
Front Row founder Jayne Charneski weighs in as influencers share more about anxiety and depression online, teens are following suit—and becoming targets. See her quote featured in the WSJ below:
By Julie Jargon
It seems like lately everyone on Instagram and YouTube is feeling anxious, stressed and depressed. Images of amazing vacations, flawless bodies and beautiful homes that once dominated social-media feeds are being replaced with snapshots of real life, with all its laundry piles and stretch marks.
Celebrities and influencers are sharing more of their emotional baggage. But when regular teens do the same, it can be risky.
Influencers have used the word “anxiety” three times more so far this year than they did in all of 2016 and more than six million posts on Instagram reference #mentalhealthawareness, according to Captiv8 Inc., an influencer marketing firm.
“With millennials, everything on social media was about curation, showing the perfect life. They were raised where it was all about the group and fitting in,” said Jayne Charneski, founder of Front Row Insights & Strategy, a consumer-insights firm. “Generation Z is being raised by Gen-Xers, who are fiercely independent, and so it’s cool to be different. Gen Z is an inclusive, open-minded generation, and vulnerability is social currency now.”
Read the full piece <here>.