by Mikeie Honda Reiland, Nashville Banner
August 26, 2026
On Wednesday morning, with Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti in the gallery, Chancellor Russell T. Perkins dismissed the jury, adjourned the court and declared the state’s multiweek trial against social media giant Meta over.
Earlier that morning, Skrmetti had announced that Tennessee was part of a $17.1 billion settlement with Meta over claims that Instagram was designed with purposefully addictive features that harmed the mental health of children and teenagers. The settlement itself took place as part of a trial in an Oakland, California, federal court. Forty-seven states — along with Washington, D.C., American Samoa and Puerto Rico — also sued Meta. As part of the settlement, Tennessee will receive nearly $752 million for the new Children’s Digital Protection Fund, which will focus on youth and adolescent mental health.
“We took Meta to trial because Instagram was hurting kids and misleading parents,” Skrmetti said. “This is a generational win for our state and for our kids.”
The state’s original complaint cited internal Meta studies revealing that young users felt addicted to Instagram, leading to reduced sleep and higher rates of anxiety, depression and attention deficit disorders. “In effect, Meta is conducting a potentially society-altering experiment on a generation of Young Users’ developing brains,” the complaint read. “While this experiment’s full impact may not be realized for decades, the early returns are alarming.”
The complaint said that Instagram is particularly harmful to girls and that Mark Zuckerberg intervened to keep a filter that mimicked plastic surgery effects, despite urging from employees to ban it. Throughout it all, the state alleged, Meta created the illusion that its platform was safe, deceiving consumers and parents and violating the Tennessee Consumer Protection Act.
According to a January 2025 National Institutes of Health study, Instagram’s algorithm can rewire dopamine pathways, affecting how we process rewards, and ultimately “accelerates the development of addictive behaviors.” The algorithm uses some of the same mechanisms as slot machines, with the pull-to-refresh-the-feed system and random rewards in terms of the next posts that show up and the number of likes you get.
“Unlike other consumer products that have appealed to children for generations — like candy or soda — with Instagram there is no natural break point where the consumer has finished the unit of consumption,” read the complaint. “Instead, Instagram is a bottomless pit where users can spend an infinite amount of their time. And Meta profits from each additional second a user spends on the platform.”
According to the press release, the agreement is one of the largest state consumer protection settlements ever. As part of the settlement, Meta will implement mandatory pauses for under-18 users after 15, 60 and 90 minutes of continuous use, with a two-hour daily limit. Access will be restricted from midnight to 6 a.m. and during school hours, and there will be limits on like counters and beauty filters.
Most of these terms are in place for 10 years. Meta will initially pay $12 billion, with the additional $5 billion required if Snapchat, YouTube and TikTok settle similar lawsuits with the states and agree to changes. In a statement, Meta called on YouTube and TikTok to settle and implement changes as well.
“This framework will only work if all our peers join us,” Meta Chief Legal Officer C.J. Mahoney said in the statement. “Because teens move fluidly across dozens of apps, we need an industry-wide solution.”
Research and recommendations
Dr. Jenn Stewart, a psychologist at Monroe Carell Jr. Children’s Hospital, told the Banner that the conditions Meta agreed to were encouraging.
“Social media — and screen use in general — is made to be engaging,” she said. “And it’s an impossible ask for us to anticipate and put the responsibility for disengaging on kids and adolescents, because it’s something that most adults struggle with. It’s designed to keep us engaged; it’s lighting up the reward center, and so it’s a hard thing for [kids] to be walking away from.”
Just like limits on video games or candy, Stewart said, kids need external checks on social media. And though people may find workarounds, the new two-hour limit is important. “I think having a built-in structure that takes the responsibility off of teenagers and children is going to be a helpful start,” she said.
Dr. Katherine Spencer, also at Monroe Carell, said that the research shows that three hours a day or more significantly impacts mental health, especially in teenagers and particularly in teenage girls. With larger doses, she said, children are at an increased risk of suicide and self-harm. The 2025 Vanderbilt Child Health Poll, an assessment of roughly 1,000 parents across the state, showed that the top three parental concerns were social media and online influence, teen mental health and bullying.
And yet, Spencer and Stewart acknowledged that the conversation is complicated. “I think social media in general is a really nuanced area,” Stewart said. Both emphasized that parents need to teach kids how to engage with social media in less harmful ways. In some ways, Stewart said, parents should think about teaching kids to use social media like they’d teach them to drive a car. “You’re not just going to be like, ‘Alright, good luck, don’t drive too fast,” she said.
Stewart added that research shows being an active participant in social media — commenting, posting, engaging with people you know — often carries less risk than passively scrolling or lurking, which can lead to unhealthy comparison. The goal is for kids to use it in a way that leads to connection or feeling seen rather than just seeing things that make them feel worse.
Stewart, who has two young children, said that being a parent has made her see social media and screen time — and how she models their usage — in new ways.
“We can think about the messages that we’re sending about the importance of phones in general,” she said. “Like if we’re staring at a phone, whether it’s social media, or a game or the news, we’re really sending a message to other people and to kids that this is a really important, valuable thing. And so at the dinner table, at time spent together at school, and even if teachers are doing it, kids are constantly getting inundated with this information that this thing is valuable and important and most people spend a lot of time engaging with it.
“And so then for us to just say ‘don’t do it,’ that’s not going to happen.”
When they pull their phones out, Stewart encourages parents to talk out loud, explaining what they’re doing to their kids. For example, “I’m going to quickly answer this email for work, and then I’m going to put my phone down so I can listen to you better.”
Stewart and Spencer agree that parents can model good social media behavior and should also monitor their kids’ accounts. They should set clear expectations of who kids are allowed to follow and have access to passwords.
Stewart said research shows that social media, at its core, gives kids — especially kids from marginalized groups — access to communities that make them feel seen and heard.
“It’s a way to get to know kids and be curious about their lives,” Stewart said. “You just have to teach them how to do that in a meaningful way, and a lot of that can be through actually connecting with [people you meet on social media] in person.”
During the last school year, Tennessee Nature Academy — a charter school in South Nashville — ran an optional digital detox with its students. Of the school’s 277 students, 107 turned in all their electronic devices for three weeks.
“What drove it is that we realized that as kids get older, saying no to social media and phones isn’t quite enough,” Jay Renfro, TNA’s founder and executive director, said. “You have to replace that void with something that’s just as good.”
Kids who participated in the detox received a “VIP Pass” that let them go on certain outings. The kids took a three-mile walk to Orchard Bend Park in Antioch, where they took off their shoes, played in the creek and threw moss at each other. They also spent a day on Renfro’s family farm, skipping rocks and fishing. A few kids started biking to school, even navigating traffic-choked streets in South Nashville.
The biggest barrier to participation in the detox wasn’t the kids themselves, Renfro said, but the parents. He described certain relationships as an “invisible leash” — parents who want kids tethered to their phones so they can always be in contact in case of emergency. He said that letting go takes some trust and a leap of faith on the parents’ part. In terms of providing compelling alternatives, in addition to sports, Renfro believes in places where kids can play without an agenda.
There are no easy answers, and the discourse is here to stay. But everyone who spoke to the Banner felt that the state’s settlement with Meta was a clear victory for kids and parents.
“I don’t think social media’s going anywhere,” said Stewart. “But I’m glad that we’re holding [Meta] accountable.”
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