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Scientists comment on the Global Mind Health Report 2025, published by Sapien Labs.
Prof Pete Etchells, Professor of Psychology and Science Communication, Bath Spa University, said:
“It’s difficult to assess the claims made in this report, as the data that are provided are very sparse. The press release, for example, identifies smartphones and ultra-processed foods as ‘key culprits’ in a global mental wellbeing crisis; however the report does not appear to present data to support this claim. For instance, the report ranks countries by scores on a bespoke composite mental health score, and separately ranks them by age of smartphone acquisition. The report is then reliant on other sources of information to suggest an association between the two – I have provided critical comments on one of these sources previously.
“In short, it’s not clear to me that the claims that (a) there is a ‘mind health crisis’, and (b) that these are driven by smartphones or UPFs, can be substantiated by the information contained in this report. Mental health is a complex issue that can’t be easily explained by single factors, and we must be especially careful when those factors are not clearly or consistently defined.”
Prof Gunter Kuhnle, Professor of Nutrition and Food Science, University of Reading, said:
“’The Global Mind Study makes some very bold claims about links between ultra-processed food consumption and mental health. This appears to be based on a study that does not use any standardised method of assessing ultra-processed foods – indeed, the study cited (https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC12689381/) asks only for the following:
“How often do you eat processed, packaged, or fast food that is not made from fresh ingredients? e.g., McDonalds, Dominos, microwave meals, processed canned food, deli meats/cold cuts, noodles in a cup, packaged crisps/chips, sweets/candies, sodas/fizzy drinks”
“This question is completely unsuitable to estimate ultra-processed food intake because it does not distinguish between processed and ultra-processed food. Canned food, for example, is always processed – but not all canned food is ultra-processed. Apart from failing to distinguish between processed and ultra-processed foods, this question ignores cultural differences between the 47 countries in which the study was conducted.
“The association between food intake and mental health is complex – and it goes in both direction: food can affect mental health, but mental health can also affect food choices. People with poor mental health might prefer foods that can be easily prepared or offer comfort – something that many UPFs do.
“Making such bold claims without strong evidence risks causing more harm than good by placing undue pressure on those who are already most vulnerable.”
Prof Chris Ferguson, Professor of Psychology, Stetson University, said:
“The claims made in this report appear unreliable. I actually have access to their dataset and was unable to confirm these claims. For instance, in analyses I’ve run, age of first acquisition of smartphones was unrelated to mental health. By contrast, exposure to adverse events in childhood did predict mental health issues. Other studies support both of these conclusions. Consistently, across studies, smartphone use is not a strong predictor of mental health outcomes, however, experience to abuse, neglect and parental mental health issues as well as school stress does predict youth mental health issues. We need to be careful of big claims which do not appear to be evidence based. Too often that includes weak evidence from large datasets such as this one being misrepresented in public statements. Very often they risk distracting us from the real sources of youth mental health issues: dysfunctional families and failing schools. In fact, the report does mention the association between dysfunctional family relationships and mental health issues but that did not make it into the headline of the press release.”
‘The Global Mind Health report 2025’ will be published by Sapien Labs at 00:01 UK time on Thursday 26th February.
Declared interests
Prof Pete Etchells: I am the author of Unlocked: The Real Science of Screen Time (and how to spend it better). I am a member of the academic advisory group supporting the evaluation of Australia’s Social Media Minimum Age regulations.
Prof Gunter Kuhnle:
Prof Chris Ferguson: I have no interests to declare.