Community Mantras: A Tool for Reinforcing Positivity & Bolstering Mental Health Online
Had a fascinating discussion the other day with a leading psychiatrist who specializes in suicide, exploring the root causes of the epidemic in the U.S (controlling for age, rates increased by 33% from 1999–2017).
There are clearly many contributing factors (ex: opioids, the tumultuous job landscape due to automation & globalization; etc), but the discussion focused on the role of social media in driving the things (like vanity, anxiety, bullying) that motivate self-harm & eventual suicide.
Naturally, our conversation then turned to what the leading social platforms (ex: Facebook, Snap, Twitter, Reddit, Instagram, TikTok, etc) can do to reverse the trend. One idea surfaced that I’m sort of surprised we haven’t seen more of. Call it the “Community Mantra.”
Each social platform likely has a set of values or principles that they expect their users to employ (ex: compassion, open-mindedness, empathy, etc), much as they likely do within their companies for their employees.
Businesses already do a number of things to reinforce their internal corporate values, such as screening for “culture fit” during interviews; weaving them into all-hands meetings; covering their offices in referential posters; and more.
Their ubiquity functions much like the recitation of a Mantra, a word, phrase, or — in this case — set of phrases designed to reinforce focus and align the organization on its unique operating principles.
Where recanted internal corporate values may serve as a Team Mantra, a Community Mantra is a recurring reminder to platform users of behavioral expectations.
Where Team Mantras are part of the physical environment employees inhabit to keep top of mind, Community Mantras could be regularly displayed as part of the digital user experience wherever & whenever most effective (ex: pinned to the top of a News Feed).
You could think about this akin to what one might expect offline in the quiet car of a train (ex: no cell phone usage); inside an athletic club (ex: no non-marking shoe soles); within a subway car (ex: “if you see something, say something”); or going through airport security (ex: no liquids).
The more platforms can highlight the sorts of behaviors that are appropriate and inappropriate within their communities, the more their user bases will be equipped to self-police and the clearer the grounds will be for intervention by platforms and users alike.
In a recent chat with a friend who works at Instagram, I learned of some impressive work that its product team has done to preemptively catch negative comments. As a user types, for example, the platform in real-time assesses the sentiment text. If Instagram senses a mean tone, it prompts the commenting user with a reminder of the positivity that is expected on its platform, followed by an opportunity to rewrite the comment altogether before painful insults are even delivered to their recipient!
I’d love to hear what other initiatives the leading social platforms are working on to foster healthy communities!
