Tuna Cetin
The Trevor Project, a US-based non-profit suicide prevention organization for LGBTQ young people, has revealed the results of its latest mental health survey, shedding light on which online platforms are considered safe and supportive by LGBTQ young people of color. (via TechCrunch)
According to the survey, which saw participation from 28,524 LGBTQ individuals in the United States, found that when compared to their White peers, more LGBTQ young people of color reported feeling safe and understood on TikTok (53% vs. 45%), Instagram (41% vs. 38%), Twitter (21% vs. 20%), and on social networking sites specifically designed for the LGBTQ community (21% vs. 19%).
At the same time, they reported lower rates of those feelings on Reddit (17% vs. 21%), Twitch (15% vs. 16%), Steam (6% vs. 9%), dating apps (6% vs. 9%), and Facebook (4% vs. 7%).
Meanwhile, TikTok is the only online platform where more than half of LGBTQ young people of color (53%) said they feel safe and understood. The popular short-video app is followed by Discord (42%), Instagram (41%), and YouTube (33%) respectively.
“We know that LGBTQ young people, when they go on social media, they often can benefit from social support and exploration and things like that — so we know that’s sort of different from their non-LGBTQ peers [who] might not be seeking that as much,” said Wilson Lee, The Trevor Project’s Senior Machine Learning Research Scientist, in a statement to TechCrunch. “And then, sort of from a different lens, community support is also another thing that young people of color tend to look for in the spaces because not everyone has access to supportive spaces in real life.”
According to the research, participants who feel safe and understood in at least one online space were 20% less likely to have attempted suicide in the last year, and 15% less likely to have had symptoms of anxiety.
Comments
Loading…