SACRAMENTO – In a bipartisan vote, the California Senate approved a bill from a Bay Area lawmaker aimed at tackling social media addiction among children and teens.
On Monday evening, senators approved Senate Bill 976 by Senator Nancy Skinner (D-Berkeley) in a 35-2 vote. The bill now goes to the General Assembly for consideration.
“Research shows that once young people become addicted to social media, they experience more depression, anxiety and low self-esteem. But social media companies are unwilling to voluntarily change their practices,” Skinner said in a statement. “With SB 976, the Senate sent a clear message: If social media companies don’t act, it is our responsibility to protect our children.”
Skinner’s office cited figures from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention showing that children spend six to 14 hours a day in front of a screen, much of that time on social media. A review published in the Journal of Behavioral Sciences linked the addition of social media among young people to negative health effects, including higher rates of depression, anxiety, lack of sleep and low self-esteem.
Under the bill, also known as the “Protecting our Kids From Social Media Addiction Act,” platforms would be banned from sending an “addictive” social media feed to a minor without permission from a parent or guardian.
Social media apps would also be prohibited from sending notifications to minors between 8 a.m. and 3 p.m. during the school year (defined in the legislation as weekdays between September and May) and between midnight and 6 a.m. year-round.
The bill would also require platforms to set a default time limit of one hour that can be adjusted by parents and that the default setting for a minor’s account be “private.”
SB976 has multiple sponsors, including California Attorney General Rob Bonta, Public Health Advocates and the Association of California School Administrators. The bill is also supported by the American Academy of Pediatrics.
In a separate statement, Bonta said the bill “puts control back in the hands of parents and children.”
“Our children and teens are experiencing a public health crisis caused by profit-seeking social media companies. In California, we take mental health seriously, we take children’s online safety seriously – and we know we don’t have a minute to waste keeping our kids safe. In California, we move quickly and fix things,” the attorney general continued.
Bonta is among 33 attorneys general who have joined a lawsuit against Facebook and Instagram parent company Meta, claiming the social media platforms kept teens busy for as long as possible to collect personal data and sell it to advertisers.
If passed, SB976 would be the first such law in the country aimed at addressing social media addiction among young people. Another state, New York, has introduced similar legislation.
