文章提出，社交媒体成瘾是否会沿著香烟吸烟相同的路径发展：曾经普遍的习惯，如今在较富裕的人群中已不那么常见，但在较贫困的群体中仍根深蒂固。在美国，20世纪中期几乎有一半成年人吸烟，但到2020年，比例已降至约13%，而在研究将吸烟与肺癌联系起来之后，下降的早期迹象最先出现在受教育程度最高的人群中。这篇文章暗示，随著监管机构、法院，以及中产阶级父母越来越关注对年轻人的伤害，社交媒体也可能正处于类似的转折点，尽管其使用本身仍然十分普遍。

吸烟的例子显示不平等如何塑造这一下降：到1985年，社会压力已使吸烟在富裕圈子里不那么被接受，一位学者警告说，吸烟将成为一种阶级化现象。这一预测被证明是正确的，包括在英国也是如此；在英国，地方最贫困五分之一地区的人吸烟的可能性，是最不贫困五分之一地区人群的3倍以上，分别为22.6%对6.6%。一项2022年的综述警告说，英格兰将至少晚7年才能达到5%或以下的目标，而最贫困地区要到2044年才会达到。

作者认为，社交媒体的危害也可能变得更加不平等：较富裕的家庭更可能因应新出现的研究而限制智能手机和萤幕时间，而来自较不富裕背景的年轻人则可能面临更多负面的网路经验。但与吸烟相比，这两者之间存在重要差异，因为父母自己并没有普遍放弃社交媒体，而数位平台是个人化的，并不像香烟那样以同样方式具有普遍危险。更广泛的警告是，成瘾性产品在不再属于主流之后很久仍可能保持普遍；如果它们具有危害，就可能加剧社会不平等，而不只是反映不平等，其中AI聊天机器人被认为是未来一个可能带来类似风险的竞争者。

The article asks whether social media addiction could follow the same path as cigarette smoking, where a once-mass habit became far less common among richer people while remaining entrenched among poorer groups. In the US, nearly half of adults smoked in the middle of the 20th century, but by 2020 the rate had fallen to about 13%, and the early signs of decline started among the most educated after research linked smoking to lung cancer. The piece suggests social media may be at a similar inflection point as regulators, courts, and middle-class parents increasingly focus on harms to young people, even as the use itself remains widespread.

The smoking example shows how inequality shaped the decline: by 1985, social pressure had made smoking less acceptable in affluent circles, and one academic warned that smoking would become a class-based phenomenon. That prediction proved correct, including in the UK, where people in the most deprived fifth of local areas are more than 3 times as likely to smoke as those in the least deprived fifth, at 22.6% versus 6.6%. A 2022 review warned that England would miss its 5% or below target by at least 7 years, with the poorest areas not reaching it until 2044.

The author argues that social media could also become more unequal in its harms: affluent families are more likely to respond to emerging research by limiting smartphones and screen time, while young people from less affluent backgrounds may face more negative online experiences. But there are important differences from smoking, because parents are not broadly abandoning social media themselves, and digital platforms are personalized rather than uniformly dangerous in the way cigarettes are. The broader warning is that addictive products can remain common long after they stop being mainstream, and if they are harmful they can intensify social inequality rather than merely reflect it, with AI chatbots identified as a possible future competitor that could create similar risks.