Hana Green
Central High School
April 26, 2024
Social media is often perceived as a growing concern for parents regarding its negative effects on the younger generation. Social media have emerged and spread at a high speed, especially among teenagers, who now spend one-third of their day using devices. Researchers have found out that “22% of teenagers log on to their favorite social media site more than 10 times a day” (Pediatrics, 2011). When teenagers are constantly exposed to social media, it is not hard to imagine that it dramatically affects their communication skills. Three noticeable effects of social media are losing confidence in communicating face-to-face, inducing cyberbullying, and taking away focus from tasks and conversations.
The first effect is that teenagers are losing interest in face-to-face interaction with others. By learning to communicate online, teenagers are starting to lose confidence in direct communications, according to the Child Mind Institute (Ehmke, n.d.). The Social Media Victims Law Center states, “If a teen’s social media engagement outweighs their in-person interactions, they may struggle to identify critical social cues such as body language, facial expressions, vocal tones, and personal space” (Bergman, n.d.). Losing valuable skills that are critical for interacting with others could result in misunderstanding others and lowering the motivation to communicate with others effectively. As a consequence, teenagers could lose confidence in communicating with others.
Secondly, long-term exposure to social media increases the probability for teenagers to get targeted for cyberbullying. Cyberbullying is “bullying that takes place over digital devices, which includes sending, posting, or sharing negative, harmful, false, or mean content about someone else” (What Is Cyberbullying, 2021). According to research by the Pew Research Center, out of all teenagers in America, about half of them have experienced at least one form of cyberbullying (Jiang, 2018). Studies have found that when teenagers experience cyberbullying, it leads to lowered self esteem (Cénat, 2014). Moreover, cyberbullying can induce various mental illnesses such as depression, social anxiety, and mental instability. For that reason, teenagers become fearful when interacting with others. In addition, cyberbullying often contains extreme and aggressive words which could impact teenagers’ ability to develop empathy and understanding. These problems all pose an effect towards teenagers’ development of effective communication skills.
Lastly, social media draws away teenagers’ focus from assignments and conversations. Social media constantly distracts teenagers’ attention through notifications, and teenagers cannot focus on the work they are required to do at the moment. “31% of teens said they lost focus in class because they were checking their cell phones, and 49% said using technology for reasons unrelated to class, or “off-task” use, was distracting to them” (Jiang, 2018). For example, some teenagers might be unable to pay attention to class because they do not want to miss out on the “BeReal” alert, which requires one to take a photo in less than two minutes when a notification is sent out once every day. Furthermore, teenagers could neglect face-to-face communication because they are too focused on notifications from social media. “Phubbing”, the act of ignoring the person one is with and giving attention to one’s mobile phone instead (PHUBBING | English Meaning - Cambridge Dictionary, n.d.), has increased significantly in recent years, and research by Thrive Global has found out that 44% of people have engaged in “phubbing” more than twice a day (Hsu, 2023). Constant distraction from social media leads to a reduced attention span, which ultimately results in decreasing the ability to follow the conversation while talking with others.
The rapid growth of social media among teenagers has a tremendous effect on their communication skills. Social media causes teenagers to lose interest in face-to-face interaction, exposing them to cyberbullying and distracting their focus. This all results in students not being able to fully develop their communication skills, which are fundamental in their years to come. Social media induces various threats to teenagers’ growth, and to combat this problem, urgent action is needed.
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References
Bergman, M. P. (n.d.). How does social media affect teens’ social skills? Social Media Victims Law Center. Retrieved May 8, 2024.
Cénat, J. M. (2014, July 18). Cyberbullying, psychological distress and self-esteem among youth in Quebec Schools. NCBI. Retrieved May 16, 2024.
Ehmke, R. (n.d.). Social Media Effects on Teens | Impact of Social Media on Self-Esteem. Child Mind Institute. Retrieved May 8, 2024.
Hsu, S. (2023, May 2). Attention spans dwindle due to social media use. The Standard. Retrieved May 8, 2024.
Jiang, J. (2018, August 22). How Teens and Parents Navigate Screen Time and Device Distractions. Pew Research Center. Retrieved May 8, 2024.
O'Keeffe, G. S., Clarke-Pearson, K., & Council on Communications and Media. (2011, April). The Impact of Social Media on Children, Adolescents, and Families. Pediatrics, 127(4), 800–804.
PHUBBING | English meaning. (n.d.). Cambridge Dictionary. Retrieved May 8, 2024.
What Is Cyberbullying. (2021, November 5). StopBullying.gov. Retrieved May 8, 2024.