{"id":550685,"date":"2026-03-19T14:12:14","date_gmt":"2026-03-19T14:12:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/550685\/"},"modified":"2026-03-19T14:12:14","modified_gmt":"2026-03-19T14:12:14","slug":"australia-falls-to-new-low-in-world-happiness-report-as-social-media-impacts-young-people","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/550685\/","title":{"rendered":"Australia falls to new low in World Happiness Report as social media impacts young people"},"content":{"rendered":"

Australia has fallen to its lowest ranking in the World Happiness Report, as social media makes young people feel worse than ever before.<\/p>\n

The annual report ranks 140 countries on the general wellbeing of their citizens, with Australia falling to 15th in the rankings, a drop of four places from last year.<\/p>\n

The report, totalling more than 200 pages, said the mental health and wellbeing of young people in Australia had declined significantly due to the impacts of social media.<\/p>\n

\"AAustralia was one of several western countries that has seen the decline of youth mental health due to social media. (AP Photo\/Rick Rycroft)<\/p>\n

It was not alone, with New Zealand, Canada and the United States seeing the wellbeing levels of their younger populations – people under 25 – falling dramatically since the report began in 2013.<\/p>\n

In rankings for happiness changes for people under 25 years old, the four countries fell between 122 and 133 in the list, out of 136 countries.<\/p>\n

The study cited some Australian surveys of younger people who felt social media was becoming a large factor in declining mental health.<\/p>\n

“Australian survey data show similar patterns, with young people identifying social media as a leading contributor to declining youth mental health,” the report said.<\/p>\n

\"3.Finland, capital city Helsinki pictured, was named the happiest country in the world. (Getty)<\/p>\n

“When the apparent victims are surveyed, they positively identify social media as the perpetrator.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

It marks a fall from grace for Australia in the World Happiness Report, consistently being in the top 10 since its creation, only sliding out in 2025.<\/p>\n

Nordic and Scandinavian countries dominated the top 10, with Finland coming out on top, followed by Iceland and Denmark.<\/p>\n

New Zealand came in 11th, while the United States and the United Kingdom were further down in 23rd and 29th, respectively.<\/p>\n

\"\"\/The authors of the World Happiness Report praised Australia’s social media ban. (9News)<\/p>\n

The report, which was centred around happiness and social media, made specific mention of Australia’s world-leading social media ban, which was implemented for children under 16-years-old at the end of last year.<\/p>\n

The report’s authors said the findings concluded Australia’s model should be one to follow.<\/p>\n

“We believe that the evidence is now sufficient to justify the sort of action that the Australian government took in 2025 when it raised the age for opening or maintaining a social media account to 16,” it said.<\/p>\n

“Recent evidence suggests that younger individuals \u2013 especially in North America, Western Europe, Australia, and New Zealand \u2013 are experiencing declining levels of wellbeing and mental health. Potentially, this is a result of increased social media use among young people.”<\/p>\n

NEVER MISS A STORY: Get your breaking news and exclusive stories first by following us across all platforms.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Australia has fallen to its lowest ranking in the World Happiness Report, as social media makes young people…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":550686,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,44],"class_list":["post-550685","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/550685","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=550685"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/550685\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/550686"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=550685"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=550685"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=550685"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}