Amira Skeggs

New essay published today in the Berlin Review 📚

You can read it here: theberlinliteraryreview.com/amira-skeggs...

Big thanks to all the young people who co-created these stories with us and to my brilliant co-authors: @orbenamy.bsky.social, @adigitaltanay.bsky.social @valerieyapzy.bsky.social, Ashish Mehta, Anne-Marie Burn, Petr Slovak

Micro-narratives: A Scalable Method for Eliciting Stories of People’s Lived Experience | Proceedings of the 2025 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems

🔗 More on the method:

Micro-narratives = short, first-person stories co-created by participants + LLM-powered chatbots.

dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/...

We also found differences in harm frequency, prevalence, and platform distributions:
📉 Behavioural harms (e.g., negative commenting) happened most often
📱 Instagram & TikTok stood out as key platforms of harm exposure
🌍 Harms were perceived as widespread amongst young people

𝐔𝐬𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐦𝐢𝐱𝐞𝐝-𝐦𝐞𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐝𝐬 𝐚𝐧𝐚𝐥𝐲𝐬𝐢𝐬, 𝐰𝐞 𝐟𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐦𝐬 𝐟𝐞𝐥𝐥 𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐨 𝐟𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐦𝐚𝐢𝐧 𝐜𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐠𝐨𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐬:
1. Other people’s behaviour (e.g. cyberbullying, scams)
2. Own behaviour (e.g. compulsive scrolling, comparison)
3. Content (e.g. graphic or idealised posts)
4. Platform features (e.g. poor moderation)

🚨New preprint 🚨

𝐘𝐨𝐮𝐭𝐡 𝐏𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐩𝐞𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐯𝐞𝐬 𝐨𝐧 𝐒𝐨𝐜𝐢𝐚𝐥 𝐌𝐞𝐝𝐢𝐚 𝐇𝐚𝐫𝐦𝐬: 𝐀 𝐋𝐚𝐫𝐠𝐞-𝐒𝐜𝐚𝐥𝐞 𝐌𝐢𝐜𝐫𝐨-𝐍𝐚𝐫𝐫𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐯𝐞 𝐒𝐭𝐮𝐝𝐲

osf.io/preprints/ps...

🧵

Using a novel micro-narrative method, we collected ~ 900 first-person accounts of social media harms from young people across the UK and US.

Very elegant new paper from @georgiaturner.bsky.social on RL models for social media behaviours!

• Using 𝘀𝗲𝗹𝗳-𝗱𝗲𝘁𝗲𝗿𝗺𝗶𝗻𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗼𝗿𝘆, we outline a behavioural change framework supporting 𝗮𝘂𝘁𝗼𝗻𝗼𝗺𝘆, 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗽𝗲𝘁𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲, and 𝗿𝗲𝗹𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗱𝗻𝗲𝘀𝘀—especially for adolescent users

We highlight the need for 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗼𝗿𝗲𝘁𝗶𝗰𝗮𝗹𝗹𝘆 𝗶𝗻𝗳𝗼𝗿𝗺𝗲𝗱 𝗮𝗽𝗽𝗿𝗼𝗮𝗰𝗵𝗲𝘀 that centre users’ 𝗽𝘀𝘆𝗰𝗵𝗼𝗹𝗼𝗴𝗶𝗰𝗮𝗹 𝗻𝗲𝗲𝗱𝘀.

• We distinguish between 𝘂𝘀𝗲-𝗿𝗲𝗱𝘂𝗰𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗶𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗿𝘃𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀 (e.g., limiting time) and 𝘂𝘀𝗲-𝗶𝗺𝗽𝗿𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗶𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗿𝘃𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀 (e.g., enhancing content and interactions)
• We introduce a 𝗰𝗼𝗻𝘁𝗲𝘅𝘁𝘂𝗮𝗹 𝗺𝗼𝗱𝗲𝗹 mapping interventions across five levels: 𝗽𝗹𝗮𝘁𝗳𝗼𝗿𝗺, 𝗱𝗲𝘃𝗶𝗰𝗲, 𝘂𝘀𝗲𝗿, 𝗳𝗮𝗺𝗶𝗹𝘆, and 𝘀𝗼𝗰𝗶𝗲𝘁𝘆

Social media interventions to improve well-being - Nature Human Behaviour In this Perspective, the authors review current interventions on social media use among adolescents and propose a new theoretical model based on self-determination theory to guide the effective design...

New Perspective out in @nathumbehav.nature.com today with co-author @orbenamy.bsky.social!

We propose a new framework for designing 𝘀𝗼𝗰𝗶𝗮𝗹 𝗺𝗲𝗱𝗶𝗮 𝗶𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗿𝘃𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝘀 that support well-being, grounded in self-determination theory 🧵

www.nature.com/articles/s41...

If you’re still around at the very end of the day, come hear me talk about how we re-conceptualise EMA-type questions as an approach for helping parents tune into their child’s emotions throughout the day #CHI2025

Presenting our work alongside Petr Slovak on micro-narratives, a new method to elicit stories of lived experience at #chi2025 #ai #wellbeing

Person at lectern presents talk on developing LLM based micro narratives.

@amiraskeggs.bsky.social shares new work on developing a remote narrative elicitation method terms micro narratives. #cockneychai2025 #chi2025

Metabolism: the Matryoshka dolls of life — NoS Understanding the metabolism across each level of biological function is like opening an intricate nesting doll

In this Science Metaphor, Monica Emili Garcia-Segura explores why understanding the metabolism across each level of biological function is like opening an intricate nesting doll.

My recent chat with @adamclarkestes.com for @vox.com about digital wellness tools and the limitations of screen time metrics!

Cambridge leads governmental project to understand impact of smartphones and social media on young people Cambridge researchers are leading the first phase of a new research project that will lay the groundwork for future studies into the impact on children of

My team has got news!

Looking forward to working on this with great team members and collaborators across the UK ⬇️

www.cam.ac.uk/research/new...

🚨New preprint with co-author @OrbenAmy. In this paper, we introduce a framework for social media interventions and explore their potential to improve wellbeing (particularly for adolescent users).

Currently recruiting! Do you know any 16-20 year olds who want to take part in social media research? We are looking for 10 adolescents to join our paid advisory panel in June! @mrccbu

Very excited to be presenting Kindred’s new UK Toolkit at the #EmergingMinds Summit in Oxford today @UniofOxford @EmergingMindsUK

Digital technologies offer an opportunity to tackle our youth mental health crisis. I discuss the potential for digital solutions to improve mental health care in Australia. Published in The Policy Maker from @JMIPublicPolicy

Super excited to launch Kindred’s 'Mental Health Toolkit for Young People'



@jjxe_ and I created this toolkit to help young people navigate mental health resources. It’s free, reviewed by psychologists and easy to use.