In today’s society we rely on interacting with people via phone, past generations didn’t experience this because phones were too expensive, or were a luxury to have. The norm is to text or email, and with people today the internet is the way to express the emotion to others. This goes into my first source which states “Some assume a relationship-lost perspective, suggesting that the Internet causes people to cut off from social interactions by communicating via a socially impoverished medium.” (Chan 276) With the communication of writing to others it helps strengthen verbal contact, While texting doesn’t do that, society has the ability to change, but it takes all of us to help accomplish this goal, and to end social media addiction.
Texting does help communicate with others who could be across the world, it’s important to limit the use of social media to keep yourself happy. Social media also can be a form to help yourself cheer up, but not a cure. Furthermore, Social media has be shown to prove it causes depression. “Increasingly, people with diverse health conditions turn to social media to share their illness experiences or seek advice from others with similar health concerns. This unstructured medium may represent a platform on which individuals with severe mental illness naturally provide and receive peer support”.(Naslund,Grande,Aschbrenner, Elwyn) as discussed in this quote, with internet addiction, social media addiction needs to be controled before the issue causes havic betweens families and other adolescents.
To help this problem I believe the younger generations have the capability to live off the internet for communication for a month, this idea would be great for people to use social skills when talking face to face with people instead of being glued to their phone. The idea doesn’t sound ideal, but for people to have better social cues, and to help with their mental state, because it’s important to take time off social media to better yourself, and to be happy. Another Issue with social media and the negatives are self esteem and peer pressure, as cited in this quote “CB has unique characteristics, such as the anonymity of the cyber-perpetrator, distant and rapid communication, and accessibility to a wide-ranging audience” (Heiman 28) it is important to limit social media use because of the serious consequences it has for children, teens and adults who may have difficulty understanding cyberbullying.
Also keying into depression again, while searching for something agaisnt bullying on the interent, this brought my attention “ It makes you hate people you should feel unity with and envy people you should find insufferable.” (Dunbar, 13) this is yet another reason communicating from writing and face to face is important. Too much social media usage can lead to depression for children and teens. And superadic behavior Also, it’s important parents keep tabs on their children, also limiting social media usage to a child’s happiness being ripped from addiction to the internet is worth noting here
Furthermore, communicating with others face to face can help others bring a smile to their face, due to the fact that emotions can be misinterpreted as something different than intended. To add onto this topic with cyberbullying, violence is a big problem with social media. As argued here “cyber-victimization may initiate in childhood a cycle of violence and socio-emotional problems. It was found that among adolescents, even when controlling for traditional forms of victimization, cyber-victimization experiences were associated with increased social anxiety, loneliness, peer rejection, depressive moods, low self-esteem, a low sense of well-being, and low levels of social support” (Brighi et al., 2012; Modecki et al., 2013; Patchin & Hinduja, 2010; Şahin, 2012, Wright & Li, 2013). I do believe after time this can change, but it will take time and years for humans to recognize the issue with social media addiction, and how it creates large issues in the past and now.
Then again, many children and teens can handle the peer pressure, bullying and language used on social media. Due to past experience with social media, or just used to the language, foul language, slang and other experiences, which is no surprise, But I believe this group of individuals have possibly experienced some sort of peer pressure, or bullying, but are too afraid to admit it, or are afraid of backlash from peers for not taking the bullying or peer pressure as a joke. Furthermore, while reading into cyber bullying more from an article I found this quote intriguing “Loneliness is a condition in which the individual feels depressed and disconnected from society (Killeen, 1998). Studies on loneliness among children and adolescents (Cassidy & Asher, 1992) reported that at least 10% of participants reported loneliness due to social problems at school. It was also found that the child who is perceived by other children as isolated is at risk of becoming a victim and target of violence” (Heiman 30) This piece from the research I’ve done also points to issues at school where the root of many bullying incidents occur the most for children and teens, it’s important for adults to listen to children and teens because, if a problem is solved before it jumps to social media it possibly saves a child from growing depression later down the road.
What is Cyberbullying defined as by educators? It is defined as ”willful and repeated harm inflicted through computers, cell phones, and other electronic devices” (Hinduja & Patchin, 2011,1) also that Shariff and Gouin (2005 explain that “cyberbullying consists of covert psychological bullying, conveyed through electronic mediums such as cell phones, web-logos and websites and online chat rooms”(3) Horowitz, Bollinger, Merle, Dorothy. Cyberbullying In Social Media Within Educational Institutions, The quote from the book Cyberbullying in Social media within educational institutions is a great example as to the epidemic with addiction to social media causing the spread of bullying, depression and loneliness. To help with spreading the movement of this addiction with social media, it will take talking about the subject on news networks, though with the depression being a touchy subject to some, or not wanting to be mentioned in conversations, It’s important to bring these up. Most importantly it is important to educate the world on this topic.
Cyberbullying causes many different things other than depression, in school the effects cause grades to sink, less time in school, may seem sad. In the book Cyberbullying in social media within educational institutions a superintendent was quoted by saying this “students who experience cyberbullying may avoid discussing what they are doing online. These emotional responses have caused educators, psychologists, and researchers to study their impact on students in school in the school setting” (Horowitz, Bollinger, Merle, Dorothy. Cyberbullying In Social Media Within Educational Institutions)
The counter argument is this “Social media sites allow allow teens to accomplish online online many of the tasks that are important to them offline: staying connected to family and friends, sharing photographs, and exchanging ideas. Social media participation can also offer adolescents deeper benefits that extend into their of self, community, and the world, including community engagement” Horowitz, Bollinger, Merle, Dorothy. Cyberbullying In Social Media Within Educational Institutions, Social media has it pros and cons, many of which some will agree or disagree with, but there’s a fine line with social media usage which can cause many issues for a teen in the future. Which may include even anxiety with making friends in school or against loneliness throughout their life.
“Cyberbullying in social media is a critical and expanding problem in the educational institutions. It ranges from primary schools through college, and from off campus to on campus.” Horowitz, Bollinger, Merle, Dorothy. Cyberbullying In Social Media Within Educational Institutions. Next, following up with cyber harassment this quote came up “approximately 36 percent of the respondents have been victims of social media harassment at some point in their lives, whereas the ratio of female victims is markedly higher than that of male users (61% vs. 39%). Most of the harassment occurs at the social networking sites and instant messaging platforms where people share their personal information and pictures publicly. Online harassment often causes distress and depression in subjects’ personal, academic and professional lives. However, majority of the victims who are subjected to online harassment do not label it as such and consequently never report it.”(Erum Hafeez. Cyber Harassment and Its Implications on Youth in Pakistan.) as per stated in this piece harassment is more likely on social media sites or sites of interest to communicate. The quote is a good example with how children react to harassment, this quote should be a key reason schools and institutions do a better job of handling harassment before it spreads from school.
How can communication with people face to face or writing be brought to teens and parents attention? Well, Today we praise celebrities, actors and public speakers who I believe can persuade audiences to change their ways to communicate with others. Social media is many of these people’s man way to communicate to people all over the world, Song writers are also the main people who can help spread awareness with how we rely on text messaging to talk to others. I say all these types of people who we look up to are options is because teens rather hear information from people they are familiar with instead of researchers due to the fact that they listen to the newest music to date. Going into why teens rather hear this information from the actors and singers they praise is because these groups of “inspiring people” are able to attract their audience to what they are talking about. For example you have artists like Janelle Monae in 2018 brought up rights for women and the LGBTQ community.
An issue that isn’t mentioned much is how parents attitude with their children cause them to take advantage of internet usage, then leading to the social media addiction. In an article about parents attitude, not paying attention to their children as to what they are actually doing on their devices, I found many parents thought their children were doing homework or school work. “In addition, whereas the parents believed that the students used the computer for homework, the students actually used it more often for games and chatting “(Yeşim Uncu, Pınar Vura, Çağatay Büyükuysal, Züleyha Alpe, Emine Zinnur Kılıç. 268) This proves that parents need to take the initiative and check up on their kids to make sure they are not hiding things.
How is communicating face to face better than texting or using social media? From one article I found this quote “mobiles phone use continues to soar as people are becoming increasingly reliant on their devices. However, it seems that human cognition and social norms cannot keep up with this profound proliferation in the use of this technology. Humans have held face-to-face conversations for thousands of years, and a complex set of implicit social rules have evolved to guide these interactions. Face-to-face conversations are such an accepted, integral part of each culture to the point that, in general, there is nothing particularly remarkable or concerned about being exposed to people interacting in this way. However, it seems that the same cannot be said of mobile phone conversations. As noted by Monk et al. (2004b), (Brendan Norman, Daniel Bennett. Are mobile phone conversations always so annoying? The ‘need-to-listen’ effect re-visited. Introduction page.) this quote explains exactly what needs to be said about social media usage and talking on the phone, with mobile devices the face to face talk is unachievable, and actually talking to someone directly. The key social skill isn’t put to work with texting or calling, which should change.
Why should we write instead of type? Writing helps us bring out emotions we cannot express with typing, with typing misconception can easily occur, because you are not taking the time to think about what you want to say, this quote goes directly into this “Why write? Because doing so engages us, changes us, and makes us think. What better reason is there than that? Why write? Because we must as a sign of fulfillment of self and calling and because we should for the sake of the world in which we live and for which we are responsible.” Writing challenges are our brain to think about what could be meaningful to the pearson they are communicating with. Using meaningful words can brighten people’s day, or bring a smile. If we chose to write about 3 to 4 times a month, and during this time limit social media usage to 4 hours a day I believe the percentage of teens with depression will go down drastically, because without social media you have to do new things, by getting out of your comfort zone, and talk to people directly. With the limitation of social media it would also cause teens and other people to explore their surroundings that mother nature offers them.
With the limitation of texting and not looking at your phone 24/7 comes into play, teens can learn to do new things with others that they could not do with their phones or the internet. It is important to know that all of this can not happen in one day, but it can take years to accomplish, speaking of this issue with social media addiction is important for future generations to know social media isn’t the only way to communicate with people, nor is it the way to be happy with yourself. Because social media is spend your free time to talk to others, possibly learn learn new things from others, but it is not something to be taken advantage of in amway, what I mean is that social media can manipulative for teens, and further lead to peer pressure.
In conclusion we can change how we are communicating with people because growth is that we as humans can do. Going out and giving a stranger a compliment can change their day, and it can brighten someone’s day, because as humans we cannot determine how someone feels or in what state they are in as we pass by them or stand next to them, so it’s important we start changing now to help our future generations from suffering from depression, cyberbullying, anxiety. Change is possible, for everyone, we just have to work together to solve the issue.
