Mental health issues and Social media 

 Mental health issues and Social media

The development of technology has altered the way we conduct our lives bt what has been dramatically affected in the way we carry out our interaction with one another. Social media plays a critical role in each individual, and mostly in teenagers. As he uses of social media increases, there is a direct impact of its growth in use with that of mental issues. There has been an exponential increase in spiritual awareness campaigns; however, little is done to ensure its success. Mental health issues such as depression have been associated with social interaction with research dating hundred of years ago. However, there are little efforts put into combating the effects that social media brings in. Social media affects mental health by causing mental instabilities such as social anxiety, low self-esteem, and also depression.

Humans are in constant need of connection to attain happiness; the way we used to interact in the past has changed. One significant change in society is social media, which has brought with it social isolation. Ironically these social media are supposed to increase our interaction. However, they have negatively impacted our mortal connections. There’s the need to be a clear difference between social media interaction and real-life interaction.such is a case when sending an email or message on social media; there is no human connection, but the platforms provide human interaction. When a person spends most of his time on social media communicating with others through social media, it’s adversely affected how much they continue their conversations with others in real life. It is most likely to replace their real-life communicating and interaction with social media, or they might even minimize their real-life interaction and communication. Reduce communication and cooperation, in turn, leads to adverse effects such as negative emotions and low self-esteem.

When two people on social media who have no connection or similar purpose may result in the creation of adverse effects, in context, studies have clearly shown that the use of Facebook has a adverse impact on the user’s self-esteem. This is a result of user life comparisons, which mostly is not right and is edited or altered to make it look better. These affects users who ussually compare themselves to others in terms of physicall attractiveness. When people compare themselves to others in social media , it is ussually based on use of pictures on social media which are not accurate representation of the persons real life . These photos are actually handpicked by the users to only potray the best parts of their lives , leaving out the negative ones. Comparisons of users lives to that others create a feeling of discouragement which in turn may lead to creation of other negative emotion s that lead to complexities such as depression . Depression and low self-esteem when combined make it very hard for a person to improve their mental health.

Studies have also shown that comparison on social media always leads to jealousy . By self-inducing jelousy through social media comparisons, such as seeing posts that potray what users dont have or they wish to have could lead to extreme actions by users in order to be seen better. Such actions such as posting unrealistic posts, posting photos when they only happy or faking lifestyle , these might lead to oversharing and exposure of ones private life.

As much as social media is addictive and brings in some negative pyschological impacts, there are also some benefits to be enjoyed by all social media users. In addition control can be implemented to limit what one one posts to minimize its impacts. Through the use of social media one can curate meaningful relationships and connections that would otherwise not have been achieved. Social media bridges the distance gap as such one can communicate with another person millions of miles away and be able to establish businesses and strengthen relationships. Social media can be used to carry out charitable courses, such as by creating awareness users what is happening in one part of the world that may be of interest to others and in which they may want to take part in. Through connecting with families and friends and others who are far away , social media can help eliminate the feeling of loneliness and isolation, in addition social media can be used as a tool for expression ; singers, artists, engineers and other proffessionals may share their thoughst , creations and ideas on social media and have opportunities that they did not before.

It is clear therefore that social media is a great tool, that is here to stay and our interaction with these systems may bring in great and negative impacts to us. How it will affects us and our mental health greatly depends on us on its utilisaation. We should therefore use this tool wisely for our benefits and in a way that does not negatively affect our mental health.