Unpacking How Social Media Impacts Mental Health
People utilize social networking platforms to discuss their political opinions, acquire news, and stay in touch with family and friends.
Social media’s impact on mental health
The human species is a sociable creature. To prosper in life, we require the company of others, and the quality of our relationships has a significant bearing on our mental health and enjoyment. Social interaction with others has been shown to reduce stress, anxiety, and depression, improve self-esteem, bring comfort and joy, avoid loneliness, and even lengthen life. On the other hand, a lack of solid social ties can seriously jeopardize your mental and emotional well-being.
Many people around the globe now use social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, YouTube, and Instagram to communicate with one another. While each has advantages, it’s crucial to remember that social media can only partially replace face-to-face interaction. The hormones that reduce stress and make you feel happier, healthier, and more optimistic are only released when you are in direct physical touch with other people. Ironically, social media, which is meant to bring people together, can really make you feel more alone and alienated and aggravate mental health issues like anxiety and depression if you spend too much time using it.
It could be time to reevaluate your online behaviors and achieve a healthy balance if you’re using social media excessively and experience melancholy, discontent, irritation, or loneliness.
The advantages of social media
There are numerous healthy ways that social media may help you stay connected and boost your wellness, even while it doesn’t offer the same psychological advantages as face-to-face conversation.
- Communicate and stay up to date with family and friends around the world.
- Find new friends and communities; network with people with similar interests or ambitions.
- Join or promote worthwhile causes; raise awareness on important issues.
- Seek or offer emotional support during tough times.
- Find vital social connections if you live in a remote area, for example, or have limited independence, social anxiety, or are part of a marginalized group.
- Find an outlet for your creativity and self-expression.
- Discover (with care) sources of valuable information and learning.
The disadvantages of social media
- Feeling insufficient in your life or looks.
Even if you are aware that the photographs you are seeing on social media have been altered, they may cause you to feel anxious about your appearance or the circumstances of your life. Similarly, we are all aware that other people frequently only discuss the positive aspects of their lives rather than the adverse events that everyone goes through. However, it still makes you feel envious and unsatisfied when you go through a friend’s Photoshopped pictures of their exotic beach vacation or read about their exciting new job advancement.
- Social media can lead to self-absorption.
Sharing endless selfies and your innermost thoughts on social media can create an unhealthy self-centeredness that causes you to focus on crafting your online image rather than making memories with your friends and family.
- Social media addiction and fear of missing out (FOMO).
Social media platforms like Facebook and Instagram tend to worsen FOMO, even though the phenomenon has been for far longer than social media. Like an addiction, feeling missing out on particular things can lower your self-esteem, cause worry, and increase your social media usage. FOMO can make you pick up your phone repeatedly to check for updates or compulsively respond to every alert, even if doing so puts your safety and that of other people at risk while you’re driving, prevents you from getting enough sleep at night, or forces you to put social media interaction ahead of real-world connections.
- Anxiety and depression.
Face-to-face interaction is essential for maintaining human mental health. Making eye contact with a caring person is the fastest and most efficient way to alleviate stress and improve your mood. You’re more likely to experience mood disorders like anxiety and sadness if you prefer social media contact over in-person connections.
- Isolation.
A study at the University of Pennsylvania found that high usage of Facebook, Snapchat, and Instagram increases somewhat decreases feelings of loneliness. Conversely, reducing social media usage can make you feel less lonely and isolated and improve your overall well-being.
Social media impact on your mental health: Telltale Signs
- Social media distracts you.
This might be an issue if your social media usage is interfering with your relationships or keeping you from your career or studies. You should reconsider your social media usage if skimming through it makes you jealous, unhappy, nervous, or furious.
It’s possible that to protect your mental health, you need to do a social media detox and be offline for a while.
- You use social media to avoid negative emotions.
If you frequently turn to social media to get through boredom or deal with loneliness, that is also a problem. Even while these emotions are unpleasant, and it makes sense to desire to get rid of them, using social media as solace or diverting from challenging feelings and emotions is not a healthy coping mechanism.
Here are a few more indicators that social media use may be detrimental to your life and mental health:
- Your symptoms of anxiety, depression, and loneliness are increasing.
- You spend more time on social media than with real-world friends and family members.
- You tend to compare yourself unfavorably with others on social media or are frequently jealous of others.
- You are being trolled or cyberbullied by others online.
- You are engaging in risky behaviors or taking outrageous photos to gain likes.
- Your work obligations, family life, or schoolwork is suffering because of your time on social media.
- You have little time for self-care activities like mindfulness, self-reflection, exercise, and sleep.
