Congress Should Not Mandate Warning Labels for Social Media

Senators Katie Britt (R-AL) and John Fetterman (D-PA) introduced legislation on September 24, 2024, that would require social media platforms to add warning labels about the potential mental health impacts of using social media. This policy proposal is fundamentally flawed for two key reasons. First, there is no established scientific consensus linking social media to harmful effects on mental health. Second, pop-up alerts on websites are largely ineffective, serving only to frustrate users without delivering meaningful behavior change.

The U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy published a New York Times op-ed on June 17, 2024, arguing that social media poses such a threat to children’s mental health that these platforms should come with warning labels like cigarettes and alcohol. Following this, 42 state attorneys general sent a letter to House and Senate leadership on September 9, 2024, supporting the warning label proposal.

Sens. Britt and Fetterman’s Stop the Scroll Act “envisions a pop-up box appearing every time users log on to access the platform, asking them to acknowledge the potential mental health risks before they’re allowed to scroll, post, or chat. The labels, which would be developed by the U.S. Surgeon General and FTC, would also link to mental health resources.

First, users often ignore pop-ups and cookie banners. In the European Union for example, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), in combination with the ePrivacy Directive (colloquially called the “cookie law”), requires users to give consent before sites store cookies or other data on their devices. These laws have led to a proliferation of cookie banner pop-ups on many websites. The consensus is generally that these pop-ups are mostly useless and disruptive to the online experience. Research shows that over 90 percent of internet users don’t read the terms of service or privacy policies. In addition, only 10 percent of kids understand the idea of a paid advertisement on social media posts. Are policymakers expecting children to understand the seriousness of a warning label? A pop-up warning label is unlikely to be read, let alone influence public opinion—especially for children.

Second, there is no scientific consensus that social media is causing mental health issues among youth. A warning label on social media would imply that, like cigarettes and alcohol, there are scientifically proven health harms from social media use. There are clear linkages between cigarette use and increased risks of cancer and lung disease, but similar linkages don’t exist for social media. The Surgeon General’s own advisory on children’s online safety in 2023 concluded there is a lack of evidence to determine whether social media harms children. Social media use among youth does not present a similar level of risk as tobacco and alcohol use. Young people gain significant benefits from using social media appropriately, including education, connections to friends and family, and just plain fun.

Advocating for a social media warning label is an attempt to perpetuate the narrative that social media is dangerous to children, despite the lack of scientific evidence to support this claim. This fearmongering tactic echoes the 1980s when then-Surgeon General Dr. C. Everett Koop argued that video games led to violence, social isolation, addictive behavior, and poor health outcomes among children. Popular belief and scientific consensus are not the same. For example, health gurus once warned against eating eggs because of their high cholesterol content, but they are now considered a healthy food source. While new facts and research may uncover unknown risks or benefits, Congress should refrain from implementing burdensome and ineffective policies like warning labels until researchers better understand social media's impact on children's health.