The Downsides of Social Media

In her social media presentation, Samia Khan discusses the negative side of the social networking sites and apps people use to create and share content. The college student shares several statistics about usage: 98% of college-age students use social media, with an average of spending 2 hours daily on social media.

The speaker shares some of the psychology behind why social media is so addictive. For example, platforms are built to encourage users to continually keep checking in, eventually conditioning them to stop what they are doing to check if they have new notifications. The amount of interaction positive posts receive not only elicit more posts, they act as affirmation and impact the self-esteem of the user. This pattern is exacerbated in students due to the context of their positive achievements.

The social media presentation explains how this creates a one sided conversation where people are unlikely to post or discuss negative events in their lives. This is particularly harmful in the context of mental health. The speaker encourages people to be intentional with their social usage and be more authentic so others can be too.