With social media now a big part of daily life for youths, there has been growing concern about its negative impact on their mental health. But it can also be a force for good.

“The reality is that technology can play a powerful, positive, and useful role in our lives by connecting us with people,” said Dr Janil Puthucheary, Senior Minister of State, Ministry of Communications and Information and Ministry of Health, at the annual Social Service Research Centre (SSR) Conference on 20 March.

A key question, he noted, was how to “mitigate the issues” that arise from the negative influences of social media. It was a topic that was discussed at the conference, titled “Youth Mental Health Landscape: Upstream Prevention and Downstream Intervention”, organised by SSR at the NUS Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences.

The hybrid conference, attended by 800 social work practitioners, healthcare professionals, policymakers and researchers, shone a spotlight on the various approaches to help youths cope with social media pressures – from digital initiatives to providing more support at school and at home.

Online Engagement
As youths have built a strong social media presence across multiple online platforms such as Instagram, Reddit, YouTube, and TikTok, digital strategies such as online peer support development programmes and mobile-led mental health applications make for good outreach tools.

To reach out to these youths, apps such as mindline.sg by the MOH Office for Healthcare Transformation (MOHT) and Myloh by SHINE Children and Youth Services were created.

Fearing mental health stigmatisation, many youths prefer to remain anonymous. For example, MOHT found that many youths posted about their troubles anonymously on r/SGExams, a popular subreddit or forum hosted on the social network app Reddit.

This prompted MOHT to launch an anonymous discussion forum called “let’s talk” on mindline.sg as an alternative platform that allows for youths to discuss their mental health issues and seek help. “We wanted to create a safer version of Reddit for our youths to get support and accurate information,” said Ms Janice Weng, Deputy Director at MOHT.

All services provided by Myloh also provide user anonymity. “[Remaining anonymous] is what young people want,” said Mr Eric Sng, Assistant Director at SHINE.

Connecting the Dots
Digital solutions aside, Dr Yeo Geck Hong turned to peer support training as an outreach tool to support youth mental health.

The research fellow at SSR ran an online peer support training programme evaluating 450 students across three local secondary schools. Bite-sized modules across four sets of skills—mattering (the extent to which we make a difference in the world around us), selfhood, compassion, and mindfulness—were taught over eight sessions lasting 45 to 60 minutes each, across three schools from 2020 to 2023

Preliminary findings revealed that students improved their grasp of the four skills, contributing to healthier peer relationships and in turn a more wholesome school environment.

Caring relationships between teachers and students and strong parent-child bonds were successful in promoting long-term mental health recovery in a study conducted by Mr Dennis Teo, Research Specialist at the National Council of Social Service.

Among 444 youths aged 13 to 19, those who improved in these two protective factors saw greater reduction in their behavioural issues over the course of two years.

Social work executive Rachel Reuben, who works with troubled youths, found the findings shared at the event very insightful. “It really helped us to make the connection with our youths,” she said.

Identifying At-Risk Youths
While prevention is important, experts also call for more intervention for youths who risk falling through the cracks.

“Most of the time, we deal with issues that are at the end stage of the problem,” said Dr S. Vasoo, Emeritus Professor at the NUS FASS Department of Social Work. “We need to develop a system that can identify the young people who are vulnerable.”

These include individuals such as youth offenders and youth who are emotionally neglected at home.

Assistant Professor of Social Work at NUS Dr Lee Jungup shared findings from a childhood traumatic experiences study (that is currently under review) on 1,000 students from local universities aged 18 to 30. She found that 75 per cent of them said they had experienced emotional neglect in their formative years. Some 56 per cent had faced physical neglect, and around 37 per cent experienced physical abuse. Those with multiple trauma experiences were more likely to have conditions such as depression and anxiety, she observed.

“During the short period (from adolescence to adulthood), there are a lot of ways that things can change biologically, socially, and cognitively,” she added.

Given such findings, it is imperative to have all hands on deck to improve youth mental health as a collective.

“The solution necessarily has to take the ‘whole-of-society’ approach with coordinated participation from various segments of society, including the community, government agencies, welfare organisations, healthcare, academia, schools, and workplace,” said SSR Director Associate Professor Eddie Tong, who is also from the Department of Psychology at the NUS Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences.

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This story first appeared in NUSNews on 8 April 2024.