With Australia’s social media ban coming into force this week, a new survey from Monash University has found that almost four out of five Australian adults support the Australian government’s social media ban for children under 16.
The survey, funded by the Australian Research Council and conducted by Roy Morgan on behalf of researchers at Monash University surveyed 1,598 Australian adults, found that 79 per cent supported the ban.
Support was lowest (72 per cent) among 18-24-year-olds. By contrast, 80 per cent of those aged 50-64 agreed with the ban as did 87 per cent of those 65 or older.
Professor Mark Andrejevic, who leads a research team that commissioned the survey, said the ban is targeted at platforms that have received negative attention for their impact on young people.
“This ban targets a handful of powerful, overseas platforms that profit from tracking young users to capture their attention and pepper them with ads,” said Professor Andrejevic. “These apps are flooded with loosely regulated ads and have scaled back fact-checking just as misinformation surges. They are using increasingly powerful algorithms to determine how best to capture and exploit young people’s attention. It’s a timely intervention in an increasingly unregulated digital environment.”
Australia’s ban has received global attention and other countries could follow suit. In the United States, there is bi-partisan support for the “Kids Off Social Media Act,” which would ban social media companies from delivering algorithmically recommended content to children under 17.
The findings also show bipartisan agreement across political affiliations. Support was highest among those identifying with the Nationals (88 per cent). Eight-five per cent of those who identified with the Liberal Party supported the ban, and 82 per cent of those who identified with Labor. Those who identified with the Greens supported the ban by 71 per cent. Those identifying with the Libertarian Party showed the lowest level of support at 52 per cent.
Of those who supported the ban in Australia, the survey found that key reasons included concerns about forms of influence and manipulation directed toward young people whose brains were not yet fully developed.
Survey respondents also expressed concern about mental health issues, bullying, exposure to extremist content, misinformation, and grooming by sexual predators.
Of those who opposed the ban, the main concerns included State interference with something perceived to be parental responsibility, censorship, effectiveness, and depriving young people of the benefits of online sociality and information. There was also concern about the consequences for marginalised communities being excluded from finding likeminded people online.
Professor Andrejevic said while some critics oppose the ban as a blunt instrument that removes the opportunities for these platforms to show they can behave better, expecting social media giants to reform on their own is unrealistic.
“This is a big ask for a system that channels untold wealth to those who have cracked the formula for filling our feeds with whatever is most likely to provide a quick dopamine hit, regardless of accuracy, civility or democracy,” Professor Andrejevic said.
“Unlike other media institutions, these platforms are not in the business of taking responsibility for the content they circulate. The platforms do not care about the wellbeing of our children or our democracy, that is up to us.”
The team that developed the survey along with Roy Morgan includes Associate Professor Zala Volcic and Dr Isabella Mahoney from Monash University, Fae Gehren, and Kyle Herbertson.
