Sophie 1

Professor McGriff

Sophie Johnson

ENC 1102

3/6/20

Social Media’s Impact

Social media is a general term referring to several different platforms with different uses,

but all relating back to a way of communicating or connecting with others all over the world.

Most social media platforms involve the action of “posting” pictures and interacting with others’

pictures as well. This gives all its users the ability to be able to keep up with what’s going on in

their friends’ and family’s lives, but also even strangers they may not have ever met outside of

the internet. These different platforms all also provide forms of communication for people in

various stages of life, age ranges, and places of living. This would be such things as direct

messaging other users, which creates a private conversation versus the mostly public

communication that goes on within the app. The most commonly used social media apps today

include Snapchat, Instagram, and Facebook. Users should be careful to consider the

consequences social media can bring before downloading it. Common issues include a negative

feeling towards the user’s body image, a negative influence on one’s opinions and perceptions,

and difficulties with bullying.

These apps typically tend to generate a following of mostly young adults, however, there

are many more adults within these platforms than one might realize at first. Social media is often

praised for being such a useful and creative source because people enjoy the freedom and ability

it gives them to express themselves. However, a lot of things have come up to contradict this
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somewhat set opinion. Knowing that there are older adults, among the other users, there is often

concerns and issues that go on with the interactions between members of those two groups.

Another major issue that is often bought up and addressed is the amount of “suffering” that being

on social media can bring. This suffering can affect many different areas, whether it’s mental,

physical, or emotional health. In fact, damaging mental effects can often go on to lower self-

esteem and affect one’s physical health. In my own experience, I have even seen how social

media often distorts its users’ perceptions and can affect the way they see themselves and how

they live their daily lives.

Social media platforms are known to appeal to mainly the younger generation because

that is the generation that is going to continue to use it on to their later years. Social media apps

are just as much a business as any other and they are always looking to find the best ways to

reach people and encourage them to use their app. In this, there are always cases where children

under the age restrictions for each specific app still find a way to be apart of it anyways. With the

pressures and consequences that can come with these social medias, it is not necessarily the best

option for those age kids to have and interact with social media daily or on their own. Tyler

Percival, author of “The Importance of Social Media Age Restrictions,” wrote that, “around age

12, biologically, most kids have not developed robust enough cognitive functions for impulse

control or ethical thinking.” This being said, it is dangerous for kids under certain ages to even

partake in using social media because they haven’t matured enough to the point of knowing how

to control themselves within that kind of setting. This could be very dangerous for them when

they irresponsibly upload something inappropriate for the entire internet, not anticipating the

consequences it could have on their futures.

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Social media has been known to often give its user a negative feeling towards their own

body image. In her article “Self Esteem…,” Bindal Makwana interviewed a former social media

influencer about her personal experience with some of these apps. In this interview, the

“influencer” shared her own journey within social media and shared several thoughts that agreed

with those of other girls who were interviewed. These girls shared that in their experience,

viewing others’ pictures caused them to go on to dislike their own bodies or appearance in one

way or another (Makwana). It is understandable that on an app like any of these, one would

want to share their lives with others, but not all realize the effect their “glamorous” pictures can

have on another person’s life who may already think less of themselves. These kids are put in a

dangerous situation to receive harm mentally when they doubt themselves based on another’s

life. Another thing that heavily contributes to a girl specifically questioning and doubting

themselves is that many popular influencers will edit their pictures to where what they are

portraying as real life is not even close or realistic (Makwana). When people edit their pictures,

they give a false representation of themselves and what their once again, “glamorous” life is like.

Being that person just seeing it through the screen though, allows one to easily believe that what

they are seeing is very much true, which then leads to them possibly thinking that their own life

isn’t good enough anymore. One study reveals that there are “links between body dissatisfaction

and eating disorders,” (Makwana). Though it’s not something everyone may realize or want to

hear, some people even take action in their own lives and try to physically change who they are.

Body-image is a topic that can be very sensitive for certain people, in that they may feel that they

need to change how they look to better their lives. When social media is involved, and providing

these false images of what a “perfect body” is, girls can feel it’s especially necessary that they

change to look more like another person. Though it’s never wrong for someone to want to be
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healthier, people in these situations will often act in ways that can have detrimental affects to

their permanent health. Eating disorders are not only caused because of social media, but there is

enough shown through several studies to prove that it can easily result from dangerous

comparison.

Social media has been blamed in situations of changing one’s opinion or perception of

certain things in false advertising or promises. In his article, “A model of opinion and

propagation structure polarization in social media,” Prasetya talks about the issue of

“polarization” that goes on within some social media platforms. The idea of “polarization” pretty

much creates secluded groups of people who all distinctly share the same ideas or beliefs and

nothing more (Prasetya). These kinds of groups are not healthy for an individual to place

themselves within because they are then consistently getting the same extreme views and

opinions placed on them over and over. Prasetya refers to this concept as the “echo chamber

effect” which highlights the fact that their own ideas are shot back at them and around the group,

which never enables them to receive new outlooks. This likely also moves one to become more

and more close-minded which can be dangerous when someone may come along and be trying to

actually give them some help that they need. Once someone has become involved with one of

these groups, they can begin to be sucked in and what they once held as their own views can

even begin to be twisted. Their perceptions of their lives and what they choose to believe can

begin to change and cause them to go a direction that they never necessarily wanted to go in.

Another point that may not be so surprising to today’s users is that many users on each platform

will rely on that platform for their news source (Prasetya). Once again, not one single person or

account on social media is unbiased because it is all run by people with hopes that any average

person will see their appealing title or picture and want to know more of the information they
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have. The kind of news spread on social media is often made up of contents that is considered

something a general audience would find appealing. In order to create that “appeal” real ideas

and facts are often twisted and no longer reliable. When people take their news updates from

social media, they never really are getting all the right information and they then go on to live

their lives with the wrong ideas. Overall, many social media users can find themselves putting

far too much trust in certain accounts or other users that they don’t actually know, leading them

to a false sense of what’s real and what’s not.

Not only does social media affect people in their own self-judgement, it offers an easier

way for some to be bullied by others who think they’ve found a safe space from behind their

screen. In her article, “Social Media and Adolescents,” Jessica Durbin highlights a huge factor

that should be considered when wanting to participate in any social media. Durbin says, “social

media use is associated with psychosocial problems and can be even worse for an individual who

is already predisposed to depression, anxiety, or mental illness.” This being said, Durbin is trying

to point out that those who have already been struggling with mental health issues, having more

of a chance to be affected negatively by social media and also harass others on social media. One

study in specific showed that increased depressive moods from using social media can cause the

user to cyberbully other users (Durbin). Cyberbullying has an enormous effect on people that the

bully doesn’t often ever know about. Cyberbullying puts thoughts in the victim’s mind that they

may not have generally placed on themselves before. On the other hand, these ideas and thoughts

can be added to those that the victim may have already been having, causing them complete

mental destruction and pushing them to their end. Downloading social media allows every single

user to be at the risk of being cyberbullied. There is no way to make sure that one is “safe” from

it as it is not something that one might ever expect for themselves. There have been several cases
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where people have sadly taken action in their own lives because of something an

unknowledgeable bully said to them. This becomes a very serious issue because once it’s gotten

to this point, it becomes a problem that is irreversible. It’s sad to see it come to such a terrible

place such as that, but the only hope that can come of it is that it will finally cause others to

recognize the strength of their words or actions.

In their article, “A Computational Study of Mental Health Awareness Campaigns on

Social Media,” Koustuv Saha a look into some methods and tactics that some groups are using

within social media to try to counteract the effects of cyberbullying. Sadly, even in numerous

efforts, there will never be a way for those programs to be sure of every single incident of

bullying that goes on through a platform (Saha). With so many things being privately messaged,

and the victims being scared to talk to anyone, a lot of it stays hidden; possibly forever. This

article helps to reiterate the point that those who choose to use social media should be very

selective in what they post and careful when deciding to download the app in the first place.

Because there is always the possibility of facing cyberbullying, one should be very careful and

be sure to weigh the consequences before downloading any social media.

There are several things that have come up to go against social media, however, through

several personal stories and other studies, it is shown that social media can often also have a very

positive use and impact. In their article, “The Negative Effects of Social Media for Teens,”

Krietz also points at the good aspects of social media. One view is that social media actually

goes on to help advance students’ social skills (Krietz). In even my own personal experience,

I’ve heard many who have raved about the cool people they have talked to or met on social

media. It does seem reasonable that one could find easier ways to communicate as they are

meeting new people and going into new situations, but there are several things that inhibit the
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progression of usual communication. In her article, “How Using Social Media Affects

Teenagers,” Rachel Ehmke goes into great detail over the scientific studies of communication.

Much of Ehmke’s article goes against the idea that social media is a good mode of

communication. For one, many social cues and body languages aren’t understood as a result of

not having a conversation in person or even in real time (Ehmke). Ehmke writes that those who

do most of their communication through a screen, “grow up to be adults who are anxious about

our species’ primary means of communication—talking,” (Ehmke). Another point that could be

argued for is that social media allows people to be able to keep up with what is going on around

them and in their community. Personally, having social media has helped to inform about certain

things, but not always the full story. I’ve often found myself sucked into an article or headline

that would relate to myself, just to be disappointed when it was overexaggerated or on a

completely different topic. Like what was mentioned above, social media is not always giving

the correct facts or information and those students are allowing themselves to be misinformed.

That becomes especially dangerous for those that are gullible and begin to believe all that they

read or hear.

In conclusion, it is not that one should consider social media as terrible and useless, but

they should consider all that comes from it. First, one must honestly assess themselves. It’s

important that they are able to be confident in who they are and know their own worth. With one

of the main issues being lowered self-esteem and comparison, it’s extremely important that

someone who is mentally unstable does not get sucked into the possibly toxic environment of

social media. Second, it’s important for the individual to have a firm establishment of their

values and morals to keep them from being falsely persuaded in some direction. Lastly, an

individual needs to know their boundaries and what to say to certain people, as to not upset
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anyone. They also need to be careful with who they interact with and receive messages from so

they are not putting themselves in danger. Overall, before downloading social media, each

individual needs to be sure that the pros outweigh the cons for themselves personally. When

people are simply more careful with the way they handle their social media use, they can save

themselves from a lot of possible trouble to come.

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Work Cited

Durbin, Jessica, et al. "Social media and adolescents: What are the health risks? Primary

care providers should screen for depression and other health-related risks associated with

the use of social media by adolescents."Clinical Advisor, July 2018, p. 19+.Gale

Academic OneFile

,https://linkgalecom.db23.linccweb.org/apps/doc/A550301578/AONE?

u=lincclin_sjrcc&sid=AONE&xid=a84b57c1. Accessed 16 Feb. 2020.

Ehmke, Rachel, and Child Mind Institute. “How Using Social Media Affects Teenagers.”

Child Mind Institute, childmind.org/article/how-using-social-media-affects-teenagers/.

Krietz, Chloe, et al. “The Negative Effects of Social Media for Teens.” Smart Social, 11

Nov.2019, smartsocial.com/negative-effects-of-social-media/.

Makwana, Bindal, and Yaeeun Lee. “Magazine Issue 1 2018 / Issue 35.” The Inquisitive Mind, 
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www.in-mind.org/article/selfie-esteem-the-relationship-between-body-dissatisfaction-

and-social-media-in adolescent?

gclid=EAIaIQobChMI1aSz9qy5wIVjICfCh3OVw9rEAMYASAAEgJw-vD_BwE

Percival, Tyler. “The Importance of Social Media Age Restrictions.” Net Nanny, 26 Dec. 2017,

www.netnanny.com/blog/the-importance-of-social-media-age-restrictions/.

Prasetya, Hafizh A., and Tsuyoshi Murata. "A model of opinion and propagation

structure polarization in social media." Computational Social Networks, vol. 7, no. 1,

2020, p. NA.Gale Academic OneFile, https://link-gale-

com.db23.linccweb.org/apps/doc/A610971634/AONE?

u=lincclin_sjrcc&sid=AONE&xid=2193c294. Accessed 9 Feb. 2020.

Saha, Koustuv, et al. "A computational study of mental health awareness campaigns on social

media."Translational Behavioral Medicine, vol. 9, no. 6, 2019, p. 1197+.Gale Academic

OneFile ,https://link-gale-com.db23.linccweb.org/apps/doc/A610763722/AONE?

u=lincclin_sjrcc&sid=AONE&xid=24644728. Accessed 16 Feb. 2020

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