The use of social media is harmful to children. In todays society children are using cellphones from such a young age. These kids dont get the experience of talking on the phone. Kids are able to text one another as well as hide behind the screen. Social media is harmful because it also results in many cases of cyberbullying. During COVID-19 kids are more often to be glued to their phones on apps such as snapchat, instagram, TikTok and twitter than outside enjoying fresh air. During COVID-19, people could be also learning new hobbies such as learning an instrument, something among the arts or so on.

Besides tech corporations selling our private information and allowing us to be bombarded with ads, I find other common trends on social media equally disturbing. One of these is the fact that civil conversation between people who disagree has become a sad rarity. Rather than calmly explaining why they disagree with another's position, individuals choose to instead launch personal attacks and defamation on the other party from the safety of their keyboards. I feel that a great deal of this type of argument has unfortunately spilled over from our digital realm and into our real world, which could have potentially dire consequences on how we treat and speak to other people, simply because their point of view differs from ours.

Second, I am disturbed by how much social media aids the spread of disinformation, conspiracies, and outright falsehoods. For example, one of the Facebook groups of which I am a member is devoted to those of us with an interest in archaeology. Disturbingly, I have noticed that more and more of those posting on the group site are individuals who seem to believe the Ancient Aliens version of history. Seeing what started off as a group for people interested in serious discussion about ancient history being slowly taken over by a bunch of kooks who practice zero critical thinking is absolutely maddening.

Thirdly, I especially dislike how social media has led to an onslaught of videos being posted by people carrying out "good deeds." You know the ones; an individual is helping a stranger, feeding the homeless, or rescuing an animal. Strangely, they seem completely unable to do this without a phone in one hand recording the whole thing. Good deeds done for the goodness of the act are wonderful things, and it's understandable how a bystander would want to capture the moment. But when people in the process of the act film themselves doing it and later post it, it adds a layer of unhealthy ego stroking as the so-called do-gooders get flooded with uncounted views, shares, and reacts. This has created a trend of those who practice charity less out of the goodness of their hearts, and more to show off what wonderful people they are. Frankly, I find the trend a disgusting one.

I think that social media can be most harmful to adolescents, especially when it impacts their self esteem. I have seen this first-hand with my younger sister, who is a freshman in high school. She's grown up with social media from a young age and has always been very self conscious about her appearance and her social media pages. I think it can be dangerous to have young individuals (especially females) constantly comparing themselves to people online during a formative time in their lives. When I was twelve, I compared myself to the other twelve year old girls in my school who also had braces and wore shorts down to their knees. My sister at the same age was seeing and comparing herself to much older teens with bikinis on and heavily filtered pictures. She always felt the need to "catch up" to the people she saw on social media and to dress more maturely. I think the pressure of social media and comparison has definitely taken a toll on younger groups who have grown up online. I still struggle with comparing myself to others as an adult, but I can't imagine starting to do so at such a young age.

Social media can be more harmful than beneficial when people tie their value and self-worth with the amount of likes or comments they get on a post. Even so, a study from Harvard University that is explained in the article “Dopamine, Smartphones & You: A battle for your time”, found that people actually experience increased levels of dopamine when they see that their status or post has been liked. Whereas, one could see this as a positive impact on one’s mental health, we should also consider the reality of the situation. In a perfect world, someone whose post got 1000 likes would just leave it at that and move on with their lives- not think about it too much but feel rewarded. But realistically, when someone gets a lot of notoriety on social media, they often want to keep their following. The problem comes into play when the obsession to keep followers or to grow the account arises. As we have seen on the news from time to time, some teens will go to great lengths to maintain a following. Some recent examples include their participation in the Tide Pod trend and now the nutmeg one. Consequently, the shock value factor to get a following I believe is most dangerous. Since the actions are easily able to be replicated and will get attention, there appears to be more reward than risk. However, the failure to see consequences due to the type of news coverage that presents the behavior as a “weird thing kids are doing” increases the interest and desire for others to participate in the activity which overall makes social media harmful under these circumstances.

More than anything, I think about the idea of a sociometer, which was mentioned in “The dark psychology of social networks.” The article doesn’t spend much time on the idea, but it tries to explain how people can use social cues to monitor how others are responding and reacting to us. It’s looking around the room to see if your joke landed or if people are paying attention, or watching someone’s body language to realize that you need to end the conversation.

But in an online space we lose all of those social cues. The only things we have to go on are people’s “engagement” with what we type; did they like it, retweet it, pin it, or blast it? And the best way to get engagement is by being hyperbolic. It’s the same as the clickbait headlines we all know - “Michael Jordan DESTROYS LeBron GOAT Claims” “HILARIOUS Video Shows Cat Falling Over.”

I don’t see anything but the decline of people’s abilities to communicate clearly and calmly. Social media has no room for rational debate, because there’s no reason for me to be rational with someone I can just label a bot and block.

Social media can be very harmful in today's society. The usage of social media aids in online addiction in which is very prevalent in many of our lives. We are essentially glued to our phones and social media heightens this addiction. Social media exposes children to things they do not need to see at their age and I feel as if they spend most of their time on social media rather than playing with friends or outside. I have seen kids on TikTok and other various apps doing dances in which are provocative. Social media has shown them that these dances are 'cool' and 'trendy'. In regards to kids, stranger-danger is real more than ever on social media. Children are talking to people they should not be talking to and sometimes end up in horrible situations. Parents do not even know their children are talking to these strangers online. People also use social media to boost their confidence. They rely on likes and comments to make themselves feel great. It is not the right way to build confidence in yourself. On the otherwise, cyberbullying is also the result of social media. People rely so much on the comments they receive and take it personally when someone comments something negative. It puts our responses and emotions to comments at an all-time high. Some people say whatever they say just because they are behind a screen. It hurts people's feelings. Social media is not all positivity and memes.

I think there are many clear red flags and harmful factors that are unbelievably apparent in regards to social media. I think this is especially true regarding children of a young age when they are at their most impressionable. often it is filled with Clickbait titles, false information, and the spread of hurtful ideas. I think the biggest issue is it impacts individual self-esteem. Often people can get ideas that they aren’t as adequate as others trapped in their heads due to the constant comparing that can be done on social media, as well as the national competition that it creates. I also think that danger lies in the constant stimulation that your brain can receive from social media in regards to the fact that it never ends. I know that this often leads to people finding themselves more and more unsettled when they aren’t exposed to their phones.

Social media can be harmful because of a few reasons. It is addictive, so it takes time away from more valuable things in life, like spending time with family and friends, working on projects around the house, doing schoolwork, among many other activities. Social media also glamorizes peoples' lives-- by that, I mean that people mostly share only the highlights of their lives. Sometimes they share the negative parts, but highlights seem more common and they can give viewers the idea that their own lives are not as good as those that they're seeing. In other words, it makes them want a life that is not realistic, one that is good and glamorous all the time. This ties in with adolescents, as well. Through social media, impossible standards are set for them and they also set those standards for themselves.

There are many people out there who believe that social media is more harmful than beneficial. The reason for this is the amount of toxicity that lies inside of social media apps.the idea behind social media is for people to share their experiences and view points but to many people do not like to see eye to eye with others. With this being said there seems to be a decent amount of toxic interactions that are not very productive. You should never go on to social media thinking you will change somebody's opinion, because i guarantee you you will not. People are too stubborn and hard headed on twitter to be anything but harmful