The Negative Effects of Social Media

Smartphones have become somewhat of the pinnacle of society. They are our means of communicating with our friends and family, our GPS, our camera, and even our health tracker.

In 2019, Irish people spent between 4-6 hours on their phone a day. That figure has gone up due to the Coronavirus pandemic, with people spending upwards of 6 hours on their phones in the last quarter of 2020.

The rise of social media addition

The brain releases the hormone dopamine when we open and check our phones and scroll through social media. Dopamine motivates and reinforces behaviour that makes us feel good, therefore creating addiction.

As a result, you could be spending up to 145 minutes on social media platforms a day.

What are the dangers of social media?

Decreased mental health

All social media platforms are designed to keep you scrolling on the app for as long as possible. Social media and mental health have been the topic of discussion in recent years. Over-usage has been directly linked to increased anxiety and depression, especially in teens.

Diminished confidence

The act of comparing ourselves to our peers and influencers can damage our confidence. This causes us to view our lives through a lens of dissatisfaction and develop FOMO (fear of missing out).

Unrealistic expectations 

Apps such as Instagram and Snapchat have millions of filters for you to choose. This has many downsides as they can change your appearance to become virtually unrecognisable. The use of filters create false realities and unrealistic expectations of how you should look. Instagram has been trying to combat this by including a warning that a filter has been used on pictures, although this is only limited to filters used on the app itself.

Toxic hustle culture

The negative effects of social media can be overwhelming as most people only post the good parts of their lives. This fuels the concept of hustle culture and consumerism to the extreme. As we are constantly exposed to this content, there becomes a sense of competitiveness amongst our peers.

How to decrease your time on social media

Avoid aimless scrolling simply setting downtime on your smartphone via the settings app. This way the app will lock you out once you have reached your set limit. Alternatively, downloading an app such as Offline or Moment, will notify you to take breaks from your phone.

Investing your time into a hobby is a great way to get off your phone. Pick up an outdoor activity to improve your health or something tamer such as knitting. You will forget about Instagram in no time!

Work on actively recognising when social media is taking a toll on your mental health. If you feel yourself feel down over what you are seeing, delete the apps for a couple of days and take a social media detox.