Paediatricians Will Ask Kids About Facebook To Gauge Depression

Hello there, lad. Breathe in. Breathe out. Good! Now I’m going to take your temperature. Looks fine. Would you mind stepping on the scale? Hm. OK, now how many Facebook friends do you have? Oh. Hm. I see.

This scenario could soon be part of a kid’s routine checkup, according to new guidelines from the American Academy of Pediatrics, which believes social networking stats should be incorporated in medical questioning to screen for depression. This isn’t just any ordinary depression, however – it’s Facebook Depression, a new, sort of silly-sounding disorder from the APA. It’s pretty much the exact same thing as non-Facebook depression. Symptoms include: “classic signs of depression, such as changing sleep and eating habits, experiencing mood swings, hanging out with different friends or becoming socially isolated.”

Now whether it’s Facebook Depression of Depression Depression, it’s a serious thing for anyone, child or adult. And apparently Facebook is a serious part of it. Now, I’ve often turned to Facebook as a pick-me-up, to see how fat an ex-girlfriend has gotten, or reminisce about how good at beer pong I used to be, so – hey, wait, that is kind of depressing. Sigh. [Time via Yahoo]

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