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Does Social Media Harm Children's Mental Health?

Audrey Carville and guests discuss the impact of social media on children's mental health.

Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt has threatened social media firms with new laws if they don't do more to protect children online, accusing them of "turning a blind eye". He has given them until the end of the month to outline action on cutting underage use, preventing cyber bullying, and promoting healthy screen time. To discuss the impact social media has on young people's mental health and if more needs to be done to protect them online are Koulla Yiasouma, the NI Commissioner for Children and Young People, Dr Noel Purdy, the Director of Research and Scholarship at Stranmillis University College and Cyberpsychologist, Dr Mary Aiken, from the University College in Dublin.

The Tuam Mother and Baby Home was one of ten Irish institutions run by religious orders where thousands of unmarried pregnant women are thought to have been sent. A child died there nearly every two weeks between the mid 1920s and 60s. Anna Corrigan describes how she has only recently discovered that her mother Bridget gave birth to two baby boys there and that she is trying to uncover if one of them, John, is one of the 796 babies discovered on the site and if the other, William, is still alive.

A new memorial and museum dedicated to the legacy of racial violence, lynching and injustice in America has opened in Montgomery, Alabama. Andrew Yawn is a journalist with the Montgomery Advertiser, a paper that has began to atone for their past coverage of lynching. He describes how the National Memorial for Peace and Justice and Legacy Museum is not only a place of reconciliation, but a place that is making America confront its violent racist past.

According to Philosopher John Gray, there are seven types of Atheism and he has no truck with those Atheists who believe in progress or who believe in science. He talks to Audrey about his new book, and whether religion and atheism were the opposites of each other.

The eight hundred year-old heart of St Laurence O'Toole has been returned to Christ Church Cathedral in Dublin, six years after it was stolen. His heart is one of many relics across Ireland in churches, another notable one being the head of Saint Oliver Plunkett in St Peter's Church in Drogheda. Historian Dr Niamh Wycherley, from the NUI in Galway, discusses why we have such relics in our churches and if they still have the same significance as they did hundreds of years ago.

1 hour, 45 minutes

Last on

Sun 29 Apr 2018 08:30

Broadcast

  • Sun 29 Apr 2018 08:30