News from the Data-Community: MyData Weekly Digest

[Simple] Teen Loneliness Has Increased in 36 Countries. The Reason May be Smartphones

Loneliness among adolescents around the globe has skyrocketed since a decade ago, reports the Washington Post . And it may be tied to smartphone use, a new study finds:

In 36 out of 37 countries, feelings of loneliness among teenagers rose sharply between 2012 and 2018, with higher increases among girls, according to a report released Tuesday in the Journal of Adolescence. Researchers used data from the Programme for International Student Assessment, a survey of over 1 million 15- and 16-year-old students. The survey included a six-item measure of loneliness at school in 2000, 2003, 2012, 2015 and 2018. Before 2012, the trends had stayed relatively flat. But between 2012 and 2018, nearly twice as many teens displayed high elevated levels of “school loneliness,” an established predictor of depression and mental health issues.

#children   #smartphone

[Intermediate] Thousands of Scientists Warn Climate Tipping Points ‘Imminent’

Thousands of scientists have repeated calls for urgent action to tackle the climate emergency, warning that several tipping points are now imminent. From a report:

The researchers, part of a group of more than 14,000 scientists who have signed on to an initiative declaring a worldwide climate emergency, said in an article published in the journal BioScience on Wednesday that governments had consistently failed to address “the overexploitation of the Earth,” which they described as the root cause of the crisis. Since a similar assessment in 2019, they noted an “unprecedented surge” in climate-related disasters, including flooding in South America and Southeast Asia, record-shattering heatwaves and wildfires in Australia and the US, and devastating cyclones in Africa and South Asia.

#climate   #science

[Intermediate] Me2B Relationships and Me2B Deals