An Example of an Essay on How Social Media Affects Humans

Introduction

Sociology is termed as the study of how humans interact daily or how they relate to each other in society. Through social media, it offers a new foundation on how humans interact with the invention of new behaviors. Persons interact on social media platforms with the aid of technology (Chon & Park 2019, p.72). Through technology, it has brought about inventions and advanced information that plays a significant role in aiding the society to achieve its objectives, and through a good foundation of the relationship, one can accomplish the goals described above. Social media has enabled the interactions to be broader and also more creative, making it more successful, unlike any other form of interaction.

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Human Need

Through social media, humans can meet one's needs and even deepest desires, such as building a relationship. Social media allows everyone to maintain relationships across the universe, such as families, friends, and even others (Chon & Park 2019, p.80). Through interaction, which usually facilitated with social media such as WhatsApp, Twitter, Instagram, the persons can connect and interact without being hindered with anything, and thus, it can influence one's behavior either positively or negatively. Social media has enabled persons to achieve happiness and also any form of fulfilment concerning human cognitive behavior such as Online Dating Applications, which has enabled persons to interact, and through it, one finds one's, soul mate. Through this, one becomes happy since interaction and companionship can get achieved.

When persons engage in social media platforms, it shows the need for persons to network since it is a human feeling of one being happy when one interacts and socializes with others. Through these connections with others, it tends to influence one's change; thus, one needs to be careful when intermingling with others through social media (Cooley & Parks-Yancy 2019, p.251). The interactions also seem to affect one's conscious and also subconscious mind. Also, for social media to be effective, it requires total commitment and one's involvement to maintain one's pattern of interest. For example, for one to keep having more followers, one needs to improve on one` s creativity and post new pictures and quotes every day.

Business

When one engages in social media, one tends to be able to build a successful business since one intermingles and engages with the customers. Through positive interaction, one can build a good rapport with the customers (Cooley & Parks-Yancy 2019, p.256). Also, through social media, humans can build a good interaction, which involves giving out quality information regarding the business one is launching. Through social media, one can sell products and also services that are always built based on trust. Through the interactions on social media, it has brought about emotions and business relationships that have progressed through the aid of social media.

Communication

The way persons used to communicate has brought about evolution since a person font interact daily through face to face interaction (Cooley & Parks-Yancy 2019, p.260). Sociology has invented new aspects and dynamics; thus, one's information and voice have grown much more reliable with the aid of social media.

Problems that May Arise

Cyberbullying

It refers to when one repetitively uses social media to hurt someone. The bullying effect brings about depression, increases anxiety levels, and also brings about low self-esteem on persons, mostly adolescents. Cyberbullying mostly involves the use of technological equipment such as computers, phones, and even tablets. It includes the sharing of false information, harmful contents, and even sharing of a person's private information, thus causing humiliation and embarrassment on a person (Hemsley et al. 2018, p.76). The online bullies mostly use the anonymity technique to gain a person's interest or even trust, and later on, humiliate them in social media.

Cyberbullying occurs in many social media platforms such as Facebook, Snapchat, Twitter, texts, online gaming, and even the use of texts. Cyberbullying tends to harm a person's reputation in many ways since this private information can affect one's job opportunities, and also one can be denied access to a school that one desires. Many countries have ruled out cyberbullying as a criminal offence and thus have enforced laws to curb these issues.

Cyberbullying causes one to develop deep scars that often make one develop suicidal thoughts and end up doing it later on. The online bullies use social media to target persons and strip them from their efforts or even public offices, in which one has worked for years to be successful and be in that position.

Increased Negative Emotions

Social media tends to affect one's cognitive behavior, such as affecting one's mood, and this results in increased poor mental status and also arises in symptoms such as anxiety and even depressions (Hemsley et al. 2018, p.77). Social media makes one view a person's best life and negatively compare one's life, thus making one feel that one has no purpose in life, thus increasing levels of anxiety.

Missing Out

Social media tends to bring about adverse effects like one develops a fear of missing something or missing out. It refers to increased anxiety level, which makes one develop anxieties such as when one gets scared that is missing an experience of something that someone else is wildly enjoying (Hemsley et al. 2018, p.78). For example, one can check on the Facebook or Instagram news feed to see if a friend is doing something or is enjoying oneself without tagging one or bringing one along.

Online Addiction

Social media causes persons to be addictive since one tends to get glued all day long, thinking about it or checking up on kinds of stuff to do (Hu et al. 2017, p.335). It causes one to get depressed or get a feeling of rejection when one unfollows a person on social media. Also, when some of one's favorite social network disappears or gets hacked into one develops a feeling of anxiety. Internet addiction also tends to cause unhealthy sleep patterns, and it brings about an increased feeling of alcohol and cigarette abuse. It also affects how one relates to others, such as close friends and even family members. It also encourages one to inflict pain on others or even oneself.

Pornography

Social media platforms are always prone to the leaking of pornographic content, which is unhealthy for teens or even college students. The leaking of pornography has some effect on one since it brings about increased sexual behavior, encourages one to have multiple partners or even engage in anal sex (Hu et al. 2017, p.340). When one watches pornography based on violent content, one tends to develop aggressiveness, and thus one tends to inflict pain on others while having sex; this tends to be a mental disorder always referred to as masochism.

Online Dating

Social media has brought about the invention of online dating through mobile applications or even websites. The websites tend to give strict rules that one does not have to share personal information, but persons tend to ignore these rules. Online dating causes persons to explore their sexual interests online daily (Hu et al. 2017, p.340). These have brought about increased sexual behaviors among teenagers and also lead to increased risk of getting Sexually Transmitted Infections because most of them practice unprotected sex when they meet up with strangers (Rehman, Baharun & Salleh 2019, p.75). Through the online dating applications, one can explore and share sexual interests with the other parties, and thus, it can bring about leaking of personal photos such as nudes and thus cause one to develop suicidal thoughts.

Sleep Abnormalities

Persons who are generally obsessed with social media tend to develop suicidal thoughts, depression, obesity, and that they perform poorly in schools. Also, studies conducted show that the light that is generally emitted by the screens results in disruption of one's sleep patterns (Arendt, Scherr & Romer 2019, p.2423). One needs to avoid the use of these digital instruments and get enough sleep to avoid developing any forms of depression or even develop complications that may arise with obesity.

Advice one can give in response to concerns about the effects of social media

Limit time

One needs to limit the time they spend using social media. For example, some applications such as Instagram can come in handy with settings that show one how many times one has used the application daily (Ryan et al. 2017, p.76). One can also set simple rules such as no use of social media for a given hour. One also can put away the phone when eating with family members (Gibson & Trnka 2020, p.245). Through this, one will build an ethical boundary with the use of social media.

Use of Social Media for Inspiration Purposes

One needs to use social media for developmental and inspiration purposes such as involving oneself with business groups, support groups, and also create healthy relationships with strict boundaries (Szolnoki et al. 2018, p.109). Through it, one will always feel connected and have a purpose in life and thus quickly push out persons bringing about negativity in one's life.

Unfollowing Technique

One needs to unfollow persons on social media, especially those that spend most of their time posting things that can make someone feel bad about oneself. Social media tends to affect one's behavior and also self-esteem levels (Hu et al. 2017, p.340). Therefore, the elimination of bad accounts can be a way of self-empowerment, and thus, one can never feel bad about oneself (Gibson & Trnka 2020, p.243). Also, when a person gives negative comments about a person's looks or the way one dresses, one can quickly get rid of that by deleting the negative posts and always try to focus on something more positive.

Control

One needs to be more careful and control how one uses social media. One should also consider the social media use patterns, and time gets taken to indulge in social media activities, what one posts daily on social media platforms (Gibson & Trnka 2020, p.241). The moment one knows all these, one can easily manage the bad comments and adverse effects that arise when one uses social media.

References

Arendt, F, Scherr, S & Romer, D 2019, "Effects of exposure to self-harm on social media: Evidence from a two-wave panel study among young adults", New Media & Society, vol. 21, no. 11-12, pp. 2422-2442. https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444819850106

Chon, M & Park, H 2019, "Social Media Activism in the Digital Age: Testing an Integrative Model of Activism on Contentious Issues", Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, vol. 97, no. 1, pp. 72-97. https://doi.org/10.1177/1077699019835896

Cooley, D & Parks-Yancy, R. 2019, "The Effect of Social Media on Perceived Information Credibility and Decision Making", Journal of Internet Commerce, vol. 18, no. 3, pp. 249-269. https://doi.org/10.1080/15332861.2019.1595362

Gibson, K & Trnka, S 2020, "Young people's priorities for support on social media: "It takes trust to talk about these issues", Computers in Human Behavior, vol. 102, pp. 238-247. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/335622506_Young_people's_priorities_for_support_on_social_media_It_takes_trust_to_talk_about_these_issues

Hemsley, J, Jacobson, J, Gruzd, A & Mai, P 2018, "Social Media for Social Good or Evil: An Introduction", Social Media + Society, vol. 4, no. 3, p. https://doi.org/10.1177/2056305118786719