Ethics & Equity: Tech Access and Mental Health Equity in Marginalized Groups

In this conversation, Yuki Kotani of the Child Mind Institute talks to Casey Pick, director of law and policy at The Trevor Project, about the impact of policies limiting youth access to social media — particularly for minoritized groups such as LGBTQ+ teens. This discussion is part of our webinar series on Technology and Youth Mental Health, which asks how tech can improve mental health outcomes for all young people.

Pick cautions that basing policy decisions only on negative aspects of online spaces plays into a harmful bias. She cites research from The Trevor Project and others on where LGBTQ+ youth say they feel safe. “Only about a third of LGBTQ+ young people will tell us that their home feels like a safe and accepting environment for their identity,” she says. “About half will say that their school is a safe and affirming environment. But it rises to nearly two-thirds when we’re talking about access to an online environment.”

These stats may surprise people aware of online bullying against LGBTQ+ youth. “But they experience negative input — bullying, discrimination, etcetera — everywhere, online and offline,” Pick says. “Sometimes the online environment is the only place where they will find that affirming environment, learn about their own identities, communicate with their peers, or see representations that give them hope for a future that they can strive for.”

Kotani contextualizes this insight succinctly. “Listening to the data — what the youth are saying — writes a whole different narrative than what the general populations is seeing.”

The interview touches on TrevorSpace, “a moderated community intentionally designed” for LGBTQ+ young people from The Trevor Project.

This video is part of a series of discussions on the ethical and equity challenges to accessing and leveraging real world data in youth mental health research. View more videos on this topic:

• Christa Studzinski, PhD, of the Ontario Brain Institute
• Amy Green, PhD, of Hopelab
• Stephen Scheuller, PhD, of the University of California, Irvine
• Becca Brendel, MD, JD, of the Harvard Medical School Center for Bioethics

View the Full Series

The Child Mind Institute is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. Donate and support work like the Technology and Youth Mental Health Series.