New lawsuit claims YouTube can cause insomnia, ADHD in kids

YouTube is accused of designing its user interface to "exploit human psychology" and increase children's screen time to dangerous levels in a lawsuit filed in Santa Clara County Superior Court.

While similar lawsuits have highlighted the psychological impact social media has on minors, such as depression, anxiety, and suicidal thoughts, the latest complaint, filed on Aug. 21 by a minor from Kansas, focuses on other disorders allegedly caused by YouTube addiction, including insomnia, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, and "an inability to quit."

It claims Google LLC, YouTube's parent company, knowingly designed YouTube's interface to create addictive behavior despite knowing of these risks. Melton v. Google LLC, 24CV445753 (Santa Clara Super. Ct. filed Aug. 21, 2024).

Google has been embroiled in the wave of litigation against social media companies over their platforms' psychological effect on users, including two coordinated proceedings in California state and federal court.

Google's press office did not respond to requests for comment. The multidistrict litigation is currently pending in California's Northern District Court and the Judicial Council Coordinated Proceeding, or "JCCP," is ongoing in Los Angeles Superior Court.

Google has had recent success defending against some of the claims contained within these novel lawsuits. In a June 14 dismissal of four school districts' claims under the JCCP Act, Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Carolyn B. Kuhl found that product liability claims could not be brought against social media companies because they were not "tangible products within the framework of product liability." In re Social Media Cases, JCCP 5255 (L.A. Super. Ct. filed Oct. 24, 2022).

The plaintiff's legal team -- Joseph G. VanZandt, Sydney Everett of Beasley Allen Crow Methvin Portis & Miles LLC in Montgomery, Ala.; and C. Brooks Cutter, Jennifer S. Domer and Margot P. Cutter of Cutter Law PC in Sacramento -- detailed the physical impact on users in the complaint.

"These features take advantage of biological systems, human behavior, and psychology to addict and condition users to engage in repetitive content-consuming actions such as scrolling, "liking," and sharing content in search of repeated dopamine releases," the attorneys wrote. "All the while, the users' input and behavior are tracked to allow the platform to automatically tune itself to each individual user to become highly addictive and as difficult to stop engaging with as possible."

In May 2024, U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy issued an advisory regarding the impact youth social media addiction is having on society and mentioned the impact screen time can have on children's physical health.

"Excessive and problematic social media use, such as compulsive or uncontrollable use, has been linked to sleep problems, attention problems, and feelings of exclusion among adolescents. Sleep is essential for the healthy development of adolescents," Murthy wrote. "A systematic review of 42 studies on the effects of excessive social media use found a consistent relationship between social media use and poor sleep quality, reduced sleep duration, sleep difficulties, and depression among youth."