If you ever find yourself scrolling through Instagram, or stalking your friend’s sister’s roommate’s cousin on Facebook, and feeling really bad about yourself, you are certainly not alone. While social media can affect the self-esteem and body image of both genders, it takes a harsher toll on girls and women. With all the social media outlets that are used these days, it’s almost impossible to avoid constantly checking and updating them. Social media has a variety of effects on us. It makes us anxious, depressed, jealous, and feel bad about the way we look. In a study conducted by the University of Salford in the UK, of 298 social media users, 50% said that, “Facebook and Twitter make their lives worse”.
A huge problem with social media is that it’s essentially a constant stream of things we want but can’t or don’t have. Think of Pinterest for example, people (82% women) can scroll endlessly, looking at million dollar houses and designer clothes and “perfect” hair and “perfect” bodies. After a while, that is bound to take a toll on a person’s self esteem. There are many theories on the subject. According to the Social Comparison Theory, when people make “upward comparisons”, or compare themselves to people who are better off than they are, it leads to depression and negative self-image. Psychotherapist, Sherrie Campbell, explains it very well, “When we look to social media, we end up comparing ourselves to what we see which can lower our self-esteem. On social media, everyone’s life looks perfect but you’re only seeing a snapshot of reality. We can be whoever we want to be in social media and if we take what we see literally then it’s possible that we can feel we are falling short in life”.
If social media is making us feel so bad, why do we use it constantly? The answer is simple: we are addicted. The National Institute of Health added Internet Addiction Disorder in 2012; “”Internet Addiction Disorder (IAD) ruins lives by causing neurological complications, psychological disturbances, and social problems”. Although it’s hard for most people, deleting social media accounts, or using them less can be very beneficial to a persons self esteem and well being.
sources:
http://www.westminstercollege.edu/myriad/index.cfm?parent=…&detail=4475&content=4795
http://www.salon.com/2014/03/11/7_telltale_signs_social_media_is_killing_your_self_esteem_partner/
I love that you wrote a blog about this! I think there are so many problems with social media and it definitely has a major effect on our self esteem. Social media has also caused people to undergo FOMO. This is an abbreviation for “Fear of missing out.” People in our generation are so obsessed with our cell phones. We constantly check social media pages and if we find that our friends did something without us, we often go into panic mode. Before cell phones and social media, none of this existed. People were not aware if their friends hung out without them, because they couldn’t post about it all over the internet. Fear of missing out has caused a lot of psychological problems in many teenagers. Although social media brings us many benefits, it has a lot of negative effects as well. Read more about FOMO here: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/stephen-mariani/overcoming-the-fear-of-mi_b_5921406.html