The light at the end of the tunnel is a train: Risky behaviours in the era of social networks

Dear Editor,

On 8 March 2017, a 13-year-old boy from southern Italy died hit by a train while he and two same-aged friends were taking a selfie on the railway tracks, with the train approaching in the background (Mazzuca, 2017). This case represents the tip of the iceberg of an alarming new trend, the so-called ‘daredevil selfie’, that is gaining popularity worldwide especially among teenagers. Self-pictures taken in high-risk poses, standing on the edge of skyscrapers, bridge wires or electricity pylons, holding loaded weapons or surfing on moving vehicles: teens dare themselves to capture the moment and post the proof of their bravery on social networks (Facebook, Instagram) to increase their popularity. In 2014 and 2015, around 50 fatal accidents related to daredevil selfies have been reported by the media; victims were mostly very young (68% were 21 or younger, but is has also to be highlighted that 14% were 25 or older) with a significant prevalence of males (75%) (Crockett, 2016). Adolescents are peculiarly prone to risk taking, often driven by personal characteristics such as sensation seeking and egocentrism (Greene, Krcmar, Walters, Rubin & Hale, 2000), which, in a generation of native digitals, are naturally fuelled by social network exposure. Teenage brain goes through a phase of active development, and dopaminergic neurochemical pathways controlling emotions, reward-seeking and decision making are modified, greatly affecting risk perception and emotional learning (Kelley, Schochet & Landry, 2004). This represents an evolutionary advantage, as allows increased independence and enhancement of individual skills, but also a major threat, as unintentional injuries are among the main mortality causes in this age group (Casey, Jones & Hare, 2008; Viner et al., 2011.). Normal adolescent narcissistic vulnerability may nowadays be exacerbated by the pursuit of microcelebrity, a way to strategically improve one’s image on social networks to increase online popularity (Marwick, 2015). New media technologies have allowed non-famous young people to generate, manipulate and share an enormous quantity of personal contents, reaching a potentially unlimited ‘audience’ (Marshall and Redmond, 2015). Social networking sites highly affect teens’ identity development and peer relationships, amplifying to the extreme social comparison, self-identification and distress (Shapiro and Margolin, 2013). Moreover, the shifting to older ages of the transition from adolescence to adulthood is leading to a generation of delayed adults (Hayford and Furstenberg, 2008), therefore widening the number of individuals potentially victim of problem adolescent behaviours. The daredevil selfie represents one of the most dangerous contemporary phenomena, on the edge between physiological and psychopathological processes, which should be targeted by a multidisciplinary expertise (sociological, psychological, educational, normative), in order to delimit the dangerous impact on an increasingly fragile and overexposed society.