Negative Effects Of Social Media

It has become extremely common for an individual to sign into their Facebook account, and see a picture that they feel exposed a little too much. Check into their Instagram account, and regret letting everyone know what their location was. Feel uncomfortable, or bullied by a tweet that a person posted to their Twitter. Per Farheen’s article on negative effects of social media “participating in social media sites such as these can make you feel more connected” (Sagheer 1). It is not okay for individuals to feel victimized due to the negative effects of social media. Social media tends to distract, humiliate, and destroy one-self through entertainment. If people would donate more time to things more supplemental to their growth, and limit their use of social media, then maybe people would stop walking over the harm that social media presents to our community. Monitoring the time invested into social media will help eliminate most of the detriment, privacy issues, and bullying flowing through today’s society.

The past seven years have seen the rapid adoption of social media platforms by users all over the world, today there are more than 2.46 billion active social media users in the world . Social media enables users to consume timely news inexpensively, and allows them to further comment, share and discuss the news with other social media users, making news consumption on social media attractive to a large portion of these users. For example, a recent study by Pew research center found that 67% of American adults get news on social media . However, compared to primitive news media like radio and television, news in social media is easy and less expensive to produce and distribute and it is not fact-checked or filtered by a third party prior to dissemination. This has made social media a very attractive platform for fake news creators, i.e. news that is deliberately created to deceive the reader to believe something that is not true.

Presently, the internet provides much of the world with endless games, chatting and many other sources of entertainment. This, in turn, is causing people to spend numerous hours per day talking with friends, posting pictures or video, discussing the latest trends or technologies, or playing online games and gambling. Society is beginning to disregard the world around them, and are now more focused on the digital lives they have formed around themselves. These numbers are very rapidly expanding since the earlier days of social media. According to Andrew Perrin of the Pew Research Center, statistics show that almost 90% of individuals ages 18-29 use at least one form of social media and spend at least 3-4 hours per day logged into some social media on their smartphones or computers. Research also shows that 80% of adults ages 30-49, and less than 35% of adults ages 65 and over are also using some method of online

Social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram are commonly used among the younger generations, but can the excessive use of these apps cause mayhem? According to a new study conducted by the Family Technology Education Non-Profit Group, teenagers are spending nearly 9 hours a day on social media. The excessive use of social media is a bad influence on adolescents because of the negative impacts it has. Social media can cause direct impacts to the mental health, safety, and lives of its users. Teenagers need to ensure that they are being cautious and responsible while using different social media networks.

Today technology has impacted society both positively and negatively by reducing face to face social interaction. Our cellphones allows us to post personal information, pictures, and post comments anonymously. Anything posted online can be seen by anyone at any given time, and can remain online forever. Social media has also became a distraction to both young teens and adults “Social media is a powerful procrastination tool” (Shah, 2016, para. 3). This quote explains how social media

Nowadays, social media is a big part of the American culture with approximately eighty-one percent of the US population using it(Edison Research). On average, people spend two hours a day on social media meaning the average American spends five years of their life on it. This in part has to do with the variety of platforms which equals more time on them. (Asano) The rise of social media began in the early 2000s with the start of Myspace and continues to grow. Today, we have various platforms including: Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook, and YouTube amongst the most popular. These platforms provide a new way for billions of people to connect, communicate , and inform themselves amongst others at any time of day. It’s a new form of interaction where now the most social person sits on their couch, smart phone in hand, all day. People tend to say being online is toxic because of cyber bullying, hackers, and fake news; however, due to the increased access of ties between people and information, social media has begun to influence social and political change in a positive way through its power of communication.

Walking down the hallways of any high school can be a maze. Majority of students have their heads down looking into their phones. Awkward moments are avoided by constantly refreshing social media apps to look like things are being done. Phones and social media are a huge part of life these days, “94 percent of teens who go online using a mobile device do so daily. 71 percent of teens say they use more than one social media site.” (HHS). More than half the teen population is using social media websites and the effects of them can be life long. Everything from bullying to harassing someone can occur on these sites. Along with being judged by others and judging yourself based on what other people post as well. Social media can be a great place to share things with friends but it can also be a place that lowers self-esteem to rock bottom.

Some researchers have observed that the decline in the reading habits of students is as a result of technological innovations such as social networking. According to Agwu and Kalu (2011), the abuse of new technologies contributes to students’ poor reading. They opined that in this era of information and communication technology, the general orientation of young people has unconsciously changed from reading and the love of books to these new technologies. They further emphasized that people now live in the generation of ipod, laptop, iphone, facebook, twitter and other social networking sites, thereby reading has been literarily sacrificed on the altar of modern technologies. While social networking has become a staple of social interaction, therein lays a great deal of potential dangers. Marsh (2012) noted that social networking sites like every good things, has a flip side as well. Sites such as facebook, MySpace and Twitter can also have a negative effect. He relented that social networking are time-consuming as students are gradually becoming addicted to them. The hours and time spent on these sites is enough to be used to acquire knowledge rather such study and useful time is spent social networking. This is the reason Bature (2010 as cited Mbachu, 2011), pointed out that, “a white man once said if you want to hide anything from a Blackman, hide it in a book”. In other words, social networking is taking greater part of students’ studying hours and the negative effects

With the advent of the internet, social media platforms have become a form of mass communication. The large database of information and mobilization has led to the increased integration of social media in daily life. Along with the transition towards new societal institutions, controversy and exposure of the negative effects surrounds the stigma of social media. With the increase of street protests in the United States, people believe that social media may be the cause for the unrest and the continually perceived unsuccessful movements. Although social media creates a different dynamic in the diffusion of current social and political demonstrations, the evidence shows that social media increases participation, efficiency, and success for protests and social movements. Being an integral part of current and future demonstrations, social media’s benefits and consequences should be studied more.

Researchers have shown an increase in body or self-dissatisfaction and the linkage with social media (add names). Social networking sites promote specific body ideals for men and women, thus creating the latest trend, which women will follow. A study showed how young women will “blindly follow a trend if it can provide them with the qualities they desire, such as attractiveness and popularity, while disregarding the consequences to their health” (Verma and Avgoulos 2004). The wide audience social media reaches have begun to negatively effect girls as young as 7 years of age by making them think their bodies are not normal (Grabe, Ward, and Hyde 2008). Grabe, Ward, and Hyde say the extreme cases of these young women have been linked to critical physical and mental problems, including different eating disorders, low self esteem, depression and obesity (2008).

Having social media in our upcoming generation has become one of the most popular sources of communication. Young teenagers growing up in today’s generation with social media platforms such as Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter have provided pictures and videos that have become the first thing people look at in the morning, and the last thing they see before bed. These pictures have provided unrealistic standards as to what is considered beautiful in today’s society. By establishing unattainable standards of beauty and bodily perfection, the media drive ordinary people to dissatisfaction with their body images. The dissatisfaction can results in resorts to drastic measures, and even disorders of behavior, as people try to achieve these unreachable goals.

The use of social media by athletes is observed more and more every year; both collegiate and professional athletes have large platforms, and many athletes choose to use social media accounts to communicate messages to bring awareness to a certain organization, show support for other athletes and teams, or to persuade fans to buy a particular product. Uniquely enough, athletes can send nonverbal messages on social media with the use of Instagram; and in addition to positive impacts of social media platforms, there can be negative consequences for athletes.

Today in everyday life we all have some sort of device. We all possess access to social media in some way, shape or form. Social media plays a huge part of everyone’s life. We constantly look at our phones on every beep. We read every post on Facebook. We never thought how that affects the youth and with them following us, who knows what they might find on the World Wide Web. Social media in the hands of the youth can have devastating effects, even adults misuse social media and make it become a problem in their lives or others. With the continued use of social media, we leave ourselves vulnerable in every possible way. Being left vulnerable is something that should not be taken lightly, this

In today 's society we fail to realize how easy we can access social media sites without any precautions. The accessibility may be different depending on not only the location, but it can very well differentiate through different states. The effects in which social media from the basic functions of social media websites, how sex offenders can access these websites without there being any type of consequences and how other countries can have access to their own social media.

Our lives seem to be more and more consumed by technology as great advances in this area have continue to be made, especially when it comes to social media. Many researchers have begun to notice that depending on how much time individuals spend on these social media sites, they can negatively affect their daily lifestyle in very significant ways.  For example, social networking has become a huge distraction for students and it can affect their grades depending on how often they check their various accounts while doing class work.  Researchers have also come to find out that social media can contribute to the development of psychological symptoms