The advent of social media in the early 2000s was a revolutionary step towards connecting the world. However, as time passes, social media has started influencing human lives negatively and making detrimental impacts.
Social media sites like Meta, Instagram, Twitter, etc., are channels of communication meant to make real-time conversations possible over long distances, without phone calls. These platforms can be viewed as platforms for socializing and getting updates on what our family and friends are up to.
In our modern-day world, we are so engrossed in our phones, scrolling on these social media sites when we go outside that we refrain from striking up conversations with the people that we meet. Hence, in recent times, conversations about social media making us anti-social are gaining traction.
Social media’s most discussed negative impact is unrealistic beauty standards. Due to filters and professional editing, the so-called flaws of these social media influencers are removed from their photos before uploading to various social media platforms.
This leads to them being viewed as picture-perfect people by their follower community, which comprises teenage girls and boys. People start to compare their real-life candid looks to these edited photos and feel insecure about their bodies, which leads to decreased self-confidence.
The severe impacts of increased social media usage are not just limited to these beauty standards. The need for instant dopamine hits, in other words, instant gratification, is another detrimental impact. Social media users get instant hits of dopamine, a hormone related to pleasure.
This is when the number of likes or comments on a photo they recently posted increases or when their follower count increases. Why is this a problem? People get bored or lose motivation while working towards their long-term goals wherein they do not get instant dopamine hits but delayed gratification.
A detailed study on why people get instant dopamine hits while using these sites, reveals that these social media giants hire “attention engineers” who work towards making these apps as addictive as possible. Prolonged mindless scrolling and viewing of short-form content on social media sites reduce attention spans.
People who feel addicted to social media report difficulty focusing for long periods. Reduced attention span impacts the working population and student community, who need to focus for long periods to accomplish tasks.
Who wins and who loses? These companies make billions of dollars from people spending more time on social media, while these users are getting affected by their reduced attention spans.
There is also a risk of privacy breaches when using social media sites. If you search for something on Google and then open Meta (previously Facebook), you will see ads related to the keyword you have just searched. As someone rightly said, “If you are not paying for it, you’re not the customer; you are the product being sold.” It is clear that these companies are unethically selling the personal data of users for billions of dollars.
The harmful effects do not originate from just heavy usage of these sites but how being successful or popular on these sites is equated with real-life success. Owing to this delusion, the desire to “go viral” on social media makes people go to any extent to make that dream come true. This leads to publicity hunts, illegal activities, or even dancing on the road creating traffic jams, to name a few.
Sometimes, these people act as if gaining a few million followers is the end goal of life. These false perceptions have detrimental impacts such as kids, and teenagers dropping out of schools or colleges without completing their education, to fully focus on social media growth and increase their follower count.
Another major problem prevalent on these social media sites is fake news and false information. Many a time, social media influencers consider themselves experts after gaining a little knowledge. As a result, they start advising on various topics like cures for ailments, investing tips, financial advice, etc., without having the proper license to do so. And their followers blindly follow the advice without fact-checking and ensuring the reliability of the information source.
Recently, a popular Indian YouTuber, who is also a stock market trader, received a one-year ban from trading in the stock market and a heavy penalty exceeding 1 crore INR. This was for giving investment advice and speculation without having the license to do so. This ban was imposed by the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), the stock market regulatory authority in India.
Cyberbullying is another major issue on social media. As people sit behind their computer screens, masking their identities, they spout mean words and spread rumours about others. The negative impact cyberbullying makes on people’s self-confidence is highly undermined.
Even though social media has so many disadvantages, it does not mean we have to completely avoid it. Having accounts or not having accounts on these social media sites is a personal choice in the first place. However, moderation in social media usage is extremely critical to ensure it does not overrule our lives. If used in moderation, social media can turn out to be one of the biggest boons of the 21st century due to the facilities it offers.
By: Jyothilakshmi S
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