Socialnetworking is known to be the online practice of enlarging the size of aperson’s business or even social contacts by composing connections with people,usually through social networking websites like Facebook, Twitter, andInstagram.
These social networking sites have attracted many of their users toput these sites into their daily routines. Some online sites have manydifferent followers while others attract people going by their usual languageor identity. “This year, there are 1.37 billion active users who visitedFacebook on a regular basis.
Overall, daily active Facebook users made up for66 percent of monthly active users” (Facebook, 2017). Furthermore, these socialnetworking sites are so popular in todays’ society because the repeatedlyattract people for many different reasons: The first reason, users have anopportunity to create their own personal and unique profile that can theyconnect to their selves and edit it whenever they desire to share their owninformation. Second, most of these social networks supple instant messaging, soyou can easily communicate to anyone no matter where they are in the world.Lastly, users have an ability to check other people’s profiles by looing attheir pictures and reading their personal information without having to gettheir consent. It is crystal clear to see thattoday’s society has become exceedingly technologically dependent. Many peopleoften find themselves searching the web for the right reasons, to educate themfrom time to time when they are unsure about something, but then findthemselves on other websites such as social media accounts to check theirprofile but then end up spending a large amount of time on them rather thaneducating themselves.
It is easy to notice that social networking has broughton an amazing impact to many people. However, these types of social networkingsites could possibly have more negative effects than good. In result, socialnetworking is not only changing how we communicate, but is also changing theway we interact with each other in our day to day lives. Jasmine Fowlkes, ofUSA Today, explained research stating that “One in four people spend more time socializing online than they do inperson. If there is even a chance to see people face-to-face, up to 11 percentof adults rather prefer to stay at home and communicate on their devicesinstead”.
The real and classic interactions will remain to be at risk ifwe don’t open our eyes and realize the major effects that social media. The use of Social Networking hasa major impact on our lives in so many negative ways that highly affects ourcommunication skills, self- expression, need to bully, and the cause ofisolation. Social sites affect the way wecommunicate with people. Social networks, like Facebook, were made to help individualscommunicate with each other.
There are also a lot of other reasons that thesetechnologies are used, but communication is known to be the most popular mainpurpose. Many people use these networks to talk to their family or friends inplaces close by, or even across the entire world. There are many conditionsthat do not allow to use telephones which why social networking is moredesirable to many people.
These social media sites give access to communicationbetween friends and, also give the opportunity to meet new people and make morefriends. Sameness and common friends give a great opportunity to form newrelationships. This enables one’s social circle to grow. If you asked people howthey think social networking affects them, many people will possibly respondback saying, “It is a great tool for building connections as it gives you an onlinepresence for others to explore your interests”, just as Natasha Koifman statedin her article titled, “Can Social Media Actually Benefit Relationships?” regardingthe benefits of social media. These networks draw many people’s attentionbecause they provide you with a more new and faster way to meet new people.
These new people communicate through these networks. However, standardcommunication is not the only way these social networks are used. Social sites cause many people toforget their true self due to the constant pressure of wanting to fit in. Peoplemake these pages and begin by expressing themselves for everyone one to see,even it’s not who they are truly are, they obviously want others to think it’sthe “real” them. They post pictures of themselves then, their friends orfollowers comment and “like” these photos. Most adults are of course moremature about what they post and how they communicate online. In an article regardingself-expression it was stated that adults are more likely to, “Use their profilepictures as a way of casually expressing themselves, their family, or possiblya recent trip they took” (USA Today 1). This is a fair-minded way ofrepresenting yourself online.
However, it seems to look like teens use this newtechnology in a very different way that could be extremely risky. Mostteenagers seem to focus more on their need to impress their friends andfollowers, rather than having a more mature reasoning. Young teens usually pick up their popularitythrough the interesting pictures they post, and not always for who they trulyare. Comments that are left on their photos or pages seem to mean more to themthan actual meaning of the words that were said. If they want to get the resultsthat they desire to have, they try to get a reaction from disputable images ofthemselves when it shouldn’t be that way. There is a teenager desire to be”popular” that leads to large amounts of young girls and boys trying to impressone another by displaying themselves in mature situations or showcasing theirown physique.
For example, “Most pictures that teenagers post online reveal underagedrinking, smoking, and partying” (USA Today 1-2). These clear pictures can eventuallyruin the way people perceive the user in many ways that can be quite damaging. Exposingpictures that don’t represent the actual person you are can cause other peopleto lose respect for the users doing this with the result of impaired reputations.The expression of a person’s feelings, thoughts and ideas are used on thesenetworks and should not only stay age appropriate, but also should be your realinner-self. “It’s important to remember that just posting edited picturesonline or pretending your life is a little more glamorous than it is not initself a problem”, says Jill Emanuele, PhD, a clinical psychologist at theChild Mind Institute. “Social media alone is unlikely to be at the heartof the issue, but it can make a difficult situation even harder.” Teenagers whohave constructed some kind of fake online personas might feel angry anddepressed at the gap in the middle of who they pretend to be online and who they are as a realperson.
Social sites make it easy for teens to cyberbully. Cyber bullying is atype of bullying that is only done through the web, which benefits the bullybecause they aren’t having to be face to face with the victims. This is a goodreason why social sites make bullying extremely hard for the people goingthrough these tough moments. It’s hard to just deal with something in personand even harder when it’s happening on the internet.
Being bullied throughsocial networks makes it harder for the victim to receive help when there areno witnesses, providing the bully with an easy job, insulting the person.Bullies easily insult the victims because it’s very likely that they won’t getcaught vs. if they were face to face, that’d probably be a different story. Bullyingis wrong, but cyber bullying could possibly be the most dangerous. “Cyberbullyinggives easy access to bullying because it doesn’t involve being in person.
It’sa lot easier to say mean and hurtful things to someone behind a computer thanin person.” (Psychology Today). Bullying is wrong no matter what the situationis. It is unacceptable and disrespectful and needs to come to an end. Socialsites should not be used to intentionally hurt someone while hiding behind acomputer.
