Social media have radically transformed people’s lives by facilitating communication and making individuals be able to stay in contact with one another at any moment and in every part of the world. Yet, together with unprecedented connectivity, social media have brought numerous challenges, especially for the younger generations who constitute the target group of platforms such as Instagram and Snapchat. According to recent studies, teenagers spend seven hours a day on average on their mobile devices (Jacobo, 2019). Thus, it becomes important to explore the impact of social media platforms on teenagers’ physical, social, and cognitive development.
Physical development plays a crucial role in the life of every person but especially young people who are still growing and have to stay active. As it was mentioned earlier, teenagers spend hours watching content on their devices and usually while sitting or lying. Mazur et al. (2017) discovered that excessive use of smartphones among adolescents led to a reduction in the number of face-to-face contacts and sleep problems. Young people who become addicted to browsing social media choose to stay at home instead of spending time outside with their friends. Moreover, the lack of activity may result in gaining unhealthy amounts of fat. According to Khajeheian et al. (2018), social media use was identified as one of the main factors behind higher levels of body mass in both primary and high school students. As can be seen from the research, social media possess a capacity to negatively affect the development of teenagers and, therefore, have to be used carefully.
Social development is another crucial element for younger people who have to socialize and spend their time together to advance their communication skills. Online bullying is a well-known phenomenon which may entail extremely dangerous consequences for a person who becomes subject to it and especially teenagers who are susceptible to peer pressure. Yet, researchers also identified the problem of cyberostracism, which means an exclusion of a person which occurs on the Internet. For instance, if a teenager, while looking through their Instagram feed, sees a picture of their friends at a party to which they were not invited, they may experience problems with emotional well-being, including a drop in self-esteem (Schneider, 2017). On the other hand, social media can also help teenagers cope with their mental health issues. Radovic et al. (2017) registered an improvement in quality of life in depressed adolescents who switched their social media use from negative to positive. These findings make it possible to suggest that social media can be used as an instrument to enhance teenager’s social development if used correctly.
Finally, the cognitive realm of teenagers’ development can also be influenced by social media. Ra et al. (2018) found that a higher frequency of use of social media among adolescents positively correlated with the symptoms of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Young people who are constantly checking their social media and are unable to focus on their task at hand may be diagnosed with the condition. Moreover, a study from Germany discovered that teenagers who engaged in heavy use of social media demonstrated poor school performance (Van den Eijnden, 2018). Thus, teenagers’ cognitive development may be at risk due to excessive use of social media.
Social media platforms affect people’s behavior in different ways, and teenagers, as the main users, are particularly susceptible to their effects. Adolescents can become addicted to social media and spend too much time on their devices which can limit their physical activity and lead to obesity. Mental health is another issue related to the excessive use of social media since teenagers can be subject to cyberbullying and ostracism. Cognitive development is also of great significance, and teenagers have to be careful to ensure that their social media use does not interfere with their school performance.
References
Jacobo, J. (2019). Teens spend more than 7 hours on screens for entertainment a day: Report. ABCNews. Web.
Khajeheian, D., Colabi, A., Ahmad Kharman Shah, N., Radzi, C., & Jenatabadi, H. (2018). Effect of social media on child obesity: Application of structural equation modeling with the Taguchi method. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 15(7), 1–22. Web.
Mazur, A., Caroli, M., Radziewicz-Winnicki, I., Nowicka, P., Weghuber, D., Neubauer, D., Dembiński, L., Crawley, F.P., White, M., & Hadjipanayis, A. (2017). Reviewing and addressing the link between mass media and the increase in obesity among European children: The European Academy of Paediatrics (EAP) and The European Childhood Obesity Group (ECOG) consensus statement. Acta Paediatrica, 107(4), 568–576. Web.
Ra, C. K., Cho, J., Stone, M. D., De La Cerda, J., Goldenson, N. I., Moroney, E., Tung, I., Lee, S., & Leventhal, A. M. (2018). Association of digital media use with subsequent symptoms of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder among adolescents. JAMA, 320(3), 255–263. Web.
Radovic, A., Gmelin, T., Stein, B. D., & Miller, E. (2017). Depressed adolescents’ positive and negative use of social media. Journal of Adolescence, 55, 5–15. Web.
Schneider, F. M., Zwillich, B., Bindl, M. J., Hopp, F. R., Reich, S., & Vorderer, P. (2017). Social media ostracism: The effects of being excluded online. Computers in Human Behavior, 73, 385–393. Web.
Van den Eijnden, R., Koning, I., Doornwaard, S., van Gurp, F., & ter Bogt, T. (2018). The impact of heavy and disordered use of games and social media on adolescents’ psychological, social, and school functioning. Journal of Behavioral Addictions, 7(3), 697–706. Web.