Being 13

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As eighth grade began, Anna was worried that she wasn’t very popular because her parents wouldn’t let her on Snapchat. London had a tough couple of days; she had been sent to the principal’s office for lashing out at a girl who had been mean to her by sending a text impersonating a boy that girl liked. And when Addi’s school had a lockdown later in the year, she spent the evening decompressing with her sister, reenacting a TikTok sketch — her mind far from the flashing police lights that had reflected in the windows.

Addi, Michigan

I just feel like I need my phone, you know? Like it helps me get through the day.

Elaine Cromie for The New York Times

Addi

Anna, London and Addi — three girls from three states, who, at 13, were legally able to join social media, and whose cellphones were always close at hand.

I started following them a year ago, after they responded to an open call for teenagers who’d let a reporter into their lives and phones. With their parents’ permission, they each wrote weekly diaries and recorded voice memos about their days (except when they were grounded). The girls’ last names have been withheld to protect their privacy, but all of the images and text messages you see here are real.

I wanted to put a face to the alarming headlines about teens and social media — in particular, girls. And to understand one tension: What happens when girls’ self-confidence, which has been shown to drop right around this age, intersects with the thing that seems to be obviously contributing to their struggle?

Anna, Colorado

I feel like I’m a lot more insecure than I was at the start of the year.

Rachel Woolf for The New York Times

Anna

The long-term effects of social media on the teenage brain have not yet been defined, much less proven — which isn’t to say it’s all bad. But adolescent girls have long struggled with depression and anxiety at disproportionate rates compared with their male peers, a reality that metastasized during the pandemic.

What is known is that at age 13, a person is still more than a decade away from having a fully developed prefrontal cortex, the part of the brain responsible for decision-making and impulse control. In other words, adolescents are moving into this messy digital world at a time when they desire social attention most — and are not yet wired for restraint.

“It’s all gas pedal and no brakes,” said Mitch Prinstein, the chief science officer of the American Psychological Association, who testified before the Senate on the subject earlier this year.

London, Maryland

We have feelings too. We may not show them as much because we’re in middle school.

Dee Dwyer for The New York Times

London

For adults, it’s become common to name the things that make women more likely to face burnout and stress. Many of us talk about this “mental load.” But girls have a mental load, too — in facing the age-old pressure to be good enough, pretty enough, kind enough, popular enough, but now on multiple platforms, too.

What you’ll read, hear and watch below is not an exhaustive account. But it is a snapshot of being 13 in the age of social media.