ESPOCH UNIVERSITY

Name: Doménica Hermida.

Level: 4th “A”

Influence of social networks in adolescents.

The social media is a new type or form of communication. In today´s society, all
adolescents communicate and find out the latest gossip that is trending through social
media. Some of the big names of social networks are Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat
and Instagram. The increasing usage of social media networks is strongly affecting
the social development of young adolescents. So, how do social media affect
adolescents? Social media can have both negative and positive effects. Some of the
effects of using social media can be depression, addiction, cyber-bullying and
exposure to inappropriate content and psychological effects.

The adolescents spend so much time on these sites that it begins to interfere with their
lives. Psychologists are referring to this as a social networking addiction; there are
some signs that indicate a problem with social media like spending more than one
hour daily at social media sites, checking social media sites whenever possible,
interference with work, school performance or your offline social life, withdrawal
symptoms if you try to cut down on the time you spend on social media and losing
sleep to go on social media sites.

One of the disadvantages of social networks is the exposure to inappropriate

content, there is a wide range of unhealthy material that adolescents can inadvertently
be exposed to online such as adult or sexual content, controversial content such as
criminal activity, cults, hate and intolerance and illegal drugs websites. This also
includes exposure to inappropriate pop-up ads, and alcohol, tobacco and gambling
sites.
The bullying is often defined as being an aggressive, intentional act or behavior that
is carried out by a group or and individual repeatedly and over time against a victim
who cannot easily defend him or herself. In recent years a new form of aggression or
bullying has emerged, labeled cyber-bullying, in which the aggressions occurs
through modern technological devices, and specifically mobile phones or the internet.
What are some of the effects of cyber-bullying? Victims of cyber-bullying experience
greater levels of depression than face-to-face bullying, even suicide; it can give
people a bad reputation causes low self-esteem and makes it hard to communicate
with others.

Although there are positive effects of social networking on adolescents, the negative
outweigh the few that there are. Sharing so much information could create a gateway
for cyber bullies to use that information in attempt to hurt them psychologically. The
youth of today is growing up with this new technology and therefore think socializing
through this new media is a primary communication. Most teenagers nowadays
cannot stay away from their electronic devices for long periods of time because they
have become slaves and attached to interacting through social media. Addiction to
these technologies is common throughout society and causes many different issues to
arise. Users that go on these social media constantly are more prone to anxiety,
loneliness, and depression just from being addicted to social networking.