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- Snapchat is changing a friend-ranking feature over reports of it causing teen anxiety.
- The premium feature allowed users to see their position in their friends' so-called Solar System.
- The decision highlights growing concerns about the impact of social media on teenage mental health.
Snapchat is backpedaling on a feature that allows paying users to see how close they are to their friends within social circles after reports that it was making teens anxious and insecure about their relationships.
The so-called Solar System feature, which is available to Snapchat+ users, shows where you rank in a particular friend's "orbit," based on how often you communicate. In theory, that means the closer to their "sun" you are, the closer the friendship.
"We understand that even though it can feel good to know you are close to someone, it can also feel bad to know that you aren't as close to a friend as you'd like to be," the company said in a statement.
Snapchat announced Monday that it would turn off the feature by default. Subscribers to the platform's $4-a-month service tier will be able to turn the feature back on.
"We hope this strikes the right balance between providing a feature that is desired by many who use it while avoiding upsetting those who don't want to use it," the company said. "We will also take the time to further evaluate the feature and determine if there are additional ways that we could improve it for our community."
Snapchat said that Solar System helped provide "additional awareness and context" to online relationships, which "often lack the same context and social signals" of in-person interactions.
However, some teens have said it has worsened their stress and insecurity about their interpersonal relationships.
One 15-year-old girl told The Wall Street Journal that the feature helped sour her relationship with her boyfriend after he found out that he was only the Neptune in her solar system — and that another male friend of hers was Mercury.
"A lot of kids my age have trouble differentiating best friends on Snapchat from actual best friends in real life," she added.
Snapchat noted that the feature showed the position of the user but not any other positions in their friends' Solar Systems and that individual positions were not visible to anyone else.
But the episode has placed renewed focus on the relationship between social media and teenage mental health. Experts have suggested that social media contributes to feelings of loneliness, and Snapchat and other platforms have been targeted in lawsuits.
Tensions between lawmakers and social-media CEOs — including Snap's Evan Spiegel — erupted in a congressional hearing earlier this year on child safety and mental health.