What Is About Teenage Social Life
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What Is About Teenage Social Life
I am a teen from Kazakhstan who is fascinated on the effects of social media.
Social media has the ability to both hinder teens as well as let them shine.
It seems like the Internet just came out of nowhere and changed everything, including childhood. Whether this change has been for the better or worse depends on how you look at it.
Teens today are the first generation that cannot imagine life without the Internet and the various devices that connect us to it. Our electronic gadgets have become extensions of our bodies, like crutches. On the other hand, you might also say that these powerful tools give us wings. Some people believe that the Internet and its various social networking options affect us negatively while others beg to differ. Parents who cling to their pre-Internet way of life are scrambling to make sure they have the right answers to guide their kids.
Writers and researchers have flocked in to fuel the flames of this debate with rants and data (See footnotes below for studies and articles referred to here.) In this article, we'll explore both the advantages and disadvantages of the Internet and social networking for teenagers.
Here is a rundown of the pros and cons social media can have on teens.
Researchers have found that social media use can make profound changes to the brain in similar ways that drug addiction can . A team of psychologists have found that receiving likes on the internet releases dopamine in the brain. This creates a sense of pleasure. Similar triggers for this experience includes eating chocolate or winning money.
Recent studies have also shown a correlation between heavy screen-mediated communication and depression. As this is a relatively new phenomenon, multiple theories are still being studied on the impact on mental health. A strong theory out there is that individuals often compare themselves to others they see on social media. Teens typically put on their best face on social media and don't often share their struggles. Others will only see them in a perfect, idealistic view. This form of Internet narcissism may make others feel inadequate about their own lives or body image. Even people sharing a perfect version of themselves can develop depression as they feel they can never live up to their online persona.
It must be said that the Internet may have the potential to fight depression. For shy people and introverts, the Internet can be a safe and controllable place to speak one's mind and develop high self-esteem. Those who feel marginalized can find a community of similar individuals and gain a sense of camaraderie. There can certainly be emotional support when a teen may not have such support in their own real lives.
Social media allows people to project themselves while simultaneously hiding their real identity.
However, shifting the focus of social connections to a device has its positives. In her piece describing the positive effects of social networking, Melissa Page cites eight.
Do your 5,000 "friends" on Facebook make you happy?
On the other hand, there are many huge educational benefits when the Internet and social media are used wisely.
An article that criticizes the notion of smartphones destroying a generation highlights how AP courses used Facebook to help students. Another article highlights how platforms like Twitter can keep students engaged in biology by having them create succinct explanations of lessons. At one middle school in Portland, Oregon, a teacher realized what a huge role the Internet played in her students' lives and decided that if you can't beat them, join them. Although 69% of American high schools have banned cellphones, her school didn't do that. Instead, they got every student's phone number and started calling habitually tardy kids to make sure they got to school on time. She started a social media program at her school. One year later, grades had gone up more than 50% school-wide, chronic absenteeism had been reduced by more than a third, and 20% more students were completing extra credit assignments.
So students' grades definitely suffer with unrestricted and unfocused use of the Internet and social media. But when schools embrace the Internet and social media and use them for educational purposes, everyone benefits.
Many text communications are as dumb as they look.
In summary, social networking has both its good and bad sides. Depending on the user, it can reap great benefits or just be a waste of time.
No matter what you decide—whether the computer is a heavenly tool or the gateway to hell—your teens will probably be engaging online at some point and may be using it more than you know right now, even if you have told them not to. The Internet is ubiquitous now. It's in classrooms, libraries, and places of work, readily accessible by anyone with a device. Even if your kid doesn't have a cellphone, the kid sitting next to them does. No matter what barriers you put up between your teenager and the Internet, the digital world will eventually seep through the cracks. The Internet is now a common facilitator for social interaction.
Maybe the question isn't whether social media is good or bad, but how to keep the lines of dialogue open between you and your teenagers so you can help them negotiate through this digital universe. You must show them how to distinguish good from bad, quality from fluff, and fact from fiction. You have to teach them how to use these tools to their advantage.
This content is accurate and true to the best of the author’s knowledge and is not meant to substitute for formal and individualized advice from a qualified professional.
This was a nice article but if your kids want social media at a reasonable age its ok to slowly introduce it and when teens dont have social media they will get "out of the loop" and feel very isolated outside of school . Social media is a great way to strengthen and create new friend ships❤️
This was a nice article but if your kids want social media at a reasonable age its ok to slowly introduce it and when teens dont have social media they will get "out of the loop" and feel very isolated outside of school . Social media is a great way to strengthen and create new friend ships❤️
ese rivista es muy depremida on February 21, 2020:
Mitchell Langborne on October 31, 2019:
This true but if you just write this doesn't mean the world will change. it's a good article
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This article is amazing provides good information...
so..... can we use social media or not????
this article is really good...but teens should not have any time of electronic devices in the first place to do bad stuff on like people should not let this happen :)thank you for you to my friends and family for helping me with everything.
Youtube is social media, but other than that, I don't use any.
Why do adults love dissing on social media? It's pretentious.
Who else noticed that they probably spent a ton of time making this... ON THEIR DEVICE?!?! I mean if you are trying to discourage social media, try harder. It is like chopping down trees to make paper, and on that paper, you write "Save Trees"
I have depression due to social media
Enter Your Words Here on June 13, 2018:
this article just ruined my whole mood because now i dont know definite if social media is good for us and being in the middle of something ticks me off
my comment didn't appear im offended lmao
social media is killing ppl from bullying
Alight, this article has me ticked off a little. While using social media can *sometimes* be harmful to you, all in all, it's your own fault. Not doing homework because of Twitter? WELL GET OFF YOUR PHONE. It's not their fault that using their platform is making you late on essays. They aren't our babysitter, you have to be responsible enough to actually get off your butt and do something. Also, I did agree with a lot of the pros. It can help you talk to people, express yah self. But the cons were kind of... dumb. Like, if you're getting bullied on social media, get off of it. It's not that hard. Again, if you write "smelly poo poo" on Facebook, it's not their fault that you get depression. Of course, it is the other users fault, but there's this one little thing called IGNORING THEM. I mean, seriously. If you can't get friends on the internet, get them in real life. And if not there either, then I guess be alone forever. But seriously, a lot of this article is wrong... Like that text message. W-what even is that? Why is that included in here? I don't understand. 1st of all, NOT ALL MESSAGES ARE LIKE THAT. That's, stupid. And it's 2018, nobody says "I like turtles." And so what if they say that? It's not hurting anyone. (On a side note, the poll with the "Internet Usage" the 5% of people that said that their kid never goes on social media are liars.) (Also Also, you DO know that "wehavekids.com" IS A SOCIAL MEDIA PLATFORM.) Anyways, this article is alright, but I wouldn't trust it. Peace. (Halla to my East Central peeps reading this!)
i think that this article covered a lot and I'm on social media a lot but we need to start cutting back
I liked the video with the 2 guys dancing
i love this site i'm going to us it always
Bumble Bee, me too. Except I love social media. COuldnt live without it xoxo
do you think that you could do a piece on long term effects of social media on kids im doing a research paper an i cant find anything
TKDKatz610@gmail.com on March 15, 2018:
this was helpful on my writing homework thx some much!!!
beluga@gmail.com on March 14, 2018:
This has helped me with my english assignment, but personally i disagree with technology use wasting teenage time, bc like what else are we gonna do aye.
So I strongly disagree with the use of technology but I still love to play it. I get to play with my friends but how many times I have missed major opportunities.I still love technology but I do wish I was not addicted to it. I feel like its taking over this world I would put a stop to it but I got to grind on Fortnites battle pass XD
So I strongly disagree with the use of technology but I still love to play it. I get to play with my friends but how many times I have missed major opportunities.I still love technology but I do wish I was not addicted to it. I feel like its taking over this world I would put a stop to it but I got to grind on Fortnites battle pass XD
this has really helped me with my english assignment. thank you so much :) and this has also made me want to stop using social media for a long period of time.
I'm only on my phone for a half an hour just to check tests and social media, but my parents get mad and take it away, and don't give it back for a week, and tell me to go do my homework. This has happened many times, and I have lost my phone for an entire two months (over the summer), and now I am not allowed to have social media. Is this fair? I only go on m phone for half an hour to one hour everyday.
King Kong Smah on January 08, 2018:
I /LOVE/ how people think that social media is used only for social stuff. Well, hate to break it to you hun but it isn’t. I use social media as a professional platform for art. I have discovered many artists who have inspired me to pursue a career in art through media. I’ve wanted to share my art to the world but I couldn’t, without social media that is. Without the discovering of these artists on media, I wouldn’t have been sparked an interest in art.
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Many parents worry about how exposure to technology might affect toddlers developmentally. We know our preschoolers are picking up new social and cognitive skills at a stunning pace, and we don’t want hours spent glued to an iPad to impede that. But adolescence is an equally important period of rapid development, and too few of us are paying attention to how our teenagers’ use of technology—much more intense and intimate than a 3-year-old playing with dad’s iPhone—is affecting them. In fact, experts worry that the social media and text messages that have become so integral to teenage life are promoting anxiety and lowering self-esteem .
Young people report that there might be good reason to worry. A survey conducted by the Royal Society for Public Health asked 14-24 year olds in the UK how social media platforms impacted their health and wellbeing. The survey results found that Snapchat, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram all led to increased feelings of depression , anxiety, poor body image and loneliness.
Teens are masters at keeping themselves occupied in the hours after school until way past bedtime. When they’re not doing their homework (and when they are) they’re online and on their phones, texting, sharing, trolling, scrolling, you name it. Of course before everyone had an Instagram account teens kept themselves busy, too, but they were more likely to do their chatting on the phone, or in person when hanging out at the mall. It may have looked like a lot of aimless hanging around, but what they were doing was experimenting, trying out skills, and succeeding and failing in tons of tiny real-time interactions that kids today are missing out on. For one thing, modern teens are learning to do most of their communication while looking at a screen, not another person.
“As a species we are very highly attuned to reading social cues,” says Dr. Catherine Steiner-Adair, a clinical psychologist and author of The Big Disconnect . “There’s no question kids are missing out on very critical social skills. In a way, texting and online communicating—it’s not like it creates a nonverbal learning disability, but it puts everybody in a nonverbal disabled context, where body language, facial expression, and even the smallest kinds of vocal reactions are rendered invisible.”
Certainly speaking indirectly creates a barrier to clear communication, but that’s not all. Learning how to make friends is a major part of growing up, and friendship requires a certain amount of risk-taking. This is true for making a new friend, but it’s also true for maintaining friendships. When there are problems that need to be faced—big ones or small ones—it takes courage to be honest about your feelings and then hear what the other person has to say. Learning to effectively cross these bridges is part of what makes friendship fun and exciting, and also scary. “Part of healthy self-esteem is knowing how to say what you think and feel even when you’re in disagreement with other people or it feels emotionally risky,” notes Dr. Steiner-Adair.
But when friendship is conducted online and through texts, kids are doing this in a context stripped of many of the most personal—and sometimes intimidating—aspects of communication. It’s easier to keep your guard up when you’re texting, so less is at stake. You aren’t hearing or seeing the effect that your words are having on the other person. Because the conversation isn’t happening in real time, each party can take more time to consider a response. No wonder kids say calling someone on the phone is “too intense”—it requires more direct communication, and if you aren’t used to that it may well feel scary.
If kids aren’t getting enough practice relating to people and getting their needs met in person and in real time, many of them will grow up to be adults who are anxious about our species’ primary means of communication—talking. And of course social negotiations only get riskier as people get older and begin navigating romantic relationships and employment.
The other big danger that comes from kids communicating more indirectly is that it has gotten easier to be cruel. “Kids text all sorts of things that you would never in a million years contemplate saying to anyone’s face,” says Dr. Donna Wick, a clinical and developmental psychologist. She notes that this seems to be especially true of girls, who typically don’t like to disagree with each other in “real life.”
“You hope to teach them that they can disagree without jeopardizing the relationship, but what social media is teaching them to do is disagree in ways that are more extreme and do jeopardize the relationship. It’s exactly what you don’t want to have happen,” she says.
Dr. Steiner-Adair agrees that girls are particularly at risk. “Girls are socialized more to compare themselves to other people, girls in particular, to develop their identities, so it makes them more vulnerable to the downside of all this.” She warns that a lack of solid self-esteem is often to blame. “We forget that relational aggression comes from insecurity and feeling awful about yourself, and wanting to put other people down so you feel better.”
Peer acceptance is a big thing for adolescents, and many of them care about their image as much as a politician running for office, and to them it can feel as serious. Add to that the fact that kids today are getting actual polling data on how much people like them or their appearance via things like “likes.” It’s enough to turn anyone’s head. Who wouldn’t want to make herself look cooler if she can? So kids can spend hours pruning their online identities, trying to project an idealized image. Teenage girls sort through hundreds of photos , agonizing over which ones to post online. Boys compete for attention by trying to out-gross one other, pushing the envelope as much as they can in the already disinhibited atmosphere online. Kids gang up on each other.
Adolescents have always been doing this, but with the advent of social media they are faced with more opportunities—and more traps—than ever before. When kids scroll through their feeds and see how great everyone seems , it only adds to the pressure. We’re used to worrying about the impractical ideals that photoshopped magazine models give to our kids, but what happens with the kid next door is photoshopped, too? Even more confusing, what about when your own profile doesn’t really represent the person that you feel like you are on the inside?
“Adolescence and the early twenties in particular are the years in which you are acutely aware of the contrasts between who you appear to be and who you think you are,” says Dr. Wick. “It’s similar to the ‘imposter syndrome’ in psychology. As you get older and acquire more mastery, you begin to realize that you actually are good at some things, and then you feel that gap hopefully narrow. But imagine having your deepest darkest fear be that you aren’t as good as you look, and then imagine needing to look that good all the time! It’s exhausting.”
As Dr. Steiner-Adair explains, “Self-esteem comes from consolidating who you are.” The more identities you have, and the more time you spend pretending to be someone you aren’t, the harder it’s going to be to feel good about yourself.
Another big change that has come with new technology and especially smart phones is that we are never really alone . Kids update their status, share what they’re watching, listening to, and reading, and have apps that let their friends know their specific location on a map at all times. Even if a person isn’t trying to keep his friends updated, he’s still never out of reach of a text message. The result is that kids feel hyperconnected with each other. The conversation never needs to stop, and it feels like there’s always something new happening.
“Whatever we think of the ‘relationships’ maintained and in some cases initiated on social media, kids never get a break from them,” notes Dr. Wick. “And that, in and of itself, can produce anxiety. Everyone needs a respite from the demands of intimacy and connection; time alone to regroup, replenish and just chill out. When you don’t have that, it’s easy to become emotionally depleted, fertile ground for anxiety to breed.”
It’s also surprisingly easy to feel lonely in the middle of all that hyperconnection. For one thing, kids now know with depressing certainty when they’re being ignored. We all have phones and we all respond to things pretty quickly, so when you’re waiting for a response that doesn’t come, the silence can be deafening. The silent treatment might be a strategic insult or just the unfortunate side effect of an online adolescent relationship that starts out intensely but then fades away.
“In the old days when a boy was going to break up with you, he had to have a conversation with you. Or at least he had to call,” says Dr. Wick. “These days he might just disappear from your screen, and you never get to have the ‘What did I do?’ conversation.” Kids are often left imagining the worst about themselves.
But even when the conversation doesn’t end, being in a constant state of waiting can still provoke anxiety. We can feel ourselves being put on the back burner, we put others back there, and our very human need to communicate is effectively delegated there, too.
Both experts interviewed for this article agreed that the best thing parents can do to minimize the risks associated with technology is to curtail their own consumption first. It’s up to parents to set a good example of what healthy computer usage looks like. Most of us check our phones or our email too much , out of either real interest or nervous habit. Kids should be used to seeing our faces, not our heads bent over a screen. Establish technology-free zones in the house and technology-free hours when no one uses the phone, including mom and dad. “Don’t walk in the door after work in the middle of a conversation,” Dr. Steiner-Adair advises. “Don’t walk in the door after work, say ‘hi’ quickly, and then ‘just check your email.’ In the morning, get up a half hour earlier than your kids and check your email then. Give them your full attention until they’re out the door. And neither of you should be using phones in the car to or from school because that’s an important time to talk.”
Not only does limiting the amount of time you spend plugged in to computers provide a healthy counterpoint to the tech-obsessed world, it also strengthens the parent-child bond and makes kids feel more secure. Kids need to know that you are available to help them with their problems, talk about their day, or give them a reality check.
“It is the mini-moments of disconnection, when parents are too focused on their own devices and screens, that dilute the parent-child relationship,” Dr. Steiner-Adair warns. And when kids start turning to the Internet for help or to process whatever happened during the day, you might not like what happens. “Tech can give your children more information that you can, and it doesn’t have your values,” notes Dr. Steiner-Adair. “It won’t be sensitive to your child’s personality, and it won’t answer his question in a developmentally appropriate way.”
In addition Dr. Wick advises delaying the age of first use as much as possible. “I use the same advice here that I use when talking about kids and alcohol—try to get as far as you can without anything at all.” If your child is on Facebook, Dr. Wick says that you should be your child’s friend and monitor her page. But she advises against going through text messages unless there is cause for concern. “If you have a reason to be worried then okay, but it better be a good reason. I see parents who are just plain old spying on their kids. Parents should begin by trusting their children. To not even give your kid the benefit of the doubt is incredibly damaging to the relationship. You have to feel like your parents think you’re a good kid.”
Offline, the gold standard advice for helping kids build healthy self-esteem is to get them involved in something that they’re interested in. It could be sports or music or taking apart computers or volunteering—anything that sparks an interest and gives them confidence. When kids learn to feel good about what they can do instead of how they look and what they own, they’re happier and better prepared for success in real life. That most of these activities also involve spending time interacting with peers face-to-face is just the icing on the cake.
Rachel Ehmke is managing editor at the Child Mind Institute.
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