The Problems Brought by Social Media Addiction

The use of social networking sites is rising at great rates. According to a report conducted by the Pew Internet & American Life Project in 2012, ninety-five percent of individuals aged 12-17 use the internet; and eighty-one percent of those use social network sites (Pew Interest). Although it is known that social media can have a useful impact on lives, often times people forget that with a positive comes a negative. The continual use of social network sites will impact teen lives more negatively than positively because they can cause huge distractions from valuable and critical pursuits like education; they can also cause mental health issues and a reduction in communication skills.

Addictions may seem like simple pleasures at first. Unfortunately, that's the trap with any addiction. It starts out at a pleasurable interest. Gradually, it can turn into something that's life-altering and all-consuming. Not only can it alter your own life, it can ruin your family life. When it comes to addiction, most people think about the most popular ones like drug and alcohol addictions. However, there are many addictions that fly under the radar.

It is fascinating how the Internet is changing people's lives in today’s world. Anyone is able to promptly do research and gather information on the Internet. With the click of a button you can have the data you need in less than ten seconds by searching for it on a search engine, such as Google. Since just about anyone has access to social media in today’s society, it makes it very easy for students to get distracted while in class or while doing their homework. Our world has been given so many different aids of communication which makes its very easy for us to connect with anyone.

Social media has negative effects on adolescents who overuse it. It is important as parents or guardians to remember to monitor how much kids use social media and when they use it. As a parent or guardian, you must remember that the disorders kids can get from overusing social media is real. Also remember that the internet isn’t always the safest place for our children. The use of social media can be damaging and it has no benefit. Keep control of your children’s use on social media to avoid these negative effects. The internet does interfere with daily

Health experts love to say that sitting is the new smoking. Given the number of diseases to which sitting is linked, and the number of people it apparently kills every year, sitting is one of the worst things we can do for health. But possibly as concerning is the thing that we often do while we're sitting: Mindlessly scrolling through our social media feeds when we have a few spare minutes (or for some, hours). And as we probably know intuitively, and as the research is confirming, it's not the best habit when it comes to our collective psychology.

In today’s society almost every individual has some type of social media, whether it is Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, or Twitter, People have accustomed to utilizing these types of social media and it has become part of their life and daily use. According to the essay “Students Addicted to Social Media” by the International Center for Media and Public Agenda, the study from the University of Maryland claims “American college students today are addicted to media” (Signs of Life in the USA 403). The university discovered that when these students are restricted from using media it is similar in terms of drug and alcohol addictions. During the study that the university conducted, students discuss how boring it is without media and how it gives them anxiety about not receiving information through social media. Other students claimed that texting and IM'ing gives them comfort and if they do not have these items then they feel alone and isolated from the world ( Signs of Life in the USA 404). Students are not the only ones who have an addiction of media but also parents and non-students. However, the International Center is accurate in some aspects and the responses students gave are very relatable which some people can agree with.

“Students Addicted to Social Media” and “If We’re All So Darn Sick of You, Facebook, Why Can’t We Quit You?,” written by the International Center for Media and the Public Agenda and Simon Dumenco, are two writings outlining different issues that plague users of social media. The International Center for Media and the Public Agenda summarizes their findings following a study they conducted that isolated subjects from social media for 24 hours. They found subjects experiencing feelings of withdrawal, a phenomenon that social media companies prey upon as explained by Simon Dumenco. Dumenco postures that companies such as Facebook will send false notifications to entice users into logging back in. These two ideas combine to paint a picture of an unconditionally constant presence of social media in everyday life, a practice that may be facilitated by explosive social media growth on a mobile platform. Together, these two publications point to problems that may have drastic effects on social media and those who use it.

Informal community clients can share diverse bits of individual data with others; in any case, these subtle elements might be abused by companions. Net and Acuity’s review (2005) of Facebook clients' protection concerns found that 91 percent of clients uploaded their photos, 88 percent shared their date of birth, 40 percent demonstrated their telephone number, and 51 percent composed their present address. Sharing individual data, for example, this can lead to abuse of information, regardless of whether purposeful or not. For instance, a few people share profile subtle elements such as their full name, sexual orientation and telephone number with their companions (Wills & Zeljkovic., 2011). On the off chance that the informal community account of one of the client's companions is hacked, the spammer or the programmer can abuse these points of interest to blackmail the client (Rosenblum 2007). The capacity to control protection alternatives is basic to expanding the clients' trust in their interpersonal organization suppliers. Since Internet clients speak to a scope of various societies and ages, protection alternatives ought to be clear, basic and simple to utilize. Clients must be able to control their protection choices whenever. These protection alternatives enable clients to acknowledge or dismiss the scattering of their data to others. For instance, a few clients would

It’s a serious addiction and it can fuel your snacking habits as you browse late into the night. Not to mention it can affect your sleeping patterns, which can induce stress and encourage fatty food indulgences.

Did you know the average person will spend five years and four months of their life devoted to using social media? This is more than the time we spend eating throughout our lives, which clocks in at about three years and five months, according to Mediakix, an influencer marketing service. The unstoppable march that is the advancement of technology is so quick that it’s only a matter of time before it consumes every aspect of the average life. Some might argue that social media usage is at an appropriate level and doesn’t need to be limited, but I disagree. For example, think about how many people are unable to put down their smartphone for ten minutes because, in a very literal sense, electronics have become an addiction. With this information in mind, there should be a policy enforced to limit the use of social media day by day. The government needs to enforce a law that permits only two hours of social media usage each day. This regulation is necessary because social media use is taking over the lives of modern humans, which could be put to use doing more useful activities to improve the world. This excessively large amount of time devoted to the usage of social media can, believe it or not, affect daily behavior and cause addictions. This limitation will allow us to become more effective and productive in the currently hindered work we are doing in our daily lives. The government should limit the amount of time people can use social media because it will result in

The book investigates the relationship between teens and social media in many aspects. These aspects include identity, privacy, and addiction. By the time I read the third chapter, which was based on teens’ “addiction” to social media, my perspective on it had changed completely. One of Boyd’s most critical points in that chapter is that attributing the term “addiction” to social media is a misnomer, and she specifically mentions that “addiction rhetoric positions new technologies as devilish and teenagers as constitutionally incapable of having agency in response to the temptations that surround them” (Boyd 83). In other words, using the term “addiction” to describe excessive social media usage gives a negative connotation towards social media and usage of it in general. In addition, the term also implies that teens cannot control their social media usage at levels of not being able to control alcohol and/or drug usage. This particular point grabbed my attention. Could teens really become “addicted” to social media on that level? Thinking about most of my high school friends, it seemed like that was the case for some of them. Even for those who weren’t “addicted” to social media, they still use it a lot. What are the factors behind a person’s usage of social media? Is there something special about Facebook, Snapchat, or Instagram that I was missing out on or overlooked? There was only one way to find out, and that was to interview someone about their social media usage and

Social Media is an ingrained part of today’s society. Students are constantly on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and many other sites that we adults are not hip enough to know about. The use of social media has also made its way into the classroom, leading many experts say that with the proper safeguards in place, social media use is possible- and even desirable- in the classroom. However, there is a limit as how often social media should be utilized both inside and outside of the classroom. It has gotten to the point that social media use can be labeled as an addiction, comparable to alcoholism and drug abuse. So what is an addiction? Dr. Lawrence Wilson labels an addiction as a “habit or behavior causes some kind of pleasurable sensation. However, in reality the habit is weakening the person in some way, because one begins to need more of the habit to get the same effect.” There are several telltale signs that a person may be addicted to social media including spending an excessive amount of time online, over-sharing the details of one’s personal life on various websites, and even looking for new friends and/or followers in an almost competitive way.

Technology is being invented every day, and children are growing up in a society where they are learning to use and misuse the internet. According to NSPCC, “One in five, 8 to 11-year old’s and seven in ten, 12 to 15-year old’s have a social media profile” (“Ofcom” 72). The internet can be very helpful and educational in today’s world if used properly parents just need to be sure that children are using it properly. Parents are worried about the predators and lack of physical activity that social media and the internet has caused on future generations. Haven’t parents really caused this problem on their own? As parents it’s time to unite to solve the problem, all that’s required is to become educated, and to educate our children. Children misusing the internet can lure predators, have children suffering from cyber bullying, and can cause children to have attitude and behavioral problems.

Caroline Knorr, a journalist from CNN Common Sense Media asserts the fact that companies engineer the social media apps we utilize in a certain way that keeps us hooked (“How to resist technology”) on it in order to continue usage. Although these tactics benefit the companies that create the media apps it does not always positively affect the user. Addiction can be seen as an action that has been done multiple times to the point of creating a regular practice or habit in which the person becomes a slave to. In this case though, the base of the addiction is Social Media, what leads to it, and how one can end or prevent it. Ultimately, a habit like such can negatively impact a user to where it alters their social and everyday life. Luckily, there are methods that can help such as reorganizing the way a person uses their phone, also by modifying their actions and activities in order to increase the amount of time one can spend away from their device, as well as changing their decision making for in-app purchases.. On the other hand, there are possible refutations when bringing up the issue of social media.

Today’s youth generation, has a strong attachment to the online world. Many adolescents spend most of their time online versus offline. Therefore, one can consider these adolescents as a social network addict, a person who spends a fair amount of time on one or many social platforms. Throughout the three articles, “Social Networking Addiction: An Overview of Preliminary Findings” by Mark Griffiths, “Social Network Sites: Definition, History, and Scholarship” by Nicole B. Ellison and “Taking Risky Opportunities in Youthful Content Creation: Teenagers’ use of Social Networking Sites for Intimacy, Privacy, and Self-expression” by Sonia Livingstone, show how this addiction has changed people’s communication among people. While there are