Social media has been very present in the social and academic lives of the students here at Morro Bay. Some of the content can be beneficial while others may be damaging or affect the mental health of teens. In order to recognize these benefits and drawbacks, students can look into their day-to-day life and examine how much people depend on social media. Additionally, students can limit the negative effects social media has by finding and doing other activities that students also enjoy.
There are numerous other statistics and articles that deeply examine the pro and cons of social media and what it has on teenagers’ health. Academically, pros and cons are stated by socialnetworking.org. That is, social media sites can help students do better in a range of classes and they can improve and make new friendships/relationships. For cons, social media can also lead to lower grades, and while it can help with students’ grades it is also known that social media can lead to a decrease in grades.
While all these seem to be true to the naked eye, students won’t fully trust or understand these facts until a fellow classmate and teenage representative can support these claims. For instance, Morro Bay Highschool junior, Lily Dougherty shares her thoughts on the effects of social media and how it will personally influence students socially and academically. Lily says that social media ¨shows me new business and new creative ideas.” Also, Lily ¨gets exposure to things I care about. I get good information.¨ This indicates that social media allows students to get additional information outside of school and are able to expand their knowledge and create likings for things. To take a break from social media, Lily ¨spends time with friends or family, go to the beach, cook, and mostly spend time outside.¨ These are very beneficial activities students can take part in.
As time goes on, social media will most likely be present, possibly even more present in the lives of students and society. Lily predicts, ¨it will become a bigger part of everyone’s life and will influence me as well since people I am around will be influenced.¨ This is a pretty realistic prediction as social media and overall technology usage will continue to increase.
Along with the overall pros and cons that come from social media, it is important to look into the content inside social media. More so, how it can result in mental illness and unwanted insecurities in young teens. According to a 2019 survey from SellCell, most children are allowed to have a phone by the ages of 11-12. This indicates that starting around the age of 12 years old many children have access to the dangers social media has to offer. Additionally, they are starting to have more developed insecurities about themselves and how they view the world around them.
No one knows what the effects of social media will look like in the future. However, students and humans can take advantage of the technology given to them, which may also very much benefit society in the long run.
