JB is supposedly inside The Hit Factory recording studio, recording his forthcoming album entitled “Believe”. Bieber had a recent tweet saying:

in the studio writing for #17MILLIONSTRONG !!! #BELIEVE #MUCHLOVE

— Justin Bieber (@justinbieber) February 2, 2012

According to the Miami Herald ,Thursday night hundreds of teens camped outside the studio hopeful to catch a glimpse of the “teen idol”. Recent twitter photographs reveal JB skateboarding around the studio and hanging out with rapper L’il Wayne. Biber was in attendance of Monday night’s Heat game as well; TV cameras captured him on in the audience. Biber currently has over 17 million followers on twitter and recently tweeted that he’d been “sleeping all day; working all night”.

In the experiment, the boys packed a foam cooler with a few gel handwarmers, a couple of cameras and a cell phone with built in GPS. Matt and Asad filled their weather balloon with 165 dollars worth of helium to nearly its bursting point; Ho explained his reasoning behind this to the Toronto Star:

“If you fill your balloon, say, halfway, it will reach a higher max altitude, but then obviously it’s got a lot more time in the air so it has a lot more time that it could be affected by wind, A perfect flight plan would be just up and down, on the same spot. The less we had to drive to retrieve Lego Man that was our goal, especially since we’re surrounded by so many lakes. There were so many problems that could go wrong.”

Once the balloon reached its bursting point, the parachute they fabricated would bring the experiment back to the surface of the Earth. A little over an hour and a half after launch, the boys used the GPS to track down the experiment to a wooded area near Rice Lake in Canada.

Given the company’s new privacy policy consolidation, I guess that means keeping teens safe using Google in general. Horowitz writes:

Teens and young adults are the most active Internet users on the planet. And surprise, surprise: they’re also human beings who enjoy spending time with friends and family. Put these two things together and it’s clear that teens will increasingly connect online. Unfortunately, online sharing is still second-rate for this age group.

In life, for instance, teens can share the right things with just the right people (like classmates, parents or close ties). Over time, the nuance and richness of selective sharing even promotes authenticity and accountability. Sadly, today’s most popular online tools are rigid and brittle by comparison, so teens end up over-sharing with all of their so-called “friends.”

With one of the new changes, Google will encourage teens to think before they post when they try to share something outside their circles.

For notifications, by default, only those in teens’ circles will be able to say hello.

If a stranger outside a teen’s circles joins a hangout, Google temporarily removes the teen, and gives them a chance to rejoin.

A new survey, Shopping Trends Among 18-25 Year-Olds, conducted by a group of LIM College students and in conjunction with the NRF Student Association, revealed that 68% of young people aged 18-25 years “prefer to shop in stores than online for apparel and shoes.” In announcing the release, Alexis Michaelides, student leader of the LIM College’s campus NRF Student Association, said, “We have read and observed what industry leaders had been saying about our use of technology for shopping and it did not match our own habits and preferences.”

The study also contains a bit of good news for all of those brick and mortar stores who feel like they’re living under the Amazon sword. Another member of the LIM College NRFSA team, Nicole Flasch-Mihalko, added, “Retail observers have been significantly overestimating our use of online and digital technology for shopping. We like shopping in stores and are not as engaged in shopping on the Internet as many have touted. I guess the demise of the brick and mortar format of retailing– at least for 18-25 year-olds– is grossly exaggerated.”

Some key take-aways from the study:

What’s funny is that the second bullet point up there is exactly the opposite of that oh-so treacherous Amazon Price Check app that infuriated everybody during the recent Christmas holiday. And since it only mentions apparel and shoes as items that young people shop for in brick and mortar stores, does that mean they are either purchasing media (e.g., movies, music) online? (I bet they’re just stealin’ that swag via their ultra-fast dorm room Internet connection.)

While this is a intriguing study, it’d be more telling and reliable if the results could be duplicated among a larger sample size and, perhaps, inclusive of a broader geography of youngsters since, I’m assuming, that the survey only included data from Manhattanites since LIM is located there. Have you been to brick and mortar stores in NYC? It’s considerably different than the weekend trips to Target or the local mall.

Nevertheless. Carry on, my wayward brick and mortar sons!

The National Cancer Institute, with the help of the U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services, is launching a program to give teens one more option if they want to kick the habit.

The program, called SmokefreeTXT, is a new service that will help teens by sending them useful texts before, during and after they take their last drag.

Teens can sign up by texting QUIT to IQUIT (47848) from their mobile device, or heading to the website and signing up there. The service is free, but they suggest that you think twice about signing up if you don’t have a texting plan. Once you answer a couple basic questions, you will be officially enrolled in the program.

Participants then select their “quit date,” and can receive messages up to a month before that deadline. SmokefreeTXT will continue to send encouraging messages for a month and a half after the quit date, and may also send follow-up texts a couple months down the road.

According to the NCI 20% of American teens are smokers, and that first 6 weeks after quitting is the hardest time.

Here are some sample texts that participants might receive:

Wow, 2 weeks smokefree! Have you rewarded yourself for not smoking? Use your extra cash for that new app, music, movie, or concert tickets.

What makes you wanna smoke? Stress? Boredom? Parties? Write down your top 3 smoking triggers. Knowing ur triggers is the only way to avoid them!

Nicotine is just as addictive as heroin or cocaine. It tricks your mind & body into thinking you need it. Good thing you know you don’t.

In between texts from the program, you can send your own if you’re feeling particularly stressed or tempted:

It’s tough to quit smoking. And it’s really tough to quit when you factor in peer pressure and that carefree attitude that comes with youth. Could some frequent texts really help a 16-year-old kid stop smoking? Who knows. But it sure doesn’t hurt to have someone point out that you’re doing it right – even if that person is just an automated text.

The study, which sampled 23,000 students in the Boston area, found that “sexting can include overtones of bullying and coercion, and teens who are involved were more likely to report being psychologically distressed, depressed or even suicidal.”

In fact, twice as many teens who reported sexting in the past year had depressive symptoms, compared to teens that said they didn’t sext. When you talk about suicide attempts, the trend is similar. 13 percent of sexting teens reported an attempt in the last year, compared to only 3% of non-sexting kids.

Of course, “sexting” can mean a lot of different things to different people – like the sending of explicit photos or even just having explicit conversations. For the purposes of this study, “sexting” was defined as sending or posting sexually suggestive or explicit nude photos or videos.

In general, 13% of the students surveyed said that they have received a sext in the last year.

The lead researcher Shari Schneider wants to make sure we know that it’s not necessarily a causal relationship between sexting and depression, but that there’s definitely a link -

It’s a cross-sectional study — it shows an association but not a causal relationship.” However, “it’s important to know there’s a link between sexting and psychological distress. It’s something to be considered if you know of a youth who is involved in sexting.”

The study also includes some interesting advice from the Cyberbullying Research Center regarding what kids should do regarding sext messages:

“You should delete it and not tell anybody. If it’s doesn’t get disseminated and distributed, it’s ended.”

That message has gotten them some heat, but they stick to it –

“If you tell adults, you’re throwing that person under a bus. Adults, it seems, are forced to respond to sexting in extreme ways — ways that have long-term, irreversible consequences. Until we can develop reasonable responses that do not potentially foreclose on the futures of all involved, we are wise to advise that students do not contact adults, unless the situation is appearing to get out of control. And I think teens know when it is out of control.”

What do you think about sexting? Is it a real cause for concern for parents? Or is it just kids being kids in the age of the internet and smartphones? Let us know in the comments.

With that article, I told you about a psychological study that warned of the effects that social media sites like Facebook can have on young, impressionable kids. That study found that teens who use Facebook often show more narcissistic tendencies as well as signs of antisocial and/or aggressive behaviors. It also concluded that students who checked Facebook during 15-minute “study” periods achieved lower grades.

Is social media to blame or has it just become the convenient scapegoat? Let us know what you think.

In a perplexing find, the study also said that young adults who spend a lot of time on social media sites are better at showing empathy to their online friends.

Now, a new survey is linking social media use to an increase in drug and alcohol use in teens.

The 16th annual “back to school” survey performed by the The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University (CASA) asked around 2000 teens and 500 parents about their drug and alcohol use as well as their social media use.

Out of the survey population, 70% said that they spend time on a social networking site every day. According to CASA, these teens are much more likely to use tobacco, alcohol, and marijuana than the 30% who reported no social media use.

Specifically, social media users are 5 times more likely to have used tobacco, three times more likely to have used alcohol and 2 times more likely to have used marijuana. The largest percentage is the 26% of social media-using teens who are said to have used alcohol.

As far as the relative amounts of time spent on Facebook, Twitter and others, CASA had this to say:

Our report distinguishes between no time and any time spent on a social networking site in a typical day because our analysis showed no significant difference in substance use among teens spending 1 to 30 minutes, 31 to 90 minutes or more than 90 minutes on a social networking site in a typical day.

Of course with any finding like this, the first question is always an issue of actual causation. Is social media use actually making the kids smoke and drink more? Or are the kids who smoke and drink at a higher rate simply more social media savvy? The CASA report outlines a specific reason that they believe is behind the increase in drug and alcohol use: Influence.

The survey found that 40 percent all participants have seen pictures of peers “drunk, passed out, or doing drugs” on Facebook or other social media sites. Of those teens, 49% saw those pictures at the age of 13 or younger. By the time the kids had reached 15, 90% had seen such an image.

51% of those who spend most days on social media sites have seen the “drunken peer” images. The survey concludes that the teens who have seen the images are three times more likely to have used alcohol and four time more likely to have used marijuana.

Apparently, Facebook is just a modern day enhancement of the “everybody’s doing it” argument for teens.

The questions regarding this survey are the same as those regarding the survey I mentioned earlier. Is Facebook and other social media really to blame? Or does it simply mirror what is already a reality? Are teens that use drugs and alcohol just more likely to use social media?

I’m pretty skeptical of the social media-boogeyman stories. Do you believe in all the reports that say Facebook is having a negative influence on society? Let us know in the comments.

But what about sexually suggestive photos posted on social media sites? Can schools punish teens for things they post in their own time?

A U.S. District Judge says no, as it violates a teen’s first amendment rights.

Back in 2009, two female students at a Fort Wayne Indiana high school were disciplined after photos emerged that they had posted on MySpace. The girls, aged 15 and 16, took photos at a sleepover that displayed “sexually suggestive poses with various props.” For instance, one photo saw the girls dressed in lingerie, pretending to lick penis-shaped lollipops.

The girls put these photos on MySpace, and according to the AP, their privacy settings only allowed friends to see them. Somehow, a parent at the school came across the photos and brought them to the district superintendent. The parent said that the photos were causing “divisiveness” among the school volleyball team, of which the girls were members.

Apparently, the photos also made their way around the school.

Here is the punishment that followed: The principal suspended the two girls from the volleyball team, the choir and the cheerleading team. He also ordered the girls to complete three counseling sessions and made them apologize to an all-male coaching board.

With the help of the Indiana ACLU, the two teens filed a lawsuit against the school district in October of 2009.

And now, the District Judge has ruled that the school violated the girls’ first amendment rights by disciplining them for the racy photos. From the ACLU of Indiana –

The American Civil Liberties Union of Indiana represented the students in their case against the school corporation, arguing that the conduct of the students had no substantial disruptive effect on the school. The court concluded that the discipline violated the First Amendment rights of free speech. The court also enjoined application of the school policy under which the students could be punished because they brought “discredit or dishonor” upon themselves or the school. The court said the policy was vague and overbroad.

The Judge ruled that the photos could not be ruled “obscene.” He said they were “silly” but were intended to be humorous.

If the girls would’ve taken nude photos, it might have been an entirely dfferent situation. For one, the pics probably wouldn’t have stayed on the site for very long, as MySpace like other social sites ban nudity.

Would the nude pics have been considered free speech in the context of the school code? It’s possible that criminal charges could have stemmed from nudes, just like the sexting cases. But could the school take disciplinary action over actions done off school property on the students’ own time?

According to the AP,

The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that students can be disciplined for activities that happen outside of school, so long as the school can prove the activities were disruptive or posed a danger and that it was foreseeable the activities would find their way to campus.

So I guess the answer is yes, they could be disciplined. It looks like the key part of the Indiana case was the term “disruptive.” Apparently, lingerie pics with candy penises aren’t thought of as disruptive, but nude pics probably would be.

The question remains, however, where is the line drawn? What constitutes “obscene” and “disruptive?” What do you think? Let us know in the comments.

The new information comes from research presented at the 119th Annual Convention of the American Psychological Association. Dr. Larry Rosen, PhD, discussed how he feels Facebook and other social media are influencing teens’ behavior and affecting their psychological makeup.

The presentation, entitled “Poke Me: How Social Networks Can Both Help and Harm Our Kids provided these troublesome effects of Facebook use -

• Teens who use Facebook more often show more narcissistic tendencies while young adults who have a strong Facebook presence show more signs of other psychological disorders, including antisocial behaviors, mania and aggressive tendencies.
• Daily overuse of media and technology has a negative effect on the health of all children, preteens and teenagers by making them more prone to anxiety, depression, and other psychological disorders, as well as by making them more susceptible to future health problems.
• Facebook can be distracting and can negatively impact learning. Studies found that middle school, high school and college students who checked Facebook at least once during a 15-minute study period achieved lower grades.

That paints a pretty bleak picture of social media in this age of technology, indeed. Of course, I could argue that simply living in modern society makes our children more susceptible to psychological disorder – or that the culture of over-diagnosis has something to do with all of that. But that’s another article altogether.

Dr. Rosen did outline some positive affects of social media use -

• Young adults who spend more time on Facebook are better at showing “virtual empathy” to their online friends.
• Online social networking can help introverted adolescents learn how to socialize behind the safety of various screens, ranging from a two-inch smartphone to a 17-inch laptop.
• Social networking can provide tools for teaching in compelling ways that engage young students.

If you read through both the scary social media effects and the positive social media effects, it might become evident that there is some contradiction. Facebook use causes teens to develop narcissistic tendencies and possibly anti-social behaviors, but it also teaches them “virtual empathy” and allows “introverted” teens the ability to connect to other people? Social networking is a great teaching tool but kids who check Facebook when they are trying to study get crappy grades?

Do these inherent contradictions tell us something about Facebook? Or kids in general? Can the same tool affect people in incredibly different ways? It looks like some kids are using Facebook to better connect to the global community while others are becoming depressed or anxious from it.

Is Facebook really causing this? Is it the reason the teens are psychologically unstable? Possibly. But evidence like this might suggest that social media is simply a mirror that reflects our already-present tendencies. Sure, Facebook can facilitate and even exacerbate narcissistic tendencies, but is it truly to blame?

Another day, another study about how Facebook is changing everyone. The fact that Facebook can both “help and harm” children puts it in the same category as a lot of things that they interact with everyday. It just seems like the negatives of Facebook and other social media get a lot more attention than the positives these days.

What do you think? Let us know in the comments.

And social media allows teens instant contact with hundreds of their friends. Remember when you had to call everyone you knew to invite them to a party? Or, god forbid, send a letter? Now you just click “create event” on Facebook and your work it pretty much done. Don’t even get me started on Wikipedia. Also, get off my lawn.

Since every teen has their own cellphone and every new phone has camera (or two) built in, it was just a matter of time before they all made a habit out of taking pictures of their privates and sending them to people.

And sorry, parents. Sexting isn’t going to stop. With the freedom of technology, it’s just what adolescents have come up with to deal with their changing emotions. So as long as puberty still continues to have an effect on the sex drive and kids continue to own phones, sexting is here to stay. It’s how we deal with it that matters.

Or at least that’s what the state of New Jersey thinks. The N.J. Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee has unanimously approved a bill (A-1561) that would decriminalize sexting, and instead replace it will “intense education.” It still needs to be approved by the entire Senate, however.

Sexting is criminalized, you might ask?

Over the last couple of years there have been charges filed against teens all over the country for sexting. In 2010 a 13-year-old girl and a 12-year-old boy from Indiana were both charged with possession of child pornography and child exploitation from sending nude photos to each other, of themselves.

In Harrisburg, PA, eight students at a local high school ranging in age from 13 to 17 were accused of child pornography for sexting. Pennsylvania then became one of many states that began to work on reforming the laws to fit this new phenomenon.

While some other states seek to simply make these charges less severe, as in a misdemeanor instead of a felony, many argue that the criminalization of the activity at all is ludicrous.

“Teens need to understand the ramifications of their actions, but they shouldn’t necessarily be treated as criminals,” Assemblywoman Pamela Lampitt, a co-sponsor of the bill, said. “We need to create a path that places education and forgiveness before arrest and prosecution. Young people – especially teen girls – need to understand that sending inappropriate pictures is not only potentially illegal, but can leave an indelible mark on them socially and educationally.”

The education program would involve learning about the possible legal consequences of sending nude photographs to one another. it would also explore the “effect on relationships, its impact on school life” and how the sexting could impact their ability to get a job later in life. (huh?)

I don’t know guys. Should teenagers that willingly show nude pictures of themselves be the concern of the law? It this not a parental type of issue? I’m not a parent myself, but I feel like sexting is just the expression of what kids are going to do anyways – just expressed in the tech world.

It seems like people either have to limit teenagers’ use of technology or start to seriously adjust their standards for things that upset them. If recent history is any indication, it seems America is unnaturally outraged by anyone who sexts – so it might be tough to adopt an “it’s going to happen” stance.

What do you think? Let us know in the comments.