Mapping the methodological landscape of social media detox intervention through a scoping review of evidence relevant to social media restriction policies

Governments worldwide are advancing legislation to restrict children’s access to social media, often citing experimental evidence that reducing use improves mental health. However, prior meta-analyses remain equivocal, with effects on well-being and mental health typically small, inconsistent, and frequently null. It is unclear whether this pattern of findings reflects heterogeneous intervention effects or methodological limitations, and whether the evidence supports emerging restriction policies. Here, we address these questions through a scoping review of 12,058 records, synthesizing evidence from 45 eligible studies published between 2015 and 2025. We evaluated their methodological characteristics using 76 extraction items across seven domains encompassing theory-intervention alignment, causal architecture, and policy relevance. Pervasive methodological limitations were identified across multiple domains and studies, suggesting that mixed findings may partly reflect weaknesses in study design and implementation rather than meaningful differences in intervention effects. Notably, only one study included a sample with a mean age below 16 years, highlighting a mismatch between the evidence base and populations targeted by current policies. Overall, our findings indicate that the available evidence may be insufficient to support robust causal claims about social media reduction and youth mental health, constraining its use as a foundation for policies targeting children and adolescents.