Social Media And Its Effects On Society

Social media has become deeply embedded as a part of today’s American culture and lifestyles, changing the way people interact and communicate with one another. Americans use social media every day; to not only communicate, but to express themselves. These online media sites and blogs serve as entertainment for its users and give them a sense of a social life if they do not already have one. Some users become so obsessed with their online lives that they lose the ability to successfully communicate with people in real life. Their craving for the use of social media becomes an addiction to where they can spend countless hours on their social sites. Facebook, a popular social media cite, has been proven to cause Facebook Depression, a sickness in which a person is emotionally depressed and in self denial. Studies have shown that sites such as Facebook, are a direct link to an individual’s physical and emotional well being.

You are walking out of the new Star Wars movie, posting about how superb it was, when suddenly you are swooped up and thrown in the back of a vehicle. No one would have thought posting about how you were there earlier would provoke such a situation. After all, social networking is “safe” and “friendly.” Now, social media is defined as “A form of electric communication through which users create online communities to share information,” according to Merriam-Webster Dictionary. Social networking began in 2004 and has sky-rocketed since, due to its sense of world connectivity in a mere moment. However, with this increase, a growth in seemingly harmless threats has occurred. Users sitting behind a screen are usually unaware of how complex and diminishing social networking can be. Social media may be considered negative for society as it changes what members view as behaviorally normal, increases the risk of cyber-suicide, and reduces the amount of privacy in one’s life.

Though the importance and dependence of social media in society this meaning has been developed. The third principle of symbolic interactionism is that “meanings can change or be modified through interaction” (Ferris and Stein, 2014, pg. 32). This principle proves that social media does not have to be a negative influence is the dependence and meaning of it in society changed. If society, particularly younger generations, did not place such a heavy importance on social media it would not have the meaning that it does in our society. If social media did not have the importance in society that it does it would not have the power to negatively affect the mental well-being of so many individuals.

The more technology advances the more we seem to find different ways to communicate world wide. Daily there are many different types of apps and websites being created to share ideas, photos or feelings. It has changed the lives of many people positively and negatively. Ever since social media grew so did bullying. However there are many places bullying can happen, like in school, outside of school, work, or home. There are two different types of bullying, verbal and physical. It can have a small or big impact, depending on the person. Many people will say that the main causes of bullying today is social media because it allows people to communicate with others not having to be face to face and anonymously making it easier to bully others. Although some may argue that social media causes bullying, the truth is that bullying is actually caused by overexposure of private life, the victim becoming the bully, and lack of supervision .

Americans are slowly being separated from one another through electronics. In fact, most of that is due to the social media that is easily obtainable on devices such as IPhones, Computers, and TV’s. Social media is what keeps people away from family and keeps them from going outside of the house and actually bonding with others. When people choose to connect over social media rather than connecting in person it means they are disconnecting from society and its causing human interaction to steep downwards. People socializing through social media has become a serious problem, and it happens more and more each day as technology continues to advance. Disconnection is caused by social media and technology because the latest devices are so easily obtained and it creates the elimination of human interaction.

Ever just wonder and think about the government being able to see what you’re doing online, on social media. You might be talking to someone and you think you’re safe and think no one can see the conversation but people can see it like the government. Us people don’t think about what we post on social media and that can hurt us if we are trying to get a job or anything like that, even if we put our profile on private the stuff we put out there can be found some way. A lot of people feel that the government shouldn’t be able to see what we do online because it’s our personal life and there are some things we don’t want other to be able to see. We deserve to have some type of privacy and we don’t deserve to just be watched by people we don’t

Romantic relationships have become super complicated in recent years. The movie He’s Just Not That into You portrays ten people’s perspectives on relationships and dating in the 21st century. This movie was written as interweaving stories that come together in different ways that make a point. People find the world of dating to be complicated and most times confusing. There is always a fear of cheating and falling in love with manipulative people. Social media has also become a huge part of modern dating. Everything from texting to dating websites can influence how people view potential mates. The Facebook status was invented expressly for discovering if someone was single within the first couple seconds of being on the page. You can practically advertise that you’re single to any of you friends in hopes of finding a date. Dating today can be fraught with conflict and miscommunication and is vastly different from the dating world fifty years ago as it now includes a “hookup” culture, a non marriage centered mentality, and the use of modern technology.

Social media can be both an extremely positive and extremely negative part of today’s society. In our current day and age, a majority of teenagers use social media apps every single day. Social media allows people to connect with friends and family, allows you to see what is going on in the world, and gives you the ability to express yourself to a large audience. As nice as that may sound, there are also negatives to social media. For example, some people use the power of social media to do harm. For most teenagers body image is extremely important. Even if you’re confident in yourself, nowadays people base their self worth on how many likes their picture gets, or even worse, by comparing themselves to the unrealistic, photoshopped pictures of celebrities that clutter the internet. Over time many people around the globe have recognized this problem and small steps have been taken to create a change; however, more people need to band together to solve this problem on a global level. The longer this problem goes unsolved, the more our youth is affected. I’m sure that everyone has looked in the mirror at least once in their life and pinpointed one specific thing they dislike about their body, and in many cases these people do not like that specific feature because it is not celebrated in the media. Every day that the problem of unrealistic photoshopping in the media is not solved, the number of people affected increases drastically. Celebrities and news outlets should work

Social media do not simply mean communication, sharing information, and playing games. Social media has also helped businesses increase revenue for the company by contacting customers, and introducing their products and services to consumers. According to the social savior.com (N.D.) in 2013, marketers argue that was important for business for about 86 percent. A year later that number increased to 92 percent. However, social media expansion was important for their business. Internet users in the United States, with an average usage per day, spend 37 minutes per day, while in 2015 Facebook had nearly 1.5 million users. Other sites are growing quickly as well, although not as much as Facebook is. Therefore, it makes the owner company turn its attention to social media more and more because they will benefit enormously from social media. For example, if Facebook has 1.5 million users, and a company will have consumers from advertising on Facebook, than viral marketing as Facebook has users all the time and advertising on social media that will have people to see it more than another (the social savior.com, N.D.).

Social Media: Some say it is taking over our lives one day at a time, while others say today’s generation of children and teens are just the beginning of a technological revolution that will continue to benefit and make our lives easier one day at a time. Through studying the technological benefits as well as more simply growing up in a technological era, the benefits of social media in our everyday lives becomes more and more clear as opposed to being a nuisance to society as some suggest. Social media has proven to be an effective tool in serving and protecting society by providing an outlet for law enforcement to investigate crimes and ultimately get offenders off of the streets. Social media outlets have also proven to be a way to promote a more interactive and easily accessible classroom from any location. With social media readily accessible to almost anyone with access to technology in the world, populations became more informed of the events in their communities, states, countries, and even the world. Through Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and Snapchat numerous social revolutions have been sparked and accelerated in their efforts such as “Black Lives Matter”, “Blue Lives Matter”, and the Egyptian Revolution. Social media, through the benefits to society, the educational system, as well as to the population as a whole, has proven to help society by informing and protecting social media users and nonusers alike.

When one is struggling trying to figure out one’s own identity, there are resources available. For example, YouTube may have makeup tutorials. However resources for figuring out one’s sexuality may be harder to find. Trying to turn to loved ones may result in judgment. So the Internet is the next best choice. In most cases, blogs are the ideal option because they allow for people to share the personal struggles and triumphs with the world. Upon research Tumblr may come up on a search engine. It is a social media website that hosts millions of blogs.

To quote Jim Morrison, “Whoever controls the media, controls the mind” this quote continues to reign true in the 21st century through mass media being pushed and pumped into society whether through television, advertisements, marketing or social media. Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr and SnapChat are all popular social media outlets utilized by individuals from many different backgrounds and age groups. These social media outlets are not subjective to gender, race, or class but they still affect those that utilize them. Much of the media today shapes how many people, specifically women, are expected to live and be perceived. In much of these social media outlets one can log in and view on the “popular page” images of women, both famous and normal, who are deemed by members of society to be the ideal. These ideal beauty images subjugate many if not all individuals who view them in some way shape or form. While some of the effects can be positive it is the negative effects that are detrimental.

Today, there are just over 3 billion active internet users. Today using social media is the most common activity of children. People have technology right at the tip of their fingers, which isn’t exactly a good thing. Internet use is changing the way people are living their lives, and causing unhealthy addictions. Social networking sites do have a beneficial effect. They make it easier to keep up with their distant friends and family. However, these sites are preventing real life relationships. Although many people think they need social networking sites to keep up with their friends, networking sites should have a limited access policy, because it discourages too many people from physical interaction, identity theft has become a much bigger issue, and nothing is done about cyber bullying on these sites.

There is a significant change in the way consumers interacted with brand from the traditional marketing arena to the modern times when social media has become a trend and a profitable mode of marketing as it allows consumers to directly engage with brands at their own will which means that that there are high chances of getting genuine customers through engagement. Social Media presents varied and a great number of tools that can not only allow users to engage but also enable brand track the result of their marketing efforts.

Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, LinkedIn and texting are the main communication hub used in today’s society. With all of the new technology, instant communication is readily accessible. Communication with virtually anyone is practically instantaneous no matter where you are in the world, and the beauty of it all is the fact that one does not have to see the individual he or she is corresponding with. However at what capacity does interpersonal communication fall under?