Week 2

With this week’s discussion focusing on oversharing online, we will be thinking about the following questions:

  1. Do different social networking sites offer other benefits and drawbacks?
  2. Is there an ideal number of “friends” or connections individuals have on Facebook that can improve their mental health?

Different social media sites, such as Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat, TikTok (…) were all created to capture user engagement in different ways, which is why they do have differing benefits and drawbacks. Even though we could all agree social media is the biggest load of brain rot, most of us still have our accounts because they serve a purpose to us. I use Instagram as a way to stay connected with my friends and keep up with what’s going on around me. I kept my old Facebook account because the majority of my colleagues communicate through it, and the county uses it for updates/information. Seems like FOMO fits my motto, but other people find the Facebook-Instagram pair more useful for their business operations. Tattoo artists primarily use Instagram pages instead of websites! Facebook marketplace is popular with the soccer moms! Stuff like that. I don’t use any other platform but TikTok has also been a crucial marketing tool for “influencers” (ew) to gain larger audiences with (exploitable) younger adults and children. 

I do not believe there is an ideal number of “friends” or “followers” on Facebook that can improve mental health, I’d argue for the opposite. Social media harms mental health due to the constant dopamine hits creating addictions, the influx of AI/edited images of what women ‘should’ look like setting unrealistic expectations + aiding to eating disorders, and the ability to be an anonymous bullying platform. The amounts of friends/followers are a community of people we do not have daily conversations with, and should not be a measure for mental health. Especially since the most social, outgoing, and happiest of people also commit suicide regardless of social perceptions. 

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9915628/ Check out this article on the relationship between social media and an increase in mental health problems. 


Image source: https://fherehab.com/learning/increase-social-media-mental-illness/




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