dr. twenge, more lonely.o despite the constant connectivity, and the belief that, hey, you're in touch with your friends, the way that people my age are reconnecting with people they went to high school with, in reality, they're feeling more lonely. explain that. >> yes, so that's the interesting thing. you'd think maybe that would be the exception, that even if we have some of these mental health issues that perhaps social media would help make us feel more connected to each other but at least among teens, right around 2012 when smartphones became common their levels of loneliness just spiked upward very suddenly, and that followed the same pattern as clinical level, very serious depression, as feeling like you couldn't do anything right, feeling left out, feeling lonely, all of these things spiked right around 2012. >> you say that we are on the brink of the worst mental health crisis in decades. i was really happy to see that jana and calsters letter and a paragraph that comes at the end where they say wha

dr. twenge, let me begin with you.hink i know the answer from what the title of your book, but what can you tell us about what the research says about kids and iphones? >> so i-gen is the first generation to spend their entire adolescence with smartphones. that's had ripple effects across many areas of their lives. one place that's showing up is in their mental health. so right around 2012 in the big samples of teens, there was a sudden and pretty large jump in symptoms of depression and anxiety and clinical-level depression and suicide among teens. and that happened right at the same time that smartphones became common. so there's also lots of studies showing links between mental health issues and time spent on electronic devices such as smartphones. so, for example, teens who spend five or more hours a day on electronic devices are 71% more likely to have at least one risk factor for suicide compared to teens who spend less than an hour a day. >> yang: what makes smartphones different from say television or a video g