Too much social media can impede romantic social skills in teens

Blue bird with speech bubble on keyboard button. Social media concept.

Although social media allows adolescents to stay in constant touch with each other, social interaction behind a screen rather than in real life could be preventing teens from developing the skills they need to manage healthy relationships later in life, suggests a new US study. 

Carried out by a team of researchers from the University North Carolina at Chapel Hill and NC State University, the study looked at 487 adolescents at two time periods, one year apart, to assess how much time they spent communicating with romantic partners in the more traditional ways of in person or on the phone, or by using the more high-tech ways of text messaging and social media sites.