Our need to belong increases our dependence on social media feedback.

Check out @bcdavidson.bsky.social's preprint (w/ @georgiaturner.bsky.social @orbenamy.bsky.social @livia-tomova.bsky.social and co.) about the (computational) consequences of social isolation in social media use during covid!

So excited this is now out!

Are you a potential, current, or past ReproducibiliTea organizer? ✨ Join our upcoming networking event! 📅 October 2, 2025 (16:00 CEST) on Zoom 👉 Register for the Zoom link: forms.gle/iH6sHt3dB4Wf... Everyone is welcome!

Great time in London watching intern @sineadcleary.bsky.social and research assistant Brandon Davidson give a fantastic presentation to the UK Department for Science, Innovation and Technology - what superstars I get to work with!

An abbreviation (ABB) in a journal article (JA) or Grant Application (GA) is rarely worth the words it saves. Every ABB requires cognitive resources (CR) and at my age by the time I'm halfway through a JA or GA I no longer have the CR to remember what your ABB stood for.

Can confirm it was a fantastic 250+km across 10 islands ... when I was not miserable with wet feet, knee deep in bog, or waking up with 50+ seed ticks invading my tent 😅! Disturbed by only one Radio 4 Today interview and a phone call with a senior govt official.

BRB solo hiking the Outer Hebrides (south ➡️ north) over the next 2 weeks. 👋 No big news when I am away please, thanks.

The rest of 2025 promises to be exceptionally important for advancing social media data access for UK researchers. 📣 UK social media researchers! Join us at the event below to hear directly from Ofcom and UK government on current ideas, next steps, and to also share your own perspectives ⬇️

We have a ✨NEW PREPRINT✨! Using data from the @clscohorts.bsky.social Millennium Cohort Study and linked healthcare records, we tested the association between social media use and psychiatric diagnoses in secondary care in young people in England. This is still a work in progress - feedback welcome!

I'm hiring 2+ 2.5-year postdocs over the next few months. Job 1: looking for someone with deep expertise in computational modelling (reinforcement learning, agent based modelling) on real-world/complex data (closing: 18 August, starting: October-December), www.jobs.cam.ac.uk/job/52059/

Crazy coincidence how often [thing that will fix science of all of its ailments] coincides with [thing the speaker considers themselves an expert in]. Makes you think

🚨New preprint 🚨 𝐘𝐨𝐮𝐭𝐡 𝐏𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐩𝐞𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐯𝐞𝐬 𝐨𝐧 𝐒𝐨𝐜𝐢𝐚𝐥 𝐌𝐞𝐝𝐢𝐚 𝐇𝐚𝐫𝐦𝐬: 𝐀 𝐋𝐚𝐫𝐠𝐞-𝐒𝐜𝐚𝐥𝐞 𝐌𝐢𝐜𝐫𝐨-𝐍𝐚𝐫𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐯𝐞 𝐒𝐭𝐮𝐝𝐲 osf.io/preprints/ps... 🧵 Using a novel micro-narrative method, we collected ~ 900 first-person accounts of social media harms from young people across the UK and US.

Thanks for inviting me Anna, and the rest of the History and Philosophy of Science department 🙏

Screen Sense: Parenting in a Digital World, the new podcast from @shuhbillskee.bsky.social and I - first episode is now live. We hope you enjoy it. open.substack.com/pub/screense...

Very excited and grateful to receive the 2025 Psychology of Technology Dissertation Award for my PhD thesis! A special thanks to the Institute, the organisers and my wonderful PhD supervisors @orbenamy.bsky.social & @tamsinford.bsky.social. More info: psychoftech.substack.com/p/congratula...

Interested in improving researcher's access to social media data? Kate Dommett and myself are hiring for a Research Fellow (1 year; based at Sheffield) for an exciting new project to be announced soon: jobsite.sheffield.ac.uk/job/Research...

🔷New in Biological Psychiatry🔷 **Old Strategies, New Environments: Reinforcement Learning on Social Media** In this Review, we argue that the computational framework of Reinforcement Learning can help us understand social media behaviour: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

I might just have missed something ... but... in other news, last week, my team went on a lovely retreat in North Norfolk and we had a lovely time unwinding and re-centring after an exceptionally hectic few months/year! Photographic evidence attached; more waffling on LinkedIn.

🚨 Job opportunity! 🚨 @sheffielduni.bsky.social with @profkatedommett.bsky.social and @orbenamy.bsky.social, Research Fellowship seeking to advance researcher access to social media data in the UK, apply here by 9th of June 👉👉 jobsite.sheffield.ac.uk/job/Research...

So glad to see this out as a preprint!

Congratulations to @amiraskeggs.bsky.social for leading on this thoughtful and deeply considered piece of work. Interested in social media research? Amira is one to watch!

I am so excited that this is now out. An absolutely **mammoth** amount of work, please give this thread a read ⬇️💪💪

Reminds me that I once asked @sonialivingstone.bsky.social what area of public policy we could learn from when thinking about digital life and her answer was ‘town planning’

Recommendation for anyone with a spare hour over the long weekend: Absolutely fantastic lecture about science, race/racism, art and history. One of the best I have watched in a long time + even more pertinent in light of recent attacks on scientific values in the US: youtu.be/eZEAiXl6hNY

Very accessible and engaging write up of our Science piece by @natematias.bsky.social 🙏⬇️⬇️

A must-read for all of us in #philsci #sts. Written by scientists with a first hand experience of trying to provide evidence-based answers under time pressure and with most evidence being controlled by industry. Imagine inductive risk and agnotology combined, plus more and you get Amy's world.

New Paper! I'm truly excited to share @natematias.bsky.social and my new Policy Forum in Science published yesterday. We evaluate science's ability to address technological harms, and offer recommendations for what could be done to improve on the status quo: www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Why do scientists still struggle to answer basic questions about the safety of digital tech from AI to social media, even as families point to rising evidence of individual harm with concern & grief? @orbenamy.bsky.social & I have a new article in @science.org: www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

My PhD student @adigitaltanay.bsky.social released an episode of his podcast Cognitations interviewing ... me. One of the toughest interviewers I've had! You can listen to it here: open.spotify.com/episode/6L7q... He will feature some other team members next, so do give the podcast a follow 🤳

It was an absolute privilege to have interviewed one of my intellectual north stars @orbenamy.bsky.social on the @cognitations.bsky.social podcast. Another bucketlist dream checked off!! As always, she provides nuanced, thoughtful answers that reflect empathy for various stakeholders in this debate

A warm welcome to Dr Christina Haag, who joined our team earlier this month! 🙌 Christina brings outstanding expertise in computational methods, NLP, and AI, particularly in analysing psychological trace, language and questionnaire data - I'm thrilled to have her on board.

Deadline is Sunday!

I'm hiring! I'm looking for 1️⃣ pre-doc and 2️⃣ post-docs. If you're fascinated by media effects, quantitative methods, and open science, please consider applying 🙂 International applications welcome! Application Pre-doc: jobs.uzh.ch/job-vacancie... Application Post-doc: jobs.uzh.ch/job-vacancie...

First ride that felt a bit like spring 💐

Nice to see The Economist spotlighting our research and emphasising that we are “trying to paint a complete picture with both hands tied behind their back”. Understanding new technologies requires not just good quality and independent data, but long term and sustainable investment.

Representatives from government, regulatory bodies, and academia joined my team at Cambridge last week for an engaging and insightful 2-day workshop, discussing what types of research can help inform UK policy decisions around the impact of social media and smartphones on children and young people.

🥂 New winners of the Improving Research Community Builder Award are announced! 🥂 Congratulations to the winners, and thank you to the over 100+ ECRs who applied. Find out more about the wide variety of projects we are supporting here: www.orben.group/improving-re...

So excited to see this in print! A manifesto paving the way for responsible generalisation and co-authorship practices in open science - with an incredible team of scholars! Very much inspired by the benchmark Munafò et al. manifesto for reproducible science www.nature.com/articles/s44...

Hello #PhD students! We are running a workshop on how to organise scientific conferences. We would love to include your questions in our Q&A sections. Any tips and tricks you would like to hear from those who've been through it all? Read on… 🧵 1/5 #PhDSky #PhDchat

Researchfish. Never forget 💀 www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-uk-c...

My team is looking for someone to lead our operations and communications in a senior-level role! More details: www.jobs.cam.ac.uk/job/50079/

How can scientists provide courts with reliable evidence in tech litigation? @mwoluchem.bsky.social interviewed researchers, civil society, & litigators CAT Lab convened to ask this question. Here's her report: A Collective Front Toward Platform Accountability citizensandtech.org/2025/01/scie...

Come join us!

Calling Cambridge ECRs passionate about open, robust and reproducible science! Cambridge joined the UK Reproducibility Network as an Institutional Member this month. We are looking for a Local Network Lead to join our efforts (close 14 February), more info: www.reproducibleresearchcambridge.co.uk

My team has got news! Looking forward to working on this with great team members and collaborators across the UK ⬇️ www.cam.ac.uk/research/new...

Great to see work from our team lead by the fantastic @fassiluisa.bsky.social being written up for a general audience by The Mental Elf! Worth a read if you are interested in the evidence base on social media and clinical anxiety/depression in young people ⬇️

Smartphones: Friend or Foe? We'll be discussing the @joshmacalistermp.bsky.social Safer Phones Bill, with Josh, @orbenamy.bsky.social, Lisa Henderson and @jburnmurdoch.bsky.social. Last chance to register to attend in person or online. policyexchange.org.uk/events/smart...