Written by Honor Whiteman
In 1971, the first email was delivered. More than 40 years
on, social media has taken the world by storm. Social networking sites, such as
Facebook and Twitter, are now used by 1 in 4 people worldwide. Such activity
may seem harmless, but some researchers suggest social media may affect our
mental health and well-being.
In 2012, Medical News Today reported on a study suggesting
that Facebook use may feed anxiety and increase a person's feeling of
inadequacy.
A more recent study, led by social psychiatrist Ethan Cross
of the University of Michigan, found that using Facebook may even make us
miserable.
"On the surface, Facebook provides an invaluable
resource for fulfilling the basic human need for social connection," says
Kross. "But rather than enhance well-being, we found that Facebook use
predicts the opposite result - it undermines it."
But are such claims exaggerated? Or should we be limiting
our use of social media? Medical News Today looks at the evidence.
What is social media?
In essence, social media defines an array of Internet sites
that enable people from all over the world to interact. This can be through
discussion, photos, video and audio.
Facebook is the leading social networking site, with more
than 1.2 billion global active users every month. The site's popularity is
followed closely by MySpace, Twitter, LinkedIn and Bebo.
Facebook screenshot
On average, Americans spend 7.6 hours using social
networking sites, such as Facebook, every month.
The latest statistics show that around 42% of online adults
use multiple social networking sites. Perhaps not surprisingly, the majority of
social media users are under the age of 30, although the number of older users
is on the rise. Around 45% of Internet users aged 65 or older now use Facebook,
increasing from 35% in 2012.
On average, Americans spent 7.6 hours a month using social
media, with the majority of individuals accessing social networking sites
through cell phones.
But what attracts us to social media?
In the late 1980s, the first commercial dial-up Internet
service provider (ISP) was launched in the US. Internet technology has
certainly advanced in the past 25 years, so much so that the words
"dial-up" make most people cringe.
Of course, one of the main attractions for connecting to the
Internet was, and still is, the ability to better connect with the world around
us. For example, the Internet allowed us to send emails as an alternative to
the timely process of sending letters through the mail. Social media has built
on this premise.
This is Facebook's mission statement:
"Facebook's mission is to give people the power to
share and make the world more open and connected. People use Facebook to stay
connected with friends and family, to discover what's going on in the world,
and to share and express what matters to them."
This sums up what the majority of social networking sites
endeavor to achieve, and there is no doubt that the general public has
succumbed to the world of social media, perhaps a little too much.
Social media addiction
Recent statistics show that 63% of American Facebook users
log on to the site daily, while 40% of users log on multiple times a day.
We all have our own reasons for using social media. Some of
us like to browse at other people's status updates and photos, while others use
the sites as a way to vent their emotions. But according to Dr. Shannon M.
Rauch, of Benedictine University at Mesa, AZ, one of the main reasons we use
social media is for self-distraction and boredom relief.
"Therefore, social media is delivering a reinforcement
every time a person logs on," she says.
"For those
who post status updates, the reinforcements keep coming in the form of
supportive comments and 'likes.' And of course we know that behaviors that are
consistently reinforced will be repeated, so it becomes hard for a person who
has developed this habit to simply stop."
This behavior can lead to Facebook addiction. In fact, such
behavior is so common that researchers have created a psychological scale to
measure Facebook addiction - the Berge Facebook Addiction Scale (BFAS).
The scale, developed by Dr. Cecile Andraessen and colleagues
at the University of Bergen in Norway, uses six criteria to measure Facebook
addiction. These include statements, such as "you spend a lot of time
thinking about Facebook and planning how to use it" and "you use
Facebook to forget about personal problems." The researchers say that
scoring "often" or "very often" on four of the six criteria
indicates Facebook addiction.
What is interesting is that the researchers found that
people who are more anxious and socially insecure are more likely to use the
social networking site.
Last year, Medical News Today reported on a study that
provided a potential explanation for addiction to Facebook "fame."
The research team, led by Dar Meshi of the Freie Universität
in Germany, found that individuals who gained positive feedback about
themselves on Facebook showed stronger activity in the nucleus accumbens of the
brain - a region associated with "reward" processing. This stronger
activity correlated with greater Facebook use.
From these studies, it appears that many users who are
addicted to Facebook use the site as a way of gaining attention and boosting
their self-esteem. But can this behavior have negative effects on mental health
and well-being?
The negative impacts of social media
In 2012, Anxiety UK conducted a survey on social media use
and its effects on emotions.
The survey found that 53% of participants said social media
sites had changed their behavior, while 51% of these said the change had been
negative.
unhappy girl using computer
Many people using social networking sites make comparisons
with others, which can lead to negative emotions.
Those who said their lives had been worsened by using social
media also reported feeling less confident when they compared their
achievements against their friends.
"This problem has definitely gained recent
attention," says Dr. Rauch. "We know that many people on social media
sites often present idealized versions of their lives, leading others to make
upward social comparisons, which can lead to negative emotions."
Furthermore, the survey revealed that two thirds of
participants reported difficulty relaxing and sleeping after they used the
sites, while 55% said they felt "worried or uncomfortable" when they
were unable to log onto their social media accounts.
In a more recent study, conducted by Dr. Rauch and
colleagues, the team found that social interaction on social media sites,
specifically Facebook, may have a negative impact on face-to-face encounters
for individuals who already have high levels of anxiety.
Another concern regarding social media use is cyber
bullying. As stated earlier in this feature, the majority of social networking
users are under the age of 30, and most of these are adolescents.
According to Enough is Enough (EIE) - an organization that
aims to make Internet use safer for children and families - 95% of teenagers
who use social media have witnessed forms of cyberbullying on social networking
sites and 33% have been victims of cyber bullying.
But Dr. Rauch believes it is not purely the use of social
media that is getting out of control, but our need to be electronically
connected at all times.
She adds:
"I think
parents should be aware that their adolescent children are living at a time
where they are constantly 'on' and connected.
I would encourage
any parent to explore ways to encourage or even mandate 'off' time, not just
away from social media sites, but away from the devices. That is probably good
advice for all of us."
Could Facebook be used to improve mental health and well-being?
Although many studies point to the negative impacts of
social media on mental health and well-being, some researchers say they could
have the opposite effect. Social networking sites could be a useful tool in
identifying individuals with mental health issues.
Last year, Medical News Today reported on a study from
researchers at the University of Missouri, which claimed that Facebook activity
may be an indicator of a person's psychological health.
Some studies have suggested that social media use may even
improve mental health and well-being.
The team found that people who shared fewer pictures on the
site communicated less frequently, had a longer profile and fewer Facebook
friends, and were more likely to experience social anhedonia - the inability to
encounter happiness from activities that are normally enjoyable, such as
talking to friends.
Another study, from the University of California San Diego
(UCSD), suggests that using social media may even spread happiness. The research
team, led by James Fowler of the School of Medicine at UCSD, found that happy
status updates encourage other users to post happy status updates themselves.
"Our study suggests that people are not just choosing
other people like themselves to associate with but actually causing their
friends' emotional expressions to change," says Fowler.
"We have enough power in this data set to show that
emotional expressions spread online and also that positive expressions spread
more than negative."
In fact, the researchers believe that this viral spread of
happiness is so strong that if magnified, it could trigger an "epidemic of
well-being."
"If an emotional change in one person spreads and
causes a change in many, then we may be dramatically underestimating the
effectiveness of efforts to improve mental and physical health."
Overall, it appears that the exact effects of social media
on our mental health and well-being remain to be seen. But one thing is
certain; our use of social networking sites is unlikely to fade anytime soon.
Original post in Medical News Today
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