New Releases by Emily Weinstein

TEENS AND THEIR SCREENS: Harvard researchers reveal how younger generations navigate a networked world—and how adults can support them. “A new and important voice to the conversation around teenagers and the ways we interact with our screens.” —San Francisco Chronicle What are teens actually doing on their smartphones? Contrary to many adults’ assumptions, they are not simply “addicted” to their screens, oblivious to the afterlife of what they post, or missing out on personal connection. They are just trying to navigate a networked world. In Behind Their Screens, Emily Weinstein and Carrie James, Harvard researchers who are experts on teens and technology, explore the complexities that teens face in their digital lives, and suggest that many adult efforts to help—“Get off your phone!” “Just don’t sext!”—fall short. Weinstein and James warn against a single-minded focus by adults on “screen time.” Teens worry about dependence on their devices, but disconnecting means being out of the loop socially, with absence perceived as rudeness or even a failure to be there for a struggling friend. Drawing on a multiyear project that surveyed more than 3,500 teens, the authors explain that young people need empathy, not exasperated eye-rolling. Adults should understand the complicated nature of teens’ online life rather than issue commands, and they should normalize—let teens know that their challenges are shared by others—without minimizing or dismissing. Along the way, Weinstein and James describe different kinds of sexting and explain such phenomena as watermarking nudes, comparison quicksand, digital pacifiers, and collecting receipts. Behind Their Screens offers essential reading for any adult who cares about supporting teens in an online world.

Chinese and Russian government officials are keen to publicize their countries’ strategic partnership in emerging technologies, particularly artificial intelligence. This report evaluates the scope of cooperation between China and Russia as well as relative trends over time in two key metrics of AI development: research publications and investment. The findings expose gaps between aspirations and reality, bringing greater accuracy and nuance to current assessments of Sino-Russian tech cooperation.

Xi Jinping has made artificial intelligence a primary focus of China’s innovation and high-tech development since 2012. The emergence of COVID-19 in December 2019 has amplified these efforts, as Chinese companies of all sizes across AI-related sectors have developed and retooled AI systems for epidemic control and prevention. This issue brief offers a high-level assessment of the types of AI technologies used to fight COVID-19 and the key players involved in this industry, according to CAICT assessments. The tools and systems described in the CAICT report appear to address technological and logistical pandemic response challenges, including difficulties in case-by-case investigation, prevention, and control for “grassroots” case investigators; patient rehabilitation tracking and management; tracing close contacts of sick individuals; epidemic-related misinformation; medication consumption problems; supply mismanagement; and overworked doctors and understaffed hospitals.

To help U.S. policymakers address long-held concerns about risks and threats associated with letting Chinese university students or graduates study in the United States, CSET experts examine which forms of collaboration, and with which Chinese universities, pose the greatest risk to U.S. research security.

Daily social media use is routine for most contemporary adolescents. However, as social technology use rises, we are still largely unclear about the nature of adolescents' multifaceted experiences and the mechanisms that may disrupt well-being. In two studies, I use qualitative and quantitative methods to examine the relationship between adolescents' social media use and their psychosocial well-being. I conducted a survey and social browsing experiment (n=588), followed by semi-structured interviews with a purposeful sub-sample of youth (n=28).

In this chapter, the authors explore the role that networked platforms play in identity development during emerging adulthood. They use the stories of two youth to highlight dominant themes from existing research and to examine the developmental implications of forming one's identity in a networked era. The inquiry is theoretically informed by the work of the psychologist Erik Erikson, who depicted identity development as a process of exploration that ultimately results in a sense of personal continuity and coherence. The authors consider what insights this theory -- formulated in the mid-twentieth century -- has to offer in a digital world. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the practical implications relating to education, policy, and the design of new technologies.