-concept, they often present multiple highly idealized selves than those who reported a more fully defined self-concept. For instance, Balick describes the “false self” as the vehicle for our self-expression on status updates and tweets. In this way, the individual protects aspects of subjectivities that are less positive and happy to be projected into the world. Online self-presentation can also facilitate positive effects on the development of self-concept as adolescents interact with others through comments and messages, potentially resulting in the formation of supportive online peer groups. Studies have documented effective interventions to enhance self-esteem, such as in a study of resilience and cultural identity, researchers found that a culturally grounded program for indigenous youth increased levels of cultural self-esteem.
Importance of self-esteem and connecting with peers in digital environments
Researchers have suggested that self-esteem may be affected by both incidental and long-term exposure to social media. Positive and negative experiences on social media predict the amount of time spent on social media, but more importantly, can predict changes in self-esteem. Conversely, self-esteem may impact the way adolescents engage with social media. When young adolescent girls were asked what general social media guidance they tend to seek from adults or peers, the most frequently mentioned topic is to improve their self-esteem, as opposed to getting less hooked on social media or avoiding harms. Studies find that individuals with low self-esteem are more likely to shy away from actively engaging in social media platforms like posting content. Nonetheless, individuals with low self-esteem tend to engage in the act of “lurking” which involves keeping track of people. Those with a high self-esteem on average but fluctuate up and down due to external circumstances report fewer positive social media experiences compared to their peers and may be particularly vulnerable to a drop in self-esteem due to negative online experiences. While some studies argue that social media may negatively affect self-esteem, in a study by Mackson and colleagues the researchers found that self-esteem can be positively associated with social media use. They found that participants with Instagram accounts reported higher levels of self-esteem and lower levels of anxiety, depression, and loneliness compared to non-users. Effects of social media may also depend on individual characteristics that they bring such that adolescents with low self-esteem have been found to have positive effects in self-esteem the longer they spend on social media compared to adolescents with average self-esteem.
Researchers have found that social self-esteem is related to how adolescents engage with peers on social media sites, particularly when adolescence is a developmental period that centers around peer influence. Peer relationships in real life often mirror their social relationships in the online world. For instance, high self-esteem is linked to more online friends. Many adolescents engage in social media to seek acceptance and popularity. Not only do adolescents build a social rapport via social media use, but they also develop their identities. This sense of identity is often fueled by a sense of belonging in groups with which an adolescent relates to. Using social media has been shown to strengthen a sense of belonging in a community for older teenagers, particularly those with low self-esteem.
Social media use has been related not only to greater social connectedness and well-being, but also to increased loneliness. Loneliness is defined as a unique condition in which an individual perceives himself or herself to be socially isolated even when among other people. Loneliness is a subjective psychological state, and has been associated with objective social isolation, depression, introversion, or poor social skills. For instance, Pop and colleagues found that the use of Snapchat was found to be strongly positively correlated with self-esteem in a study of medical students. Almost half of the students demonstrated an association between Snapchat use and a moderate to high level of loneliness. Age and gender were found to be important; the younger the user, the higher the scores for loneliness and feeling depressed, and the greater the number of hours on social networks. In contrast, prior research has also demonstrated that adolescents use social media to reduce feelings of isolation and loneliness. For instance, black, Latine, and LGBTQ and youth are significantly more likely to use online communities to reduce social isolation compared to their white and heteronormative peers.
Due to the mixed findings of the relationship between self-esteem and social media use, a systematic review found that social media does not significantly impact the self-esteem of the majority of users but rather that there are person-specific factors based on individual susceptibilities, strengths, specific motivations, and types of use. 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.
Online social comparisons
Adolescence in particular is a time in which social comparisons become more important to individuals. Adolescents see peer interactions as an increasingly integral and rewarding part of their lives and they invest more in friendships during this time. They also move from primarily seeking adult affirmation in childhood to valuing the input of their peers above that of adults during adolescence. Krause and colleagues find that the 3 processes that drive self-esteem are: 1. social feedback processing, defined as a process that involves one’s ability to self-evaluate depending on the accepting or rejecting nature of interactions with others, 2. social comparison, defined as the need for individuals to assess themselves by taking into consideration others’ evaluations of their capabilities, and 3. self-reflection, defined as an individual’s reflection of items like one’s previous behavior. Social comparison is a normative aspect of adolescent development serving affiliation needs, facilitating decision-making, and helping regulate positive and negative emotions. Social comparison promotes self-concept development as it helps individuals learn about themselves and increases their motivation to engage in self-enhancement and self-evaluation and criticism. Because adolescents formulate their self-concepts based on the opinions and actions of others, online social comparisons may further influence their development of self. Females generally report feared possible selves (eg, fears regarding one’s future self) pertaining to interpersonal relationships and anticipate the reality of feared selves more so than males. Upward social comparison occurs when comparing oneself with others they perceive as superior or having more social capital, whereas downward social comparison occurs when comparing oneself with others with less social status. Although upward comparison can be beneficial when it inspires people to become more like their comparison targets, having primarily upward comparisons online more often produces feelings of inadequacy, poorer self-evaluation, and experiencing negative affect.
Adolescents, in particular, may be vulnerable to critical self-views facilitated by these upwards social comparisons, since adolescents increasingly rely on their peer contexts to inform their self-views. Adolescents move from a childhood overly optimistic or grandiose assessment of self to more accurate but less positive assessment of themselves during adolescence. Increased social comparisons and awareness of peer contexts may be one of the reasons for this shift in self-image. A recent study noted that Instagram users who reported higher levels of social anxiety, also had a higher Instagram-contingent self-worth, which was displayed via behaviors like consistently editing post captions. Meier and colleagues suggest that comparing oneself upwards on social networking sites (SNSs) can also lead to positive outcomes, such as feeling inspired, which is closely linked to well-being. When users encounter highly positive and curated nature and travel posts on Instagram, they tend to engage in stronger upward comparisons, resulting in feelings of inspiration through a benign envy reaction, ultimately boosting their well-being.
Selfies and narcissism
Social media sites can be convenient opportunities for those who seek appraisals and crave admiration from others. Narcissism has been strongly associated with high self-esteem as well as unstable self-esteem. In a meta-analysis of 80 studies, researchers have demonstrated that higher social media use was significantly associated with lower levels of self-esteem, higher loneliness, and higher narcissism, particularly in non-Western, non-individualistic countries. They also found that high levels of narcissism are highly associated with any type of active social media use, including total number of friends, commenting/liking posts, posting photos, and status updates. There is growing evidence to suggest that there are at least 2 forms of trait narcissism, namely grandiose narcissism and vulnerable narcissism. Grandiose narcissism, often referred to as “textbook” narcissism, is the most well-known form of narcissism and is characterized by high self-esteem, extraversion, confidence, and social boldness. Vulnerable narcissism, also referred to as hypersensitive, covert, fragile, or implicit narcissism is in stark contrast to the self-assuredness of grandiose narcissism. Vulnerable narcissism is characterized by hypersensitivity to the opinions of others, an intense desire for approval, defensiveness, low self-esteem, introversion, neuroticism, and insecurity, which is more commonly found when one uses social media in a passive way (eg, lurking over other people’s posts).
Selfies, a social media form of self-portraiture, have become a powerful means for self-expression, encouraging users to share the most intimate and private moments of their lives—as well as engage in a form of creative self-fashioning, an embraced narcissism that turns navel gazing into high culture, and leisure-based consumption into a virtue. This online behavior often mimics celebrities as a way to identify with idealized figures differently from parental figures that is typically seen in adolescent development. The fandom of Taylor Swift is 1 example of this type of embracement of media culture and idealized depictions of fame, talent, and beauty. It can be translated as a second form of separation-individuation from parental figures [for example, Blos, 1967]. Since one of the hallmarks of narcissistic behavior is a preoccupation with oneself and having a grandiose view of one’s worth, it is no wonder that our culture often describes those who frequently post selfies as exhibiting a public form of narcissism. On the flip side, a study of selfies made by Chinese college women found that posting selfies was related to positive self-esteem, wherein their social networks would provide positive feedback and enhanced body image which in turn affected their self-esteem. More research is needed to understand whether those who tend to post selfies have high self-esteem and higher body esteem to begin with.
Body image and social media self-consciousness
Body image is a multifaceted construct that refers to perceptions of and attitudes toward one’s own body. Especially during adolescence, there is a heightened focus on appearance as individuals develop their physical identities. Since there is a societal focus on girls’ physical appearance generally, girls tend to care more than boys about their online appearance. Over time, caring too much about your online appearance can lead to symptoms of depression. “Imaginary audience” thinking is one of the developmental aspects of adolescence where they experience the sensation of being under a spotlight with peers as their audience. This social-cognitive phenomenon is likely intensified by the influence of social media and can affect body image. The current body of literature cautions about the emergence of a “perfect storm,” where the features of social media (eg, idealized images of peers, quantifiable feedback), the developmental aspects of adolescence (eg, salience of peer relationships), and societal pressures (eg, societal over-emphasis on girls’ and women’s physical appearance) come together, possibly increasing the likelihood of body image concerns and related eating disorders. For example, a study by Zheng and colleagues of 963 female adolescents aged 12 to 16 year-old revealed selfie-posting on SNSs was positively associated with self-objectification, and this relation was moderated by imaginary audience ideation. Specifically, the influence of self-objectification on selfie-posting was stronger for young women with higher levels of imaginary audience ideation. An adolescent receiving a “like” on a post may not discern the specific reason—whether it is due to their appearance, other elements in the photo, the caption, or simply a gesture of support from a friend. In addition, a longitudinal study found that appearance-oriented self-esteem was not significantly impacted when adolescents engaged in self-oriented social media use, such as curating their profiles and posting updates. In contrast, participants who engaged in other-oriented use, such as engaging with others’ posts reported lower levels of self-esteem with regards to a particular form of self-esteem related to appearance. This relationship was stronger for female participants than males.
An explanation as to why some adolescents are more affected by body consciousness on social media than others can be found in self-worth contingency scenarios. Appearance-contingent self-worth is the degree to which one judges their own value and worth as a person based on their appearance and is positively associated with body shame, body surveillance, and negatively associated with appearance esteem. Having a low level of appearance-contingent self-worth is protective, such that when confronted with any perceived threats to their appearance on social media, for instance, it is not as likely to threaten their own self-worth. The degree of low versus high appearance self-worth is often dependent on a variety of factors including intersectional identity factors, such as race/ethnicity and family support. Additionally, adolescents who are in emotional distress may benefit from short-term interventions. Thai and colleagues study found that reducing daily social media use has a short-term positive effect on body image among a vulnerable population of youth with emotional distress and heavy social media use. The 4-week intervention led to discernible improvements in both appearance and weight esteem compared to control groups with unrestricted access to social media use.
The most popular social media (SM) sites for teens today are highly visual (eg, YouTube, TikTok, Instagram). According to Objectification theory, cultures that objectify bodies, socialize youth (especially girls) to believe that their physical appearance is of critical importance, often leading to self-objectification and body surveillance, which in turn lowers body esteem and increased depressive symptoms. Subjectively, negative experiences on Instagram or Snapchat, in particular, impact body dissatisfaction through social comparison and body surveillance. SM provides quantifiable feedback (eg, comments and likes) on public images, encouraging social comparison processes based on appearance, which can lead to appearance-related SM consciousness and poor body image. Girls have more appearance consciousness than boys and use more visually oriented social media platforms, such as Instagram, out of appearance related motivations and body image concerns compared to boys who are more likely to engage with gaming or less visually self-oriented platforms. Also, visually oriented social media platforms may especially attract high self-esteem individuals to protect their already high self-worth, as they may expect to receive positive feedback in such a platform through likes or positive comments given its unique features.
Despite the vastly negative focus of research relating social media with body dissatisfaction, the accepting nature of interactions with others on platforms can contribute to fostering positive self-esteem. Social media can also have a positive effect on body image by exposing users to more diverse representation and content. Body positivity challenges the unrealistic standards of beauty present in both traditional and social media by the promotion and acceptance of diverse body sizes and appearances. In a recent micro-intervention study, viewing body positive Facebook posts over a 2-week period improved body image and reduced women’s appearance comparisons. Viewing appearance neutral Facebook posts also improved women’s body image. The micro-interventions had no impact on women’s self-objectification. Body positive and/or appearance neutral posts may be effective micro-interventions for body image. Therefore, individuals can find belonging and encounter people who resemble them on social media.
Theoretic and empirical work suggest that the body-positive movement may, ironically, lead to increased body image concerns among some young people, via exacerbating the focus on physical appearance and increasing self-objectification. Ultimately, non-appearance focused media may be most promotive of body satisfaction. Consistent with this idea, “body-neutrality” (ie, appreciating a body’s abilities rather than evaluating its appearance) has been identified as a potentially valuable avenue for addressing body image concerns and disordered eating among diverse adolescents (eg, gender-diverse populations).
Clinical vignettes
This Case Vignette Illustrates the Beneficial Effects of Social Media in an Adolescent During a Severe Environmental and Social Traumatic Event
Sally is a 14 year old dedicated student and comes from a supportive and loving family. She had no prior psychiatric history. She has many friends, mostly girls and engages in friendships through social media and in person. Her self-esteem was stellar with good emotional connection with parents as well as being popular at school. During the coronavirus disease (COVID) pandemic she could not go to school or plan in-person activities with friends because her parents were very worried that she could get COVID and were controlling about what she could plan in person with friends. Over 6 months through the pandemic she became more isolated as it was difficult to coordinate activities with friends and even engage online with her school teachers and classmates due to non attendance. She felt progressively anxious and sad due to consistent isolation during the first months of the pandemic.
Sally has always been an emotionally intelligent individual and decided to spend most of her daily time online using Instagram, Snapchat, and Facebook to connect with her peers. She was able to develop good emotional connections with her friends that helped her to develop a sense of belonging to a group and continued to build her identity, relatedness and competence. She was asked to sign up for TikTok by her friends to share funny clips that would balance isolation and sadness of learning that people were getting sick and dying before the COVID vaccine was discovered. Sally built a solid social media profile for herself by posting pictures, comments, and jokes that allowed her to maintain relationships, help others, be expressive and meet new people. Later on when she felt that her self-esteem was coming back to her again with the same stability as before she was still engaged in social media but spending less time per day on it.
This Case Vignette Illustrates the Development of Isolation in a 13 year Old Boy with Social Anxiety and Low Self-Esteem
David is a 13 year old boy with social anxiety, Attention Deficit and Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and persistent depression. His parents separated when he was 5 year old and his mother developed postpartum depression when he was born which impacted his attachment with her during his first year of life. He had very few friends and could not function well at school. He tried to compensate for his low self-esteem by being the class clown engaging at times in oppositional and defiant behaviors. David’s father was absent and he lacked having a fatherly male figure with whom he could build on his identity. David spent many hours on YouTube looking into clips on how he could learn funny tricks in order to interact with others at school by continuing to be the class clown. He was developing a false self through hours of digging through YouTube and TikTok. As a result David was losing connection with classmates and did not make any friends but just acquaintances. He started to engage in the act of “lurking” keeping track of people online and also engaged in distracting thoughts such as social comparison with others. David became more lonely and depressed and started to question if life was worth living this way.
His pediatrician realized that David was developing a very negative self-esteem through social media and referred him to a psychiatric provider that started him on medication for his ADHD, anxiety and depression together with psychotherapy. After some time in treatment David stopped looking into how to be a class clown on YouTube. Even though he was inattentive and impulsive at school, he spent very long periods of time engaged in social media. There was also a difference seen within his unstable “offline” self-esteem becoming more positive while engaging with other social media platforms such as WhatsApp, Instagram, and Snapchat. His classmates started to interact more with him, increasing his self-esteem and consequently lowering his anxiety, depression, and loneliness. He began to post pictures and interact with 1 or 2 real friends, building somehow a sense of belonging to an adolescent group.
This Case Vignette Illustrates the Dynamics of Selfies Toward the Discovery of Adolescent Identification with an Ideal Self Through Healthy Narcissistic Drives
Mary is a 11 year old girl and physically older than her stated age. She lives with her parents that she considers “controlling and overwhelming” in pressuring her to excel in school and engage in sports. Mary is not a sports person but an artistic soul. She loves music and is a Taylor Swift fan. She listens to Taylor Swift’s songs constantly and follows her on Instagram. She is able to connect online through other Taylor Swift fans by posting selfies of herself mimicking Taylor’s gestures and postures. Mary is trying to build up a wishful identification with an ideal “celebrity” object in order to create a sense of adolescent identification and belonging with her peers. Her desire to have a more artistic identity rather than athletic helps her explore new ways of appreciating different body types online. Mary’s self-expression through selfies allows her to share intimate ideals in a form of creative self-fashioning through a healthy grandiose narcissism, making her feel free to explore exciting versions of her future self. This initiates a second form of separation-individuation, a phase in which kids start to deviate from needing parental approval for exploring identity development in adolescence.
Recommendations for pediatricians and adolescent clinicians
Psychoeducation with parents about guiding adolescents to practice making friends in person as well as in their digital worlds is a crucial component to social development throughout adolescence. It is important to note that adolescents often interact with their peers in real life and online, and using technology to interact with their peers is considered developmentally appropriate for adolescents according to the American Academy of Pediatrics.
Given the mixed evidence of self-esteem being positively or negatively affected by social media use, clinicians should avoid blanket statements that social media is only good or bad for one’s self-concept. Prior research has indicated that there are several person-specific considerations that may influence how much social media use may impact self-concept, including personality, user motivations, upward versus downward social comparisons, body esteem, and contingent self-worth. For instance, some adolescents may feel a heightened sense of loneliness due to passive social media use, however others, particularly those with vulnerable or marginalized identities, may use social media strategically to reduce social isolation and improve their sense of belonging and group self-esteem [Charmaraman 2021; 2024]. , We recommend a curious and non-judgmental stance in exploring social media use, self presentation in online spaces and self-esteem. Understanding important intersectional identity factors for a particular youth (for example race/ethnicity, gender, sexuality, etc.), the reasons behind social media use and how the young person feels about their social media use are helpful to explore.
In order to gain a better understanding of social interactions and behaviors online, clinicians might review how their patients use social media and identify areas for adjustment, such as pointing out a preponderance of upward social comparisons in hopes of reducing feelings of envy. In some cases, upward social comparisons can be beneficial, such that comparing oneself upwards on SNSs and engaging in positive self-comparison can lead to positive outcomes, such as feeling inspired, which are closely linked to well-being. For youth who identify ambivalence or negative effects on self-esteem related to social media use, using motivational interviewing techniques to identify possible behavior changes can be beneficial. For example, youth feeling badly after excessive upward self-comparisons, may take a break from the app, or start a new profile which effectively restarts the algorithm of generated content sent to them. Clinicians can help youth challenge cultural stereotypes about beauty, bodies and self-worth, encourage the development of healthy relationships in online and offline spaces and help youth develop healthy social media habits and behaviors.
Finally, due to the cross-sectional nature of most research linking self-esteem with social media, we need further research to understand the directionality of the influence. For instance, individuals may come to social media with pre-existing vulnerabilities regarding contingent self-worth or social media may exacerbate these vulnerabilities.
Clinics care points
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All mental health evaluations of young children should include an assessment of the child’s relationship with at least one primary caregiverWhen talking to adolescents clients, watch out for making any assumptions about their social media use. Ask questions about motivations and what they get out of social media – does the content fuel their low self-esteem or can it help to boost self-esteem?
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Parents could be advised to have not just one big media use discussion but to have these conversations early and often, in order to understand short-term and long-term impacts on self-esteem as they navigate the world of social media in the early adolescent years.
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