Too much social media is bad for children and health
Dr Kris Naidu, Nadi
Technology has impacted human activities monumentally.
Social media in particular has taken the world by storm. Social networking sites such as Facebook and Twitter are now used by one in four people worldwide. Such activity may seem harmless, but researchers suggest that social media affects our mental health and wellbeing.
Identifying and understanding these changes in children and young adults is important as their brains are still developing. The World Health Organisation (WHO) have already issued concerns, recommending that children younger than five years old should spend no more than one hour in front of any electronic devices with screens on any day.
Children’s brains seem to process online interactions in a surprisingly similar way to real life ones. Doing multiple things online did not improve children’s ability to multitask elsewhere.
In fact, it makes children more likely to pay attention to new distractions.
The limitless notifications from the internet encourage us to hold a divided attention, which in turn may decrease our capacity for maintaining concentration on a single task. As online usage may have just as many bad sides as good, we need to act upon this obscure fact and enforce ways to limit social media use.
As doctors, we encourage parents to explore ways to mandate ‘off’ time, not just away from social media, but away from all electronic devices. Practice mindfulness and encourage children to engage in more inperson interactions. This is probably good advice for all of us.
Without exception, parents should be aware that their adolescent children are living at a time where they are constantly “on” and connected. The hyper-connectivity takes place at a superficial level, eliminating all of the extra elements that make communication more valuable and psychologically constructive.
Let it be known that a number of studies have linked social media use to depression, anxiety and isolation. Also, a well-known adverse effect of social media on health is sleep deprivation.
It is not purely the use of social media that is getting out of control, but our need to be electronically connected at all times. I believe social media is the modern day Pied Piper, a sort of black hole sucking up time as well as mental and emotional energy.
So, if you have successfully read this entire article and related to at least some of the points above, it might be time for you to consider a social media detox.