Eva H. Telzer’s research while affiliated with University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and other places

Contemporary affective neuroscience perspectives consider possible trade-offs of neural attunement to social cues for adolescent development. Integrating these perspectives with interpersonal theories emphasizing robust belonging needs during adolescence, this study examined whether exposure to naturally occurring interpersonal stressors was differentially associated with loneliness and depression contingent on adolescent girls’ neural sensitivity to cues indicating social threat (non-belonging) vs. reward (belonging). Eighty-six adolescent girls (M age = 16.31, SD = .84; 66.3% White) completed a social feedback task during an fMRI scan and reported on their loneliness and depression. Elevated interpersonal stress exposure was associated with more depression in girls who showed dampened but not heightened activation in the salience and social processing networks in response to threat (vs. reward). In the context of low interpersonal stress, however, dampened activation to threat (vs. reward) was associated with particularly low levels of depression. These effects were partially accounted for by self-reported loneliness. This research supports current trends toward developing a more refined perspective on the adaptational value of neural attunement to social cues for adolescent development, suggesting that the balance of social threat vs. reward sensitivity can confer emotional risks or benefits by shaping how adolescent girls navigate diverse social contexts.

Negative emotion differentiation characterizes the ability to draw distinctions between discrete negative emotional experiences with high specificity. Negative emotion differentiation is linked to improved emotion regulation and may be a key marker of adaptive emotional functioning. The present study explores how emotional language used by adolescents in daily life relates to their ability to distinguish among discrete emotions using two linguistic measures of emotion. Adolescents (N = 53; 28 girls, 23 boys, 2 outside gender binary; 73.7% non-White) rated their current negative emotions (e.g., anxious, fearful, lonely) via ecological momentary assessments (EMA) three times a day for 2 weeks. They also shared 94,497 of their direct messages sent on Instagram, one of the most popular social media platforms among adolescents. From these measures, we respectively computed participants’ degree of negative emotion differentiation across the 2 weeks and the positive, negative, and neutral sentiment of direct messages using a dictionary-based sentiment analysis (VADER). Results reveal that adolescents with higher negative emotion differentiation also had a greater percentage of positive and negative valenced direct messages. These findings are consistent with the notion that individuals greater in emotion differentiation experience and express a broader range of emotions in daily life.

Adolescent development is increasingly shaped by social media contexts, with implications for well‐being. In this commentary, we discuss and present conceptual and methodological alternatives for two persistent limitations in prior research. First, most prior work measures screen time, implicitly treating social media as a monolith. Emerging research highlights that social media are multifaceted environments where youth encounter diverse experiences. We advocate for more work taking this nuanced approach and for the development of a comprehensive taxonomic framework that categorizes specific online experiences afforded by social media features and content. To support this approach, we call for the development of psychometrically rigorous self‐report scales to measure affective and cognitive social media experiences and for innovative behavioral observation techniques. Second, research that considers specific online experiences typically focuses on one in isolation. We argue that a holistic, interactionist approach to understanding human development requires integrating the numerous positive and negative online experiences that co‐occur in distinct patterns for diverse adolescents. We discuss the merits of mixture models as one potential analytic solution to address configurations of online experiences and systematically model heterogeneity among youth. These conceptual and methodological shifts can lead to targeted interventions and policies that recognize the interactive effects of digital experiences.

Media effects research has observed significant diversity in the effects of social media on adolescent well-being, with outcomes ranging from positive to negative and, in some cases, neutral effects. In an effort to comprehend and elucidate this diversity, we have formulated The Swiss Cheese Model of Social Cues, a theoretical framework that systematically categorizes potential sources contributing to these variations. This dynamic model encompasses the complex layers of social cues present within platforms, the social environment, and individual (neuro)susceptibility, collectively shaping how social media influences the well-being of adolescents. The primary goal of this model is to enhance research by concurrently considering a broader range of individual difference factors, providing a comprehensive framework for investigations into the complex interplay of social context in social media effects.

This longitudinal, preregistered study investigated the hypothesis that adolescents who are raised in socioeconomic adversity engage in relatively more health-compromising risk-taking behavior during years when they show relatively heightened anticipation to social rewards. We operationalized this on a neurobiological level as activity of the ventral striatum, a region of the brain that is involved in social reward processing. A sample of 170 racially and socioeconomically diverse adolescents (12years at Wave 1, 53 % women, 35 % Latine, 29 % White, 22 % Black) completed annual assessments for up to five years, yielding 478 total observations. During annual fMRI scans, adolescents completed a Social Incentive Delay task during which we measured activation of the ventral striatum in response to anticipating social rewards relative to social punishments. Adolescents also self-reported risk-taking behavior annually, and we linked measures of baseline socioeconomic status via parent report and neighborhood census data. Our preregistered hypotheses were not supported; baseline socioeconomic status was not associated significantly with risk-taking behavior, even during years when adolescents were more attuned to social rewards. Sensitivity analyses examined the role of the anterior insula and amygdala and also yielded null results. Adolescents’ risk-taking behavior may not be as closely linked to socioeconomic status or social reward activation as previously hypothesized.

This study examined reciprocal relations between two dimensions of peer status, likability and popularity, and two dimensions of empathy, empathic concern and perspective taking, across adolescence. A school-based sample of 893 (Mage = 12.60, SD = 0.62) sixth- (n = 491; 55% female) and seventh-grade (n = 402; 45% female) adolescents from three, rural, lower middle-class schools in the southeastern United States completed self-report and peer-report questionnaires annually at four timepoints. Two trivariate latent curve models with structured residuals were fit. The first model examined within- and between-person associations between popularity, likability, and empathic concern, whereas the second model examined these associations with perspective taking. Results revealed no between-person relations among the latent factors for popularity and empathic concern or perspective taking. Conversely, the latent intercept for likability was positively related to the latent intercept for each of the empathic dimensions. Within-person cross-lagged effects from Grades 6 to 10 revealed that increases in popularity were associated with later decreases in empathic concern, while increases in empathic concern were associated with later decreases in popularity. Within-person changes in popularity did not predict later changes in perspective taking, but increases in perspective taking were associated with decreases in popularity. There were positive, albeit few, predictive associations with changes in likability. Results elucidate key differences in popularity and likability as dimensions of peer status; popular youth may benefit from the flexible use of empathic processes, while likable youth exhibit a stable, enduring propensity for empathic processes.

Associations of adolescents' smartphone use and well‐being have been contradictory. The present study investigates patterns of smartphone use and psychosocial risk / protective factors in US adolescents during COVID‐19 and examines their associations with depression symptom trajectories from 5 yearly waves beginning prior to the COVID‐19 pandemic. Latent profile analyses revealed three risk profiles, including a high risk profile (18.9% adolescents) characterized by elevated social media use, high levels of psychosocial risk, and low levels of protective variables. Latent growth mixture modeling identified three depression trajectories; stable low, moderate‐increasing, and high‐severely increasing depression. Both the moderate‐increasing and high‐severely increasing depression trajectories were associated with membership in the high risk profile. Results highlight the impacts of type of smartphone activity rather than use per se and can inform targeted intervention strategies.

Social media have drastically changed the context of adolescent development. To date, the majority of research investigating the effects of these changes has measured time spent on social media, yielding inconclusive results—likely because this approach conceptualizes social media as a monolith. Social media experiences are complex and diverse, as are adolescents themselves. Emerging research has identified several specific components of social media that have varied associations with adolescent mental health, as well as individual difference factors that may alter these associations across adolescents. In this annual research review, we synthesize evidence regarding heterogeneity in social media effects related to (a) specific components of social media and (b) adolescents' individual differences regarding social media use and effects. We first focus on the specific social media components—content, features, and functions—that may be especially relevant for adolescent development. These include functions designed to foster relationships and social connections (e.g., social media feeds, ‘friends’), hateful content, notifications, risky content, and algorithmically curated content, among others. Next, we provide an overview of for whom these effects may matter most. We review research on individual differences that may explain some heterogeneity in social media effects, including gender/sex, age, marginalized status, neurobiological and social sensitivities, and other preexisting vulnerabilities to mental health concerns. The nascent work in these areas suggests many specific constructs and considerations that could drive future research examining nuanced and precise questions that go beyond ‘screen time’. We discuss avenues for researchers to leverage methodological advancements and address how specific social media experiences and individual differences shape developmental outcomes.

This pre-registered study used moderated mediation to examine the longitudinal effect of racial/ethnic discrimination on executive function via resting state functional connectivity between four neural networks among 4,669 adolescents of color (e.g., 44% Latinx, 43% Black, 13% Asian, 8% Native American). Further, we explored familism and school support as social-environmental buffers. Measures included self-report, experimental, and resting state fMRI methods from the Adolescent Brain and Cognitive Development study. Greater racial/ethnic discrimination impeded adolescents’ executive function via longitudinal effects on connectivity between the brain’s attention networks, specifically among youth evincing low familism Among adolescents reporting low school support, greater discrimination was associated with heightened dorsal attention—salience network connectivity. Findings offer initial evidence for the neurobiological processes impacted by discrimination for marginalized youth. Identifying familism and school support as strengths that may “break the link” between discrimination and brain function contributes fundamental insights into brain plasticity and resilience during adolescence.