Social Media and it's Consequences

    Although I don't like to admit it, all the adults telling me social media was bad for me were right. As I grow older and think back on my life, the impact social media has on me becomes more apparent. In my age, social media is extremely normalized. Basically, anybody you meet will have all the same social media platforms as you. I very rarely go a day without a substantial amount of social media usage. This only makes me wonder how significant of an impact social media has made in my life. On the one hand, I can't think of anything about me that it has changed, but on the other, I can't imagine living without it.

    Studies from the article we read for class show that social media has a greater impact on females' mental health than men's. In studies involving teenagers, in teens with 3-5 hours of screen time per day, females saw a 26% increase in depression scores, while men saw a 21% increase. When screen time is 5 or more hours, females saw a 50% increase in scores, with men seeing a 35% increase. It is interesting to see such a drastic difference in women, and it makes me wonder if it's due to the differences in emotions shared and stereotyped by sex. In class, we talked about how men are seen as soft when they express emotions other than anger. Whereas women are more prone to expressing their emotions. However, I don't think this explains the full picture of why women seem to be affected more. I think some of the differences in statistics might be caused by men's unwillingness to share their negative feelings, leading to them not ever receiving help for their mental health, causing them to not be included in the statistics. 

        At the end of the day, I think the comparison that social media causes is the biggest and maybe only problem. All of the negative things social media can cause is due to the fact that you're seeing things that you want to be but aren't. I admit to being guilty of comparing myself to people I see doing cool things or living a life I want to live. But you have to remember 95% of the posts you see are performances to make themselves look better. If I could eliminate anything from social media, it would be comparison.