Issue 1| Winter 2026

Welcome to the 3+3 newsletter by PROMISE
 

Dear PROMISE Partners, Colleagues and Friends, 

After officially launching in September 2025, work on the PROMISE project has now finally begun. We are delighted to welcome you to the very first edition our 3+3 Newsletter!  

Why 3+3? Every three months, we’ll share three new insights and/or updates from PROMISE. This way, you can stay up to date with important developments in our project without cluttering your inbox.  
 

In this first issue of our newsletter, we share: 

1. highlights from our project launch,
2. interdisciplinary team introductions, and
3. a first look at our initial output: a scoping review of social media-related policy initiatives. 

We’re excited to have you join us along the way.  

Kind regards, 

Prof. Dr. Tobias Dienlin, Project Lead

1. PROJECT LAUNCH | September 2025 

PROMISE officially kicked off in September. The official launch meeting introduced work packages, established coordination protocols, and set the tone for the project’s collaborative and participatory ethos. 

Participants also outlined strategies for engaging youth voices, fostering connections with non-governmental organizations, and building a framework for evidence-based, cross-sector policy recommendations. 

PROMISE is a CHANSE-funded project dedicated to understanding how social media policies can be designed to improve young people’s well-being. 

Our interdisciplinary consortium spans five countries - Austria, Germany, Estonia, Spain, and the United Kingdom - and brings together expertise in Communications, Psychology, Sociology, and Media Studies.

PROMISE combines quantitative, qualitative, and computational research to deliver new insights into young people’s digital engagement and mental health implications. 

By working closely with young people, international experts, and civil society, PROMISE aims to translate cutting-edge research into practical, inclusive, and effective policy recommendations for a healthier digital future. 

“The strength of PROMISE lies in its diversity - of disciplines, perspectives, and people. Our goal is not only to understand how social media policies affect young people’s mental health, but to contribute a diversity of experience and data-driven recommendations for meaningful policy impact” 

— PROMISE Project Lead, University of Vienna 

2. MEET THE TEAM

PROMISE brings together a dynamic, interdisciplinary team of researchers from across Europe. Each partner institution leads a key aspect of the project’s scientific, methodological, or policy-oriented work. 

Our Principal Investigators include:

Switzerland/Austria

Prof. Dr. Tobias Dienlin, University of Zürich

Intervention study

Ass.- Prof. Dr. Kathrin Karsay, University of Vienna

Interventions

Germany

Prof. Dr. Adrian Meier, Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg

Scoping review of social media policies 

Estonia

Prof. Dr. Veronika Kalmus, University of Tartu

Youth focus group interviews 

Spain

Prof. Dr. Charo Sádaba, University of Navarra

Project synthesis and policy recommendations

United Kingdom

Prof. Dr. Amy Orben, University of Cambridge

Computational Analyses

Together, our interdisciplinary collaboration ensures that PROMISE reflects the complex realities of digital life across Europe, grounded in rigorous research and shaped by meaningful dialogue with young people and practitioners.

3. RESEARCH UPDATE

The first PROMISE research output - a scoping literature review, constituting project work plan 1 - is underway, with pre-registration soon to be completed by Dr. Meier and his team at FAU Erlangen-Nürnberg.  

Despite the clear significance of social media use among young people and potential associations with mental health risks, there has been no comprehensive systematic synthesis of suggested social media policies. 

The state-of-the-art scoping review maps current and emerging policy approaches addressing the mental health impacts of social media use among adolescents and young adults aged 10–25.

The review examines both enacted and proposed policies that regulate social media access, usage, and design, with explicit consideration of developmental heterogeneity across this age range.

Guided by three research questions, the study (1) develops a typology of policies according to their regulatory targets; (2) analyzes the rationales underpinning policy proposals; and (3) assesses the types and levels of evidence used to evaluate policy effectiveness in protecting adolescent mental health.  

Drawing on academic literature, policy documents, and reports from governments and civil society organizations across seven academic and grey literature databases, this review synthesizes the policy landscape to develop an integrated analytical framework intended to support more coherent, evidence-informed social media regulation.  

The final scoping review, along with other project outputs, will be published on the PROMISE website.