As social media has exploded over the past two decades, questions have arisen about its negative impact on mental health.
But how can social media positively impact mental health?
Crawford County officials remain optimistic, saying mental health awareness posts on social media reduce stigma, spread information and foster community.
Crawford County Mental Health
Monthly data on mental health emergency room visits from Meadville Medical Center (MMC) shows that young women are seeking help more.
This data is consistent with a recent study from the Pew Research Center, which concluded that more women than men use social media and that social media use is most prevalent among the 18-29 age group.
Ron Arnold, a child and adolescent services program specialist and chairman of the Crawford County Suicide Prevention Committee, said emergency rooms have been inundated with young men seeking mental health intervention, typically between the ages of 20 and 40. He said he believes the younger generation is less affected by the stigma that older generations have long held.
“The idea that mental health issues are something that should be kept quiet doesn’t sit well with young men and they will seek help,” Arnold said.
John Debevec, the county’s child and youth social services program coordinator, doesn’t use social media but has limited information from his interactions with the youth population and said he has seen young people benefit from the opportunities and resources that social media creates.
“The online approach is interesting because it allows people to access information and express their opinion without necessarily revealing their identity, so people can engage, listen and ask questions even if they are not ready to directly seek help from a professional or adult,” Debevec said.
Arnold said stigma can prevent older adults from seeking help, especially among men in the county, where older white men have made up a significant percentage of deaths by suicide over the past six years, according to a Crawford County Coroner’s Office report.
“The people who commit suicide in Crawford County tend to be older men,” Arnold said. “We don’t know all of their circumstances, but that’s consistent with the ‘take it upon yourself’ stigma.”
Major depression and generalized anxiety disorder were the most common mental illnesses reported in the county from March 2023 to May 2024. While these figures represent the number of patients receiving treatment through Medicaid, Arnold said the data reflects what would be expected if patients receiving treatment through private insurance and those who have the illness but are not receiving treatment were included.
But it’s not just people diagnosed with a mental disorder who can benefit from increased mental health awareness.
How has social media helped you?
Shannon Dietz has built her counseling career and business in Crawford County. She has been a licensed psychologist for 10 years and a licensed counselor for about 15 years, and is an associate professor in the psychology department at Thiel College in Greenville. Dietz uses social media personally and to a limited extent for her business.
Most of her clients are on social media, and Dietz noted that her experience is highly indicative: Members of certain groups, like the LGBTQ+ community, have begun to seek her help, and she believes social media may have something to do with it.
“It reduces some of the stigma of seeking help,” Dietz says. “You don’t have to have a severe mental illness to seek help. What we see are people who are struggling with problems in life, problems fitting in, problems facing discrimination and stigma in society, and so therapy can be very helpful with those issues.”
Arnold noted that mental health providers can’t always keep up with the demand for services, especially from children, and said social media can create supportive communities and spread helpful information.
His daughter was able to successfully intervene when a man attempted suicide after an acquaintance in another part of the country confessed to her online his overwhelming feelings of despair and his possession of the means to kill.
“She came to me and asked what she could do,” Arnold recalled. “We located the person’s address and called emergency services for the county, and they were able to locate the person. The person later came back and thanked her for being willing to intervene.”
Dietz explained that while many disabilities can leave a person isolated or in need of immediate support, social media can play an advantageous role by fostering community.
“I think that’s a really positive aspect of social media, that it can help individuals find a community of caring people and help them feel like they belong and maybe even give them tips on how to manage some of the symptoms that they might be experiencing,” she said.
For example, people with bipolar disorder find social media helpful because they can quickly find support to help them manage their emotions, Dietz said.
But while social media can easily provide someone with helpful information, it can also spread misinformation.
How is social media harmful?
“It’s a bit of a double-edged sword,” Dietz said of mental health representation on social media. “What I’m concerned about is the more sensationalized aspects, like community violence. And then it’s immediately linked to the idea of mental illness, and I’m a little concerned that it makes it seem more dangerous than it actually is.”
According to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), an agency within the Department of Health and Human Services, only 3 to 5 percent of violent acts are attributable to individuals with serious mental illness. In fact, SAMHSA reports that people with serious mental illness are 10 times more likely to be victims of violent crime than to be perpetrators of it.
Arnold has worked in the mental health field for 39 years, so he often sees content about men’s mental health awareness when scrolling through his social media feeds, but the algorithms that program the relevant posts that appear in his feed are driven primarily by engagement.
“Social media algorithms are designed to get more views and keep people on social media, so sensationalist posts tend to get more views and appear higher in feeds, which can expose people to a lot of misinformation,” he said.
Dietz said when a major incident or tragedy occurs, people turn to social media for information.
“When something terrible happens, we want to find an immediate solution: ‘Okay, I know why, now I can stop it.’ But the reality is that there is rarely an immediate solution or an immediate explanation,” she says. “Most problems have many interrelated factors…. Does this post seem like an oversimplification of the issue? Like an impulsive reaction rather than a well-thought-out solution based on evidence?”
Dietz and Arnold say it’s important to verify the source of content to ensure its accuracy.
Crawford County takes the lead
Mental health services in Crawford County remain in limbo as they wait for more funding from various levels of government to provide the proper support their community needs. Luckily, social media is a free resource.
This summer, Crawford County Suicide Prevention Task Force will partner with Allegheny College to increase its social media presence, working across multiple platforms to increase engagement, raise awareness of resources, reduce stigma around mental health and increase the number of calls for help to the hotline.
The task force currently has accounts on Facebook, Threads, and Instagram, and is considering expanding onto TikTok and X (formerly Twitter). This information is beneficial for all members of the community, not just those struggling with mental health.
For example, there is an informational post about support groups for people who have lost loved ones to suicide.
“Grief hits differently for different people, and talking about it is a little different,” Arnold says. “That’s part of the stigma we want to eradicate. If you say, ‘I lost a family member to cancer,’ someone is going to listen. If you say, ‘I lost a family member to suicide,’ that tends to be a different conversation, and sometimes people are uncomfortable talking about it. That may not be the case for you, because you’ve lost someone, but some people don’t know how to talk to you.”
Arnold hopes the information shared over the summer by one of her students at the university will raise the county’s profile and send a positive message.
“We want to get more information out there to destigmatize mental health and make it normal to ask for or seek help, especially if you’re feeling down,” Arnold said.
The county crisis hotline is (814) 724-2732 and is available 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.
