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| Source: https://www.dailyexcelsior.com/the-power-of-social-media/
The world was introduced to the game-changing technology of the Internet In the early 1990s. This new fascinating technology allowed people to access information and connect with people with a click of a button. Waiting weeks for letters or spending an entire day going through dozens of books in a library just to find that one piece of information was soon to become a thing of the past.
Not long after, the first Social Networking site, Six Degrees was launched in 1997, it allowed people to make individual profiles and add others to their personal network.
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| Source: https://www.cbsnews.com/pictures/then-and-now-a-history-of-social-networking-sites/
Today, however, Social Media allows us to do things that go far beyond creating profiles and adding people to our network, with the emergence of networking sites like Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, and LinkedIn people can connect to people worldwide in ways that certainly is epoch changing!
However, this drastic and sudden shift from the offline to the online world certainly brought with it a number of demands and challenges. Even though the creation of the Internet had been long in making, it took barely a decade for this new technology to become a household necessity worldwide. With such a massive reach, it becomes important to analyze and note how the creation of this completely separate and new online world where anyone has access to literally everyone else might be affecting our mental health.
1) FOMO
Social Media empowers people with the ability to stay up to date with anything and everything, particularly with the lives of the people listed in the “following” or the “friends” section. However, the urgency to check every message and notification that flashes on the lock screen has become a major cause of anxiety for people, particularly teenagers worldwide.
Teenagers are most affected by the negative aspects of social media because of their vulnerability. They are still trying to find their priorities, navigate between right and wrong and learning how to socialize right. In such a case, if used right, Social Media can be a tool for healthy socialization, but then again social media is a place that gives the illusion of limitless reach. Creating a massive circle of friends can often lead people to feeling lonely and with the increase in the number of people you follow, comes a probable greater fear of missing out on a bigger number of updates.
Edna Ferber, an American novelist once said, “Perhaps too much of everything is as bad as too little”, the fear of missing out on things that one thinks are probably more “happening” and exciting than one’s own life, leads to an obsession with the social media, so much so that people find it hard to engage themselves when the internet is down. Hence, one has to wonder if the idea that the “social media empowers” people, mentioned in the first line of this section is true after all.
The fact of the matter remains that since its emergence, social media has been evolving continuously, soon after Six Degrees collapsed, My Space emerged, followed by Facebook and finally Instagram and Snapchat. With every new platform came a new format and a plethora of new features. This loop of new features has never allowed us to introspect and think about what amount of consumption is healthy and what completely disconnects us from our real lives. It is a matter of online connection at the cost of the real, offline connection.
The introduction of the “story” feature by Snapchat which was eventually adopted by Instagram and Facebook too, seems to be a major trigger of FOMO. For someone sitting at home, the sight of his/ her friends enjoying a concert or partying in a club might trigger the idea that he/ she is missing out. On the other hand, an hour of internet shut down would too trigger the fear that the individual is missing out on exciting updates from friends or even social media influencers or for that matter celebrities. Hence, fear of missing out works on multiple levels and can affect different people differently.
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| Source: giphy.com |
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| Source: giphy.com |
2) Sleep
FOMO often leads to disruption of/ in sleep patterns. This is majorly caused by the fear of missing out on updates while sleeping, Plus, almost all of us must have experienced how time flies while on social media. Almost all Social Media platforms are designed in a way that entices the user to explore content. YouTube, for example, has a list of related videos on the right- hand side of the screen, such an arrangement tempts a user to click on additional content and hence stay on the platform for a longer period of time than was originally required. Therefore, even if someone goes online to merely check updates before bedtime, there is a high chance that he/ she will stay online longer than anticipated and therefore causing a disruption in sleep pattern.
It is not uncommon that people fall asleep with their phones in their hands or under their pillows, this happens mostly because people stay online unless they absolutely cannot, this is because of multiple reasons, firstly, as mentioned the social media websites are designed in a way that keeps the users hooked, secondly, a possible reason could be that being online late at night allows better conversations, there are almost no disturbances during the night, which allows people to connect in a better and perhaps in an emotional way and once you start having a great conversation with someone, it becomes hard to end it, another, maybe a less probable cause could be that until a few years ago a lot of networks offered “night packages "at subsidized rates, given the comparatively less online traffic during the night, internet services work faster which acts as an additional incentive to stay up late at night.
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| Source: giphy.com |
A research conducted by the University of Glasglow titled, “#Sleepyteens: social media use in adolescence is associated with poor sleep quality, anxiety, depression, and low self-esteem" mentions,
incoming alerts during the night have the potential to disturb sleep, as 86% of adolescents sleep with their phone in the bedroom – often under their pillow or in their hand (Lenhart, Ling, Campbell & Purcell, 2010). A quarter of adolescents report sleep interruptions from incoming text messages (Van den Bulck, 2003) and social media alerts are likely to cause similar sleep disturbances. Secondly, constant incoming alerts create considerable pressure to be available 24/7 and contribute to a fear of missing out (Thomée, Dellve, Harenstam & Hagberg, 2010). Young adults experience considerable anxiety when their access to texting is restricted and report feeling stressed and guilty when they do not reply to a message immediately (Skierkowski & Wood, 2012; Thomée et al., 2010). It is, therefore, possible that young people struggle to relax at bedtime due to anxiety at missing out on new messages or content. These unique aspects of social media use provide further reason to expect a link with poor sleep quality. (2016)
Given that Sleep is deeply linked with Mental Health makes social media usage at night a serious concern affecting our mind.
3) Productivity
If seen from a distance, social media appears to have made working, studying or being productive in general a thousand times easier.
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| Source: microsoft.com |
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Working online also brings with it a greater chance of getting distracted. Social Media considerably reduces the attention span. Earlier, there was a clear demarcation between the work/ study space, and the leisure or the entertainment space. Social media, however, acts as an integrating factor, placing work, entertainment, and socialization all in one space. For example, someone working on a laptop takes a break, it is likely that he/ she will use social media during that interval. However, given the kind of loop social media puts one in (as mentioned earlier) a 10 or 15 break might end up becoming a long video call with a friend or even a movie marathon.
It is ironic how new apps meant for keeping people off social media are coming up. Never the less for someone facing FOMO or a possible online addiction, these apps will come in handy. Other helpful solutions could be to step out for walks during work breaks, not only does this provide a healthier alternative to scrolling through social media but interacting with people in real life can reduce the urge to be online. Another possible habit that could help would be to treat your smartphone somewhat like a landline, avoid carrying your phone on you at all times, create a designated space for the phone, in the house or in the office and make it a point to drop the smartphone in that spot every time.
Being productive is directly linked to peace of mind. Distractions are always in a positive relationship with procrastination, not being able to finish assignments and tasks on time, hurrying up work in the last minute can cause anxiety, stress and unwanted pressure. Like any other aspect of social media, if used correctly and within limitations, it can help you in being productive and if not, it can act as a negative factor in your life.
4) Knowing the difference between Social and Real Life
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| Source: giphy.com |
With the emergence of Instagram as one of the most used social media websites, the social media experience today has become even more photo-oriented than text-based. The Grid pattern of an Instagram profile allows users to experiment with pictures to create an “aesthetic” profile. Since we spend such a considerable part of our lives on social media, we often tend to mistake this “aesthetic” picture presentation to be a depiction of real life. We forget that what we see online is filtered and shows a minuscule percentage of that individual’s life. Such a misunderstanding can cause low self- esteem in people. Igor Pantic, who is a professor at the Department of Medical Physiology at the Medical Faculty, University of Belgrade mentions in his paper titled, “Online Social Networking and Mental Health” (2014) how low self- esteem is both the cause and effect of such picture-perfect profiles. How a depiction of a better life might help a person suffering from low self- esteem and at the same time affect the viewer in lowering his/ her self- esteem, the viewer begins to compare his own real-life- to this “show” of a wonderful life.
Social Media influencers suffer from this blurring of the online and the offline world as well. People sitting behind a computer or mobile screens forget that these influencers are real people who too, like anyone else, might be affected by cyberbullying. Constructive criticism is always appreciated but social media influencers often receive rude, personal and demeaning comments, messages or emails. This can, like for anyone else be very demotivating.
Finally, on a positive note, the convenience of socializing on social media can help people recovering from mental health issues like depression and anxiety. It is often hard for people recovering from mental issues to engage in face- to- face conversations let alone step out of the house, in such a case, social media can help them stand on their feet and act as a stepping stone to going back to the real world. Also, social media sometimes creates a safe space for people to talk about their issues and motivate others to seek help and fight their battles.
5) Privacy
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| Source: giphy.com |
The lack of privacy has for long been a controversial subject. Even though a number of privacy settings have been put in place on several platforms, Social Media remains more or less an “open” space. Texting remains open even with privacy settings on, which leaves an ample space for people to exploit and manipulate others. It is not seldom that women receive sexually threatening messages from men they barely know, or even hate messages, in general, can severely affect someone and send them on a downward spiral.
In addition to that, there is a greater chance of misuse of pictures and other such information which is easily available on social media websites. While social media may paint a lovely picture, it also gives ample access to the real life of real people.
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| Source: giphy.com |
The only way to avoid social media-related mental issues is to use it responsibly, separate it from our lives, treat it only as a source of entertainment and try and not revolve our lives around an evolved “idiot” box.
References
Woods, H. C., & Scott, H. (2016). #Sleepyteens: Social media use in adolescence is associated with poor sleep quality, anxiety, depression and low self-esteem. Journal of Adolescence, 51, 41–49. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.adolescence.2016.05.008
Pantic, I. (2014). Online social networking and mental health. Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, 17(10), 652–657. doi:10.1089/cyber.2014.0070
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