Jay Van Bavel, PhD
@jayvanbavel.bsky.social
Professor of Psychology at NYU (jayvanbavel.com) | Author of The Power of Us Book (powerofus.online) | Director of NYU Center for Conflict & Cooperation | trying to write a new book about collective decisions
Pinned
Are a few people ruining the internet for the rest of us?
Why does the online world seem so toxic compared with normal life? Our research shows that a small number of divisive accounts could be responsible – and offers a way out
www.theguardian.com
Only a small % of people engage in toxic activity online, but they’re responsible for a disproportionate share of hostile or misleading content on nearly every platform
Because super-users are so active, they dominate our collective impression of the internet www.theguardian.com/books/2025/j...
Because super-users are so active, they dominate our collective impression of the internet www.theguardian.com/books/2025/j...
I'm thinking about how I'll change too. Tessa never changed--she's always been doing the hard, in person dyadic interaction work. My guess is that it will be back in vogue very soon. And a whole generation of behavioral scientists were not trained to run those kinds of hard, in person studies.
January 9, 2026 at 4:55 PM
I'm thinking about how I'll change too. Tessa never changed--she's always been doing the hard, in person dyadic interaction work. My guess is that it will be back in vogue very soon. And a whole generation of behavioral scientists were not trained to run those kinds of hard, in person studies.
I definitely feel this sometimes--as a science communicator, I regularly get trolled and mocked for sharing studies that people don't like. It sucks. The only way to cope is either block trolls or ignore them.
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
Audience Entanglement: How Independent Creative Workers Experience the Pressures of Widespread Appeal on Digital Platforms - Julianna Pillemer, Spencer Harrison, Chad Murphy, Yejin Park, 2025
Creative workers often seek a substantial audience for their work. Our findings reveal that a new struggle begins once they attain one. Existing theory fails to...
journals.sagepub.com
January 9, 2026 at 4:27 PM
I definitely feel this sometimes--as a science communicator, I regularly get trolled and mocked for sharing studies that people don't like. It sucks. The only way to cope is either block trolls or ignore them.
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
Creators need to distancing themselves from audience input, depersonalizing audience critiques, and distilling their own personal standards, to develop a sustainable online work relationship.
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
Audience Entanglement: How Independent Creative Workers Experience the Pressures of Widespread Appeal on Digital Platforms - Julianna Pillemer, Spencer Harrison, Chad Murphy, Yejin Park, 2025
Creative workers often seek a substantial audience for their work. Our findings reveal that a new struggle begins once they attain one. Existing theory fails to...
journals.sagepub.com
January 9, 2026 at 4:27 PM
Creators need to distancing themselves from audience input, depersonalizing audience critiques, and distilling their own personal standards, to develop a sustainable online work relationship.
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
Many social media influencers experience dysfunctional entanglement with their followers, characterized by feeling an oppressive dependence on audience reactions, struggling with platform volatility, and experiencing distressing emotions.
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
Audience Entanglement: How Independent Creative Workers Experience the Pressures of Widespread Appeal on Digital Platforms - Julianna Pillemer, Spencer Harrison, Chad Murphy, Yejin Park, 2025
Creative workers often seek a substantial audience for their work. Our findings reveal that a new struggle begins once they attain one. Existing theory fails to...
journals.sagepub.com
January 9, 2026 at 4:27 PM
Many social media influencers experience dysfunctional entanglement with their followers, characterized by feeling an oppressive dependence on audience reactions, struggling with platform volatility, and experiencing distressing emotions.
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/...
Large Language models pose an existential threat to online survey research www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
An AI can now evade a comprehensive suite of data quality checks, achieving a 99.8% pass rate on 6,000 trials of standard attention checks.
An AI can now evade a comprehensive suite of data quality checks, achieving a 99.8% pass rate on 6,000 trials of standard attention checks.
PNAS
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS), a peer reviewed journal of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) - an authoritative source of high-impact, original research that broadly spans...
www.pnas.org
January 9, 2026 at 4:21 PM
Large Language models pose an existential threat to online survey research www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
An AI can now evade a comprehensive suite of data quality checks, achieving a 99.8% pass rate on 6,000 trials of standard attention checks.
An AI can now evade a comprehensive suite of data quality checks, achieving a 99.8% pass rate on 6,000 trials of standard attention checks.
Sean Westwood had a similar paper in PNAS a few months ago: www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
LLMs are an existial threat to online survey research.
LLMs are an existial threat to online survey research.
January 8, 2026 at 9:30 PM
Sean Westwood had a similar paper in PNAS a few months ago: www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
LLMs are an existial threat to online survey research.
LLMs are an existial threat to online survey research.
When people were blocked from using internet on their smartphones, they spent their time differently.
Instead of using their phone, people spent more time socializing in person, exercising, and being in nature.
academic.oup.com/pnasnexus/ar...
Instead of using their phone, people spent more time socializing in person, exercising, and being in nature.
academic.oup.com/pnasnexus/ar...
Blocking mobile internet on smartphones improves sustained attention, mental health, and subjective well-being
Abstract. Smartphones enable people to access the online world from anywhere at any time. Despite the benefits of this technology, there is growing concern
academic.oup.com
January 8, 2026 at 9:12 PM
When people were blocked from using internet on their smartphones, they spent their time differently.
Instead of using their phone, people spent more time socializing in person, exercising, and being in nature.
academic.oup.com/pnasnexus/ar...
Instead of using their phone, people spent more time socializing in person, exercising, and being in nature.
academic.oup.com/pnasnexus/ar...
An intervention found that blocking internet access on smartphones for 2 weeks improved mental health, subjective well-being, and objectively measured ability to sustain attention; 91% of participants improved on at least one of these outcomes.
academic.oup.com/pnasnexus/ar...
academic.oup.com/pnasnexus/ar...
January 8, 2026 at 9:11 PM
An intervention found that blocking internet access on smartphones for 2 weeks improved mental health, subjective well-being, and objectively measured ability to sustain attention; 91% of participants improved on at least one of these outcomes.
academic.oup.com/pnasnexus/ar...
academic.oup.com/pnasnexus/ar...
We should no longer trust data collected on MTurk
link.springer.com/article/10.3...
My guess is that other online data is going to drop in quality due to LLMs. This is going to be an existential crisis for the behavioral sciences.
link.springer.com/article/10.3...
My guess is that other online data is going to drop in quality due to LLMs. This is going to be an existential crisis for the behavioral sciences.
January 8, 2026 at 8:26 PM
We should no longer trust data collected on MTurk
link.springer.com/article/10.3...
My guess is that other online data is going to drop in quality due to LLMs. This is going to be an existential crisis for the behavioral sciences.
link.springer.com/article/10.3...
My guess is that other online data is going to drop in quality due to LLMs. This is going to be an existential crisis for the behavioral sciences.
"Social media platforms reward certainty, shock value, and rage. This leaves little room for productive dialogue, quiet contemplation, or humility, and while some people may choose to stay and fight, most quietly withdraw." www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/shri...
Has Technology Made Us Less Courageous?
Why are we celebrating isolation? Technology may be rewarding avoidance—ghosting, quiet quitting, online hostility—at the cost of courage, connection, and trust.
www.psychologytoday.com
January 8, 2026 at 5:36 PM
"Social media platforms reward certainty, shock value, and rage. This leaves little room for productive dialogue, quiet contemplation, or humility, and while some people may choose to stay and fight, most quietly withdraw." www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/shri...
Reposted by Jay Van Bavel, PhD
Rank-and-file Democrats are starting to make serious noise about using the threat of a government shutdown to force substantive changes at ICE.
Furious Democrats threaten government shutdown after Minneapolis shooting
"We can't just keep authorizing money for these illegal killers," said Rep. Pramila Jayapal.
www.axios.com
January 8, 2026 at 1:51 AM
Rank-and-file Democrats are starting to make serious noise about using the threat of a government shutdown to force substantive changes at ICE.
Reposted by Jay Van Bavel, PhD
Broadband internet access is really bad for adolescents' mental health.
Why?
"Broadband internet access [is] associated with increases in cyberbullying & body dissatisfaction among adolescent girls and a reduction in the likelihood that adolescent boys reported getting an adequate amount of sleep"
Why?
"Broadband internet access [is] associated with increases in cyberbullying & body dissatisfaction among adolescent girls and a reduction in the likelihood that adolescent boys reported getting an adequate amount of sleep"
January 7, 2026 at 8:09 PM
Broadband internet access is really bad for adolescents' mental health.
Why?
"Broadband internet access [is] associated with increases in cyberbullying & body dissatisfaction among adolescent girls and a reduction in the likelihood that adolescent boys reported getting an adequate amount of sleep"
Why?
"Broadband internet access [is] associated with increases in cyberbullying & body dissatisfaction among adolescent girls and a reduction in the likelihood that adolescent boys reported getting an adequate amount of sleep"
These are admittedly very small effects after a relatively short deactivation. But nevertheless suggest there is a modest causal impact of social media use on psychological well-being.
January 7, 2026 at 8:03 PM
These are admittedly very small effects after a relatively short deactivation. But nevertheless suggest there is a modest causal impact of social media use on psychological well-being.
People who deactivated Facebook or Instagram for the six weeks before the election reported a .04-.06 SD improvement in happiness, depression, and anxiety, relative to controls who deactivated for just the first of those six weeks.
Removing these social media apps has a small positive impact.
Removing these social media apps has a small positive impact.
Do we have any information about the study design? The publicly available deactivation RCTs I've seen do also show that deactivation improves well-being, e.g.
www.nber.org/papers/w33697
www.nber.org/papers/w33697
January 7, 2026 at 8:00 PM
People who deactivated Facebook or Instagram for the six weeks before the election reported a .04-.06 SD improvement in happiness, depression, and anxiety, relative to controls who deactivated for just the first of those six weeks.
Removing these social media apps has a small positive impact.
Removing these social media apps has a small positive impact.
Reposted by Jay Van Bavel, PhD
Can't find evidence of harm if you just stop looking.
January 7, 2026 at 5:39 PM
Can't find evidence of harm if you just stop looking.
The results are consistent with reports of internal studies from meta by former staffers/whistelblowers
“Meta shut down internal research into the mental health effects of Facebook after finding causal evidence that its products harmed users’ mental health” www.reuters.com/sustainabili...
“Meta shut down internal research into the mental health effects of Facebook after finding causal evidence that its products harmed users’ mental health” www.reuters.com/sustainabili...
Meta buried 'causal' evidence of social media harm, US court filings allege
Rather than publishing the findings or pursuing additional research, Meta called off further work.
www.reuters.com
January 7, 2026 at 7:35 PM
The results are consistent with reports of internal studies from meta by former staffers/whistelblowers
“Meta shut down internal research into the mental health effects of Facebook after finding causal evidence that its products harmed users’ mental health” www.reuters.com/sustainabili...
“Meta shut down internal research into the mental health effects of Facebook after finding causal evidence that its products harmed users’ mental health” www.reuters.com/sustainabili...
I’ve read that can make stronger, if imperfect, causal inferences by looking at within-person changes over time and using controls. I’m not a longitudinal expert so this is why I referred you to the authors who are better equipped to defend their analysis. That said, IMHO The RCT approach is better
January 7, 2026 at 5:42 PM
I’ve read that can make stronger, if imperfect, causal inferences by looking at within-person changes over time and using controls. I’m not a longitudinal expert so this is why I referred you to the authors who are better equipped to defend their analysis. That said, IMHO The RCT approach is better
My guess is that it will come out in these various lawsuits.
January 7, 2026 at 5:37 PM
My guess is that it will come out in these various lawsuits.
I don’t know the study design from the internal Meta research and I agree it seems to match the results of at least 3 large RCTs I know of from academics (two from Alcott et al).
January 7, 2026 at 5:36 PM
I don’t know the study design from the internal Meta research and I agree it seems to match the results of at least 3 large RCTs I know of from academics (two from Alcott et al).
In the article, a former meta staffer compares it to big tobacco.
January 7, 2026 at 5:24 PM
In the article, a former meta staffer compares it to big tobacco.
Thanks for sharing, Joe. I’ve seen several articles like this from whistleblowers and recent lawsuits, revealing similar patterns of harms that have been buried.
I think its brutally hard for those of us outside these companies to ever get the full story.
I think its brutally hard for those of us outside these companies to ever get the full story.
January 7, 2026 at 5:23 PM
Thanks for sharing, Joe. I’ve seen several articles like this from whistleblowers and recent lawsuits, revealing similar patterns of harms that have been buried.
I think its brutally hard for those of us outside these companies to ever get the full story.
I think its brutally hard for those of us outside these companies to ever get the full story.
“Meta shut down internal research into the mental health effects of Facebook after finding causal evidence that its products harmed users’ mental health”
It's worth keeping in mind with both of these approaches that content-mediated harm may not be picked up by broad patterns of use. This is what Meta seems to have sorted out internally as the key mechanism, and then promptly buried.
www.reuters.com/sustainabili...
www.reuters.com/sustainabili...
Meta buried 'causal' evidence of social media harm, US court filings allege
Rather than publishing the findings or pursuing additional research, Meta called off further work.
www.reuters.com
January 7, 2026 at 5:11 PM
“Meta shut down internal research into the mental health effects of Facebook after finding causal evidence that its products harmed users’ mental health”
That is a great moderator to test, although it makes me wonder where people are developing these lay theories (eg media, parents, friends, or perhaps personal experiences).
January 7, 2026 at 5:09 PM
That is a great moderator to test, although it makes me wonder where people are developing these lay theories (eg media, parents, friends, or perhaps personal experiences).
This was not my work, but I also invite you or anyone else to reach out to the authors, reanalyze the data using different models and even reach out to the journal if you feel this is particularly egregious.
January 7, 2026 at 4:51 PM
This was not my work, but I also invite you or anyone else to reach out to the authors, reanalyze the data using different models and even reach out to the journal if you feel this is particularly egregious.
I’m also skeptical too—I think this only scratches the surface of potential long term networked effects. We are trying to get funding to study those too, but they are far more expensive.
I’d love if people know of any funding sources that are open to these more ambitious approaches.
I’d love if people know of any funding sources that are open to these more ambitious approaches.
January 7, 2026 at 4:49 PM
I’m also skeptical too—I think this only scratches the surface of potential long term networked effects. We are trying to get funding to study those too, but they are far more expensive.
I’d love if people know of any funding sources that are open to these more ambitious approaches.
I’d love if people know of any funding sources that are open to these more ambitious approaches.