The government is asking the public to share its thoughts on young people and social media in its ‘Growing up in the online world’ consultation. McPin Young People’s Advisory Group member Usman shares their experiences with social media and how it differs from what they see young people dealing with today.
Usman Javaid
Before the Covid pandemic, I didn’t have a smartphone – something which teenage me resented my parents for – so, outside of school, I wasn’t really able to communicate with my friends. I could call and message them, of course, but everyone my age was using Snapchat, Instagram and any and all other social media apps available. This also meant that I wasn’t able to connect with other young people through social media.
During Covid, I was able to go on social media, and it allowed me that connection to other young people and provided me with some stability, and by having it, I felt like I fit in more. I was able to keep in the loop with everything that was going on with my friends in the world. I was able to talk to my friends outside of school when I needed support.
At that time, the ability to check in with friends – who I didn’t see in person for eight months that year – going from seeing them every day at school to not seeing them in person after all that time, social media was a lifeline to connect to them and the outside world.
Social media post-Covid
Bringing the timeline forward from lockdown, social media has opened me up to so many amazing opportunities, which have supported my own personal and professional development.
Through social media, I found out about Bright Green Future, a Youth Leadership and empowerment programme and residential in 2021, and the Bradford City of Culture Youth Panel in 2023. Being part of these opportunities has allowed me so much growth, gaining a better understanding of myself, having new experiences and networks.
Social media has opened doors for me in that sense, and there is so much great signposting and knowledge on there. Looking back, I was using it like LinkedIn before I knew about LinkedIn.
On a more personal level, I was able to see adults and young people share their lived experiences with mental health on social media. Lots of the learning I did around how to cope better with my own mental health came from social media during this period, as does lots of the healthy coping mechanisms, knowledge, affirmations and thinking I still use years later.
Social media allowed me to better understand myself as a young person, as someone who was struggling during a very tumultuous time.
I was spending more and more time online, and at the very core of these apps and algorithms that is the goal - to keep you hooked, to reel you in.
Social media overwhelm
Sometimes, social media became extremely overwhelming for me – constantly seeing global atrocities and slowly becoming numb to what I saw, switching from one app to the next until the day had come and gone.
Being on social media and consuming it so much, so quickly, took over my life. I stopped leaving my house to go to school, and my attendance dropped significantly. I became a lot more self-critical, and I developed social anxiety. I was spending more and more time online, and at the very core of these apps and algorithms that is the goal – to keep you hooked, to reel you in.
I am now at the point where I no longer have any social media apps on my phone, and that has been a long journey over the past three years, but it allows me more time to truly focus on myself and to be in the moment.
One thing that is almost certain as the years go by is change. I have definitely changed and grown as an individual, but other changes – digital and technological changes – seem to outpace that.
When I was first on social media, the exposure to online harms seemed to be less than what young people experience today. Things are changing so fast in the digital world, and comparing the digital landscape in 2026 to 2016, when I went into secondary school, it may as well be completely different.
Social media is expansive and sometimes difficult to manoeuvre as a young adult - it is designed to be addictive and to get a reaction; whether that reaction is positive or negative, the platform doesn't care.
The next generation on social media
I was able to keep myself safe through common sense knowledge and through PSHCE lessons at school; however, children and young people are online now at younger and younger ages. They are pressured as vulnerable children to fit in and be a part of whatever trends are occurring. How can they accomplish that? Through social media.
More and more children and young people are on social media apps, like Snapchat, Instagram, and TikTok. Despite these apps all having minimum age requirements, children and young people are still managing to create accounts on the platforms and are exposed to a world they don’t know how to navigate. Where they aren’t in control, the algorithm may expose them to every possibility of content imaginable.
Social media is expansive and sometimes difficult to manoeuvre as a young adult – it is designed to be addictive and to get a reaction; whether that reaction is positive or negative, the platform doesn’t care.
Children and young people at these increasingly young ages do not have the emotional intelligence, resilience or knowledge on how to stay safe on these apps, because these apps aren’t designed for them – they are designed for an adult’s brain to comprehend. Having a child see and consume the content on these apps may impact their own wellbeing, growth and development.
It is assumed that children and young people are able to stay safe online because we were born with the technology and can come across as tech-savvy. But this is not necessarily the truth for many young people online today. It is wrong to take these assumptions at face value, as the knock-on impacts that this can have on our young people are currently front and centre on a national scale.
The majority of young people are on social media, and they are consuming content that may not be suitable for them. Looking at it on a timeline, a toddler may receive an iPad or tablet where they can watch YouTube from as young as the age of three.
From the moment they have that iPad, they have the potential to be exposed to the entirety of the online world – from inappropriate advertisements on the app, to sponsorships during the video (some of the most prolific sponsorships being below-the-waist male grooming products, war-themed military games and wellness products) – all at incredibly young ages.
They may begin to go on gaming apps like Roblox – which has, at least, very recently (late 2025/early 2026) brought in strict safeguards, and is taking more steps to ensure child safety on the platform after nearly 20 years – or console games such as PlayStation or Xbox.
By the age of ten, the majority of children are online, and this is the average age at which they first see harmful content online, such as violent pornography. This statistic shocked me, because when I was 10, I was still using the family computer but being online at 10 years old now is completely different.
I saw the realities of children being online, which is a difficult pill to swallow when the children aren't just a statistic on the screen; seeing first-hand how lots of the children had been online for the majority of their lives on TikTok, YouTube.
Supporting young people online
I have worn lots of different hats in my professional career. I have been a youth worker, where I have seen children aged 11 being asked by anonymous Snapchat accounts for pictures of their bodies.
I have also been a Children’s Wellbeing Practitioner, where I delivered support for young people, seeing the effects of online bullying, leading one young person to attempt to take their own life and be unable to return to school for the better half of a year as a result. I’ve seen young people so isolated due to social media, staying at home and missing out on key developmental years.
As a Digital Inclusion Officer, I delivered workshops to parents on how to keep children and young people safe online, and training to children in primary schools from Reception all the way up to Year 6.
Here I saw the realities of children being online, which is a difficult pill to swallow when the children aren’t just a statistic on the screen; seeing first-hand how lots of the children had been online for the majority of their lives on TikTok, YouTube, Snapchat, and Instagram – some of whom were eight years old. Children at this age are still expected to hold someone’s hand when crossing the road, but they are online and active on social media.
The Online Safety Act, which was passed into law in 2023 and is in full effect as of July 2025, is a landmark policy. It aims to make the internet safer by enforcing safety standards that protect children and adults from harmful or illegal content. Now social media platforms have a legal duty to protect all users from harmful content, especially children and young people.
However, it doesn’t seem like much has changed because lots of these features are still being rolled out and implemented – some of which have been easy to bypass, such as facial age verification. Children are still seeing harmful content online, especially through posts and videos being pushed by the algorithm.
Something which is now implemented on every platform in some form is AI. AI platforms such as ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini do not have any protections in place for young people
It makes sense that three years ago, when the Act was being passed into law, AI was relatively new. However, this has left glaring gaps where children are exposed to AI, with AI chatbots, and asking AI to support them with their mental health. This is all seemingly underregulated, especially considering the risks it poses.
With an increasing number of headlines about teenage suicides linked to AI in the UK and the US, it is incredibly important that this becomes a focal point when it comes to keeping children and young people safe online.
Have your say
The government’s ‘Growing up in the online world’ consultation is open for the public to respond to until 26 May. You can complete the surveys to have your say.
There are three surveys to choose from.
- Full consultation for anyone (civil society, industry and members of the public)
- Survey for parents and carers of young people aged 21 and under
- Survey for children and young people (aged 10 to 21)
Based in Bradford, Usman has been working with Children and Young People for three years as a Youth Worker, Wellbeing Practitioner and a Digital Officer, and is now working alongside the Youth Justice Team to support the rehabilitation of young people at risk of reoffending.
Having worked alongside McPin as a YPAG member on a variety of different projects such as the 4S study, SASH study, Triple A study and the Influence of Influencers study, the work Usman does stems from lived experience, supporting research on a national level and individuals on a local level.
