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Course: Social media literacy > Unit 4
Lesson 3: How does social media impact our behavior?How does social media impact our behavior?
Addiction, envy, shame, polarization...all byproducts of the road to profits
How does social media impact our behavior?
“It brings us so much comfort that we don't want to understand its harms. I can't name the last time I was truly alone. As soon as I feel uncomfortable, anxious, etc., my phone is my escape. Is that normal? Absolutely not. Do I understand that? 100%. But at the same time, am I still addicted? Unfortunately.”
–Nutsiko, 19, Tbilisi, Georgia
To understand how social media impacts us better, we first have to understand ourselves better. We are constantly changing, affected each moment by people, environments, and events, in ways we are aware of and in ways we aren’t. Although we often focus on how we are able to shape the world around us, we are also shaped by the conditions we find ourselves in.
Even before we’re born, the genetic material from our parents gives us certain physical and mental characteristics. From birth, we are shaped by every relationship and every conversation we have.
🤔 CONSIDER:
Think about the environment that helped to shape your life: where you live, the schools you’ve attended, and the activities and communities outside of school that you’ve participated in.
- How have you been shaped by these places and communities?
Think about the people in your life, your family, friends, teachers, classmates, and many others.
- How have these people shaped your life?
Think about something you’ve learned that’s important to you.
- How did you learn it?
Think of someone who has shaped your life for the better. Email or call them and tell them what they did for you and how you feel about it.
The people, environments, and experiences that shape us have a set of underlying conditions: values, hopes, beliefs, characteristics, and assumptions. These conditions influence the way we see reality and affect the possibilities for our future.
All this means that we’re always changing, and the influences around us matter enormously. What’s around most of us more consistently than anything or anyone else? Our phones and social media.
When we use social media repeatedly, it begins to train us: our thoughts, feelings, and motivations are shaped by powerful technology designed to keep us engaged. Without even knowing it sometimes, we learn new behaviors and warped values about what’s important, and they stick—even when they’re not good for us. It impacts us both online and offline. For example:
- When we are bombarded with notifications, it compromises our ability to attend to what is important.
- When endless content creates an overwhelming amount of want, we can end up addicted to seeking satisfaction, clicking and scrolling, mindlessly consuming content, often with minimal oversight from cognitive control regions of the brain. Ultimately, this behavior drains our energy.
- When social media forces us to constantly engage in social comparison, we’re filled with negative emotions: envy, shame, anxiety, or conceit.
- When we’re frequently exposed to negative content, fear and outrage can become the norm, eroding our sense of goodness and shared humanity.
- When algorithms tell us what we want to believe, we become more polarized and shared understanding across society breaks down.
None of this is healthy for us. Social media’s ability to profit from our vulnerabilities is putting our brains— and our society—at risk.
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With violence on social media, and Drugs allot of kids 10 -16 do Drugs and have guns(2 votes)