Public Policy

February 2024

Digital Well-Being Index 

ear TwoYAt Snap, nothing is more important than thesafety and well-being of our Snapchat
community. We have in place, and consistently
enforce, policies and rules that detail the typeof content and behavior that are acceptableon Snapchat. We offer tools and resources tohelp Snapchatters stay safe, and we engage
with others in industry and across the techecosystem to better protect teens andyounger users in particular. 

To offer insight into how teens and young
adults are faring online, in 2022 – and again in2023 – we conducted research into Generation
Z’s digital well-being. The study, which draws
upon more than four decades of subjective
well-being research, was adapted for theonline environment to produce a Digital WellBeing Index (DWBI), a measure of Gen Z’s
online psychological well-being. We surveyedteens (aged 13-17), young adults (aged 18-24)
and parents of teens, aged 13 to 19 in six
countries: Australia, France, Germany, India,
UK and the U.S. We asked respondents about
their exposure to various online risks and, fromthose results and other attitudinal responses,
devised a DWBI for each country and acombined reading across all six.

Index Category
Positive Emotion
Engagement
Relationships
Negative Emotion
Achievement

DWBI Readings for 2023 

The Year Two Digital Well-Being Index for the six geographies
again stands at 62, unchanged from 2022, and a somewhat
average reading on a scale of 0 to 100 – neither particularly
favorable, nor especially worrisome. By country, India again
registered the highest DWBI reading at 67 (down one pointfrom 68 in 2022), and France and Germany came in below thesix-country average, at 59 and 60, respectively, compared to60 in both geographies in 2022. Australia’s DWBI remains at63; the UK again matched the six-country reading at 62, andthe U.S. held steady at 64. The index leverages the PERNA
model, a variation on an existing research vehicle, comprising
20 sentiment statements across five categories: PositiveEmotion, Engagement, Relationships, Negative Emotion andAchievement. Respondents were asked to state their level ofagreement with each of the 20 statements, taking into accountall of their online experiences on any device over thepreceding three months. An example statement in each of thefive categories follows. For a full inventory of all 20statements, see this link. 

Role of social media 

A DWBI score was calculated for each respondent based on
the 20 sentiment statements. Their scores were aggregatedinto four DWBI groups: Flourishing (10%, unchanged from2022); Thriving (41%, down 2% from 2022), Middling (42%, up
2% from 2022) and Struggling (7%, unchanged from 2022).
(See, Below for details.)

Sample Sentiment Statement
Often felt delighted
Got completely absorbed in what I was doing online
Have people in my life online who really care about me
Worried about what other people might be saying about me online
Was able to grow in my skills and abilities

Public PolicyFebruary 2024

DWBI Group Sizes & Score Ranges
Slight shift of 2-pts. from Thriving to Middling since 2022

Closer Look at “Sextortion” 

In Year Two, we took a closer look at Generation Z’s exposure to online sextortion schemes, either via“catfishing” or “hacking.” Sixty-five percent of Gen Z teens and young adults, on all platforms and devices – notjust Snapchat — said they or their friends were targeted in online catfishing scams, or were hacked by criminals
who stole explicit personal imagery or other private information. In both scenarios, the resulting photos andvideos were then used to threaten or blackmail the young people, with abusers demanding money, gift cards,
more sexual imagery, or other personal information in supposed exchange for not releasing the material to theyoung person’s family and friends.
Half (51%) of respondents said they or their friends were targeted for, or victims of, catfishing, and 47% of
those cases targeted respondents directly over the prior three months
Meanwhile, 47% of respondents said they or their friends’ devices or social media accounts were hacked,
with 39% of those instances happening to respondents in the last quarter.
Online “catfishing” occurs when criminals pretend to be someone they are not to lure a victim into sharing
personal information or producing sexual imagery. “Hacking,” meanwhile, typically involves a criminal gaining
unauthorized access to a victim’s electronic devices or social media accounts to steal intimate photos or otherpersonal information. For the most part, in both schemes, the videos, photos, or other private information arethen used to blackmail the victim into acceding to the perpetrator’s demands. 

For more on the sextorion research results across the six countries, as well as what Snap is doing to protect ourcommunity against this online risk, see this post.