Antonia Teng, a senior researcher. “Since there’s very little in [his] social media accounts, it’s hard for us to do a complete analysis.”

The researchers, who published their findings online on Tuesday, were surprised to find that when Tepic wanted to take action to change the behavior of people viewing a certain content, it not only made them more likely to watch that content, but also encouraged them to engage in more conversations on social media with friends about it—even if in some cases their conversations came off as rude.

“Our study showed for the first time how social media and internet-based media can be harmful to the development of students,” said Svetlana Zhukova, a senior researcher. “We were surprised to find out that social media platforms can negatively impact a student’s social and social media engagement. Our findings are clear and will make it harder for students to use social media as a social tool.”

Though the researchers studied several thousand interactions, the overall impact of their findings seems to not only extend beyond the impact of a single interaction, but would impact almost all interactions.

“There are still many questions left unanswered, but the studies and data accumulated with our data will help us understand how to improve how schools operate and more efficiently use technology to benefit students,” said Zhukova.

—–

Note to the editors: For more information, contact Meredith Naylor at (301) 951-9283 or [email protected]. Students can reach Andrea Atherton at [email protected].