According to an article recently published “72% of American adults are currently using social media sites; that figure has gone up 800% in just 8 years”. Social Media is an applications or websites that support people to communicate or participate in social networking or even support students in doing their work. People are familiar with almost all social media networking sites such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc. It makes it easier for people to communicate with the social world. We also feel instantly connected with people around us that we may not have spoken to in so many years or with stranger that share the same interest. Even though, social media play an important role in our daily lives, but there are also a dark side that social media can effects people.
To start with, social media leads to cyberbullying. Cyberbullying occurs when a person threatens, teases or humiliates other people on online sources including chat rooms, e-mails, Facebook, etc. using the victim’s personal information. For example, these people use social media to threaten others anonymously by calling them in an inappropriate way. Sometimes these people bully other people by telling other people not to show up at school, threaten to kill them or even spread false rumors around on social media platform. These kind of behavior is unacceptable because it encourages people who might have been afraid to say something can now do so without worrying of their own identify being discovered. Social media is the key to all of these bullies, which can traumatize the victims and with the power that social media holds they will feel that there is no escape from cyberbullying. Social media is hugely common among teenagers and according to a research almost 60% of kids aged from 10 to 17 have reported being bullied or harassed on online platform. However, 90% of these victims will never report the incidents or fight back for their rights. Even though, the percentage of cyberbullying keep increasing but that does not stop teenager from using social media.
Apart from cyberbullying, social media also has a huge impact on children’s education. As we know, social media has help students to communicate with their classmates and teacher a lot better and it is also easier for them to share their lessons among themselves. However, most students nowadays have begun to rely on the information that their friends shared on social media or they can find it on some website in general. This can reduce the student’s focus on learning or retaining information on their own. Students no longer pay attention to details since they know that they can always check up on anything that they want to know anytime. Many students got distracted and waste their time on social media day by day. Some students even seen using their phone during class time not for learning but for chatting and surfing the internet for non-educative information. Moreover, using social media can also disrupt student’s writing skills. Since, the internet is full of short summarized stories they no longer read novels or storybooks that educate them in writing. Students have also adapted to the habit of texting in shorthand, incomplete sentences which affected their grammar, writing. These acts that involves using social media with education can affect many students in classes and exam as well.
Last but not least, social media also effects on social or communication skills. As mention above, social media is a very convenient way of communicating. It provides endless ways for people to connect to one another, but it lessens the skills that people need in real life. Today’s people spent more time looking down on their screen than interacting with people in real life. Those who use social media frequently will find it themselves trying to avoid going out, avoiding family occasion and gatherings. People try to avoid social interaction because they do not have the confidence to talk with others or they might find it uncomfortable. This happens because they isolate themselves from others in the very first place, they prefer to stay in one place spending time interacting on social media and ignore the busy world.
To sum up, social media can effect society in many ways such as cyberbullying, impacts on education and communication skills. Hence, to avoid all these negativity people should spend time wisely on social media. They should know their limit to using social media and they should use it to their own advantages not bother others. Most importantly, those who are addict to it should try to put it aside and keep up with what is happening in real life.
