By: Preslav Tonkov

For Aristotle, the good life is lived in moderation. Excess in any human action or emotion becomes a vice. Courage lies between cowardice and recklessness; generosity between stinginess and extravagance. In an age of social media – where millions curate digital selves that project identity, values, and status – this Aristotelian “golden mean” offers a useful framework for thinking about how we might engage with these platforms more wisely.

Social media’s early promise rested on a simple and powerful human instinct: the desire to belong. As Sarah Frier writes in No Filter, Instagram’s early appeal was “less about the technology and more about the psychology – about how it made people feel.” Filters transformed ordinary life into something aesthetic and in documenting that life, users began to see themselves differently and to locate themselves differently within society. Social media, at its best, allowed people not only to connect, but to reinterpret their own lives.

Over time, however, this promise shifted. What began as a space for creativity and connection has increasingly been shaped by commercial incentives, algorithmic curation and performative competition. The logic of platforms has moved from expression to optimisation: visibility, engagement, and attention have become the primary currencies. Social media is no longer simply a tool we use but an environment that shapes how we see, compare, and present ourselves – and, increasingly, how we engage with it. This shift is central to understanding why time spent online alone does not fully explain its effects.

What the data tells us about teenagers and social media

This transformation has fuelled a growing debate about whether social media is, on balance, beneficial or harmful – particularly for young people. The 2026 World Happiness Report places this question at the centre of its analysis. Drawing on data from 47 countries, it finds that young people who use social media for more than seven hours a day report substantially lower wellbeing than those who use it for less than one hour.

The pattern is consistent across datasets. Life satisfaction is highest at low levels of use and declines as usage increases. Data from the OECD’s Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), covering 15-year-olds across 47 countries, adds an important nuance: not all forms of internet use are equal (See Schrijvers et al., (2024) on Europe; Twenge et al., (2021), which uses PISA internationally; Rausch and Haidt (2023a) on the Anglosphere; and Rausch and Haidt (2023b) on the Nordic Countries). This reinforces an earlier distinction: the issue is not simply how much time young people spend online, but how they spend it. Activities centred on communication, learning, news, and content creation are associated with higher life satisfaction. By contrast, social media use, gaming, and passive browsing for entertainment are associated with lower life evaluation. Excess, across all categories, is consistently linked to poorer outcomes – particularly in countries such as the United Kingdom and Ireland.

This distinction matters. It suggests that the issue is not simply how much time young people spend online, but how they spend it. Platforms that facilitate genuine social interaction can support wellbeing, reflecting a long-standing insight from both psychology and philosophy: strong social connections are central to human flourishing. But when interaction is mediated by algorithms that prioritise engagement over meaning, users are more likely to encounter curated, performative content that encourages comparison and dissatisfaction.

Cross-country evidence reinforces this point. Combining Gallup and PISA data, youth wellbeing tends to be higher in countries where young people spend more time online communicating with others, and lower where time is dominated by passive or entertainment-driven use. Latin American countries, for example, often combine high levels of social media use with relatively high youth wellbeing. By contrast, many English-speaking countries report lower wellbeing despite broadly similar patterns of internet use. The implication is clear: social media is not a uniform experience. Its effects depend on context, culture, and design.

Public attitudes among young people themselves are shifting accordingly. In the UK, a nationally representative survey by More in Common in 2025 found that 62 per cent of those aged 16 to 24 believe social media does more harm than good for under-16s, rising to 66 per cent among young women. More than half said life would be better if social media were banned for this age group. These are not the views of detached critics; they are the reflections of a generation that has grown up within these systems.

It is therefore unsurprising that policymakers are reaching for blunt solutions. Australia has already moved to raise the minimum age for social media use to 16, and similar proposals are gaining traction in the UK and elsewhere. Such measures may reduce exposure during formative years and could yield real benefits. But they also risk oversimplifying the problem, particularly if the issue is not only how much young people use social media, but how they engage with it.

The notion that maturity arrives at the age of 16 is, at best, a convenient fiction. Two years without social media, while potentially beneficial, will not fundamentally reshape the habits, incentives, or cultural environment into which young people are then introduced. Nor does it address the underlying dynamics of platform design. The problem is not simply access, but how these systems are engineered to capture attention and encourage excess.

Beyond time limits: a question of judgement

More fundamentally, the debate risks missing a deeper point. The challenge posed by social media is not only technological or regulatory; it is ethical and cultural. It concerns how individuals learn to exercise judgment in environments designed to shape and often, undermine it.

This is where Aristotle’s insight remains relevant. The golden mean is not imposed externally; it is cultivated through habit and practice. Moderation is not the absence of use, but the ability to use something well. Applied to social media, this suggests that neither abstinence nor excess offers a satisfactory solution. Too much use can lead to comparison, distraction, and diminished wellbeing. Too little may mean missing out on genuine opportunities for connection, discovery, and participation in contemporary culture – and, importantly, on learning how to engage with these platforms well.

The question, then, is not whether social media should exist, but how it should be used – and how societies can cultivate the dispositions required for its healthy use. This includes encouraging more active, intentional forms of engagement: creating rather than passively consuming, connecting rather than comparing, participating rather than performing.

It also requires recognising the limits of individual responsibility. As Jean-Paul Sartre observed, to be free is to be responsible for one’s actions. But this responsibility does not emerge spontaneously at a particular age; it must be developed over time, through education, norms, and social structures that support it. Expecting adolescents to navigate highly engineered digital environments without such preparation is unrealistic and raises questions about how they are supported in learning to engage with them.

None of this absolves platforms of responsibility. On the contrary, it strengthens the case for rethinking design choices that systematically push users towards excess. But it also suggests that regulation alone will not be sufficient. Without a broader cultural shift in how social media is understood and used, policy interventions risk addressing symptoms rather than causes.

The debate over social media has often been framed in binary terms: as either a force for connection or a driver of harm. The evidence increasingly suggests that both are true. Social media amplifies existing human tendencies – for belonging, comparison, expression, and recognition. Whether it contributes to flourishing or distress depends on how these tendencies are shaped, both by platform design and by how people engage with it.

The Aristotelian perspective offers a way through this impasse. The aim is not to eliminate social media, nor to accept it uncritically, but to find a mean between excess and deficiency. In practice, this means designing environments that support healthier forms of engagement, while cultivating the habits and values that allow individuals to use them well.

The challenge is not to escape social media, but to learn how to live with it – moderately, consciously, and, ultimately, well.

For educators and parents, this shifts the question. The task is not only to limit exposure, but to help young people develop the judgement, relationships, and habits that allow them to engage with these platforms in healthier ways over time.

Image Credit: Sanoj Hettige