Social media has become a big part of our lives within the past few years. Whether it be Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, or Instagram, I’m sure the majority of people have a social media account somewhere. It has almost become the default way of communication for some people. It’s a place where you can catch up with old friends and family. You can easily share a photo, video, or even message someone. However, social media isn’t all good, as there tends to be a lot of jealousy that can affect your mental health. Whether it be a celebrity or a friend, someone can easily see how someone is spending their day compared to their own and get jealous. Or you could even get sucked into endlessly scrolling your feed. Either way may not be good for you. 

As social media has grown, it’s started to become a part of teenagers’ lives. I’ve had my own account at a much younger age than others, yet kids even younger than I was are getting into it now. Authors Lawrence Robinson and Melinda Smith, had written an article titled Social Media and Mental Health for helpguide.org. Both authors write for healthguide.org, which appears to be a credible source as it is a non-profit site dedicated to delivering advice for mental health for everybody. Which shows their audience is for those who have questions about their own mental health. The entire site was dedicated to a woman named Morgan Leslie Segal, who had committed suicide. They believe if she had a site like theirs at the time, she would still be here today, and so they want to help out anyone else who has those thoughts and issues. The tone of the article seems to be much more informative. The authors are simply talking about social media and informing the readers about what social media can do to you. This leads to the purpose of the article,  to inform others of the positive and negative aspects that social media has on our mental health. Whether you use social media to “communicate and stay up to date with family and friends around the world.” (Robinson, Linda) or maybe it leads to unhealthy habits like “haring endless selfies and all your innermost thoughts on social media.”(Robinson, Linda) The piece is an informative piece, which is great since it delivers its message in a cut and clear way. The piece came out at perfect timing as the article was written in July 2021, when everyone was going through the global pandemic. Possibly at the height of the pandemic, where everyone was sucked into their phones, so reading things like “Nothing reduces stress and boosts your mood faster or more effectively than eye-to-eye contact with someone who cares about you”(Robinson, Linda) could maybe motivate someone to even get off the phone. The authors seem to have a stance where social media can be much more harmful than it is good for our mental health. As they provide much more reasoning for its negative effects than its positive ones. 

We can say that social media is affecting our mental health all day, but how do we know for certain? What if we have just enough mental issues without social media. Authors, Dorien Tecla Beeres, Filip Andersson, Helen G M Vossen, Maria Rosaria Galanti decided to make an experiment out of this in their article titled Social Media and Mental Health Among Early Adolescents in Sweden: A Longitudinal Study With 2-Year Follow-Up (KUPOL Study). The idea behind their experiment was to see “the longitudinal associations between the frequency of social media use and symptoms of mental ill-health among Swedish adolescents.”(Beeres, Andersson, Vossen, Galanti) The authors of the piece seem to be credible as the article they had written, went into the National Library of Medicine and don’t appear to have any biases upon whether social media is affecting the mental health of adolescents. The audience of the piece seems to be parents. Parents are possibly the most worried group about adolescents, and with social media still being generally new, it’d make sense for parents to want to research how it is affecting their children. It’s certainly not adolescents as the article features a lot of statistical data that people at a young age may not quite understand yet. The purpose of the piece was “ to assess the longitudinal associations between the frequency of social media use and symptoms of mental ill-health among Swedish adolescents.”(Beeres, Andersson Vossen, Galanti) The article is an experiment, they came up with a question and followed through with it. They had to analyze the results and ultimately come up with a conclusion like any other experiment. The experiment went on for two years and even into the global pandemic. There is a possibility that the pandemic could have tampered with the results since everyone was home for a period of time. However, the experiment was going on for a year and a half prior. The authors don’t seem to have much of a stance on the topic other than the conclusion they came up with, which is that “social media may be rather an indicator than a risk factor for symptoms of mental ill-health.” They found that the longer you use social media doesn’t make you more prone to mental health issues.  

Teachers have even had some problems with students after the rise of social media. In the newspaper article titled Secret Teacher: Students Need Pshe Guidance But I’m Not Equipped To Give It, published in The Guardian (London), an anonymous teacher tells us about the struggles of students and social media.  As one teacher writes how students have been much more open about their mental health issues. With the author being a teacher themselves, it’s one of the best sources as they are a first-hand account. They constantly deal with teens on a daily basis. The secret teacher is an “English Graduate and an English teacher”(The Guardian). The author’s audience could possibly be any administration in the UK government. As the teacher calls out the government for the “lack of consideration for PSHE as a subject” (The Guardian) as they just throw into the rest of the work for a teacher.  The teacher seems to have a much more angry tone than the other articles. This seems to be due to the fact that they’ve dealt with the effects of social media first-hand when they shouldn’t have. They’ve had a student “ quite candidly (and bravely) open up to me about her suicidal thoughts.”(The Guardian) Their job isn’t to be hearing things like that and they want that to change. The purpose as to why they wrote the article was because they’d like to help their students as best as they could. However, they believe “There should be training for PSHE — not only to educate teachers, but to equip them with the skills to present this information professionally, non-judgmentally and confidently.” (The Guardian). This is an opinion article, which is why it works so well. This teacher is clearly passionate about their job and loves their students, which is why they’re reaching out for help. The article was published on May 5, 2018 in The Guardian, which is definitely a time where students had started to be a bit more open about themselves. Whether that be online or with a teacher. The teacher who wrote the article clearly sees social media as an issue for teens. They’ve had students tell them that they had“removed themselves from social media to escape the pressures to look, act and live a certain way.” (The Guardian) 

People’s mental health has become such an issue that those even on social media are starting to talk about it. Whether it be celebrities or just everyday people, they’re all talking about it. Singer and actress, Olivia Rodrigo, had recently spoken up about how she keeps herself “separated from all the noise and tabloids or what people are saying about [her] on social media.” Olivia Rodrigo is around most of our age and has quickly risen into fame just this year, and it’s important to see how even with fame, there are still issues with social media prevalent. Her audience is most likely either those around her age or even younger. Her music has mainly been targeted towards teens, so no reason as to why her tweets wouldn’t be. She simply seems to have an informative tone, she’s answering a question and just informing everybody about her stance on social media. With it being in a tweet, it’s possibly the best medium, as it can quickly grow and be passed around, whether it be its comments, likes, or retweets. When she said this, her fame was quickly growing which can certainly have a huge impact on someone like her as she is young and gaining attention like that quickly is overwhelming. 

Conclusion

With the rise of users of social media apps, people’s mental health issues have certainly taken a rise. Whether it be because of pressure to always post about your life, jealousy of others’ or cyberbullying, lots of people have many reasons either to take a break from social media or just quit it altogether. Which I would hope to see more of, social media isn’t a necessity and should never be one. Not everyone needs to post about what they’re doing and where they are 24/7 and that’s okay. People shouldn’t be pressured to get their own Instagram page or a Twitter just because their friends have one. Whether it be a celebrity or an ordinary teen, we all have our limits and we should all take any breaks we need and know that that’s okay to do so. 

Bibliography: 

The Secret Teacher. “Secret Teacher: students need PSHE guidance but I’m not equipped to give

it; Issues around consent, social media and mental health aren’t easy to teach – allocating the job to a form tutor isn’t good enough”. The Guardian(London), May 5, 2018 Saturday. advance-lexis-com.ccny-proxy1.libr.ccny.cuny.edu/api/document?collection=news&id=urn:contentItem:5S82-22Y1-F021-6321-00000-00&context=1516831. Accessed September 26, 2021.

Beeres, Dorien Tecla et al. “Social Media and Mental Health Among Early Adolescents in

Sweden: A Longitudinal Study With 2-Year Follow-Up (KUPOL Study).” The Journal of adolescent health : official publication of the Society for Adolescent Medicine vol. 68,5 (2021): 953-960. doi:10.1016/j.jadohealth.2020.07.042

Robinson, Lawrence, and Smith Melinda. “Social Media and Mental Health.” HelpGuide.org, 22

July 2021,

https://www.helpguide.org/articles/mental-health/social-media-and-mental-health.htm.

First Draft

Social media has become a big part of our lives within the past few years. Whether it be Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, or Instagram, I’m sure the majority of people have a social media account somewhere. It has almost become the default way of communication for some people. It’s a place where you can catch up with old friends and family. You can easily share a photo, video, or even message someone. However, social media isn’t all good, as there tends to be a lot of jealousy that can affect your mental health. Whether it be a celebrity or a friend, someone can easily see how someone is spending their day compared to their own and get jealous. Or you could even get sucked into endlessly scrolling your feed. Either way may not be good for you. 

As social media has grown, it’s started to become even a part of a teenager’s life. I’ve certainly had it since I was about 13, while others are now having it at an even younger age. Authors Lawrence Robinson and Melinda Smith both believe that we use social media since as humans we crave any social interaction we can get. Whether it be texting our friends, meeting new people,” we need the companionship of others to thrive in life, and the strength of our connections has a huge impact on our mental health and happiness”. Social media is just another part of that now. They provide multiple positive aspects as well as negative ones. How social media can allow us to connect to those family members across the country, or even express our creative selves. This has also been my experience with social media, I try to be as creative as possible with what I post. I don’t necessarily like getting too personal or even boring when it comes to posts just to maybe even stand out amongst others and have some fun with it. But, social media also has its downsides, where it can make us be jealous of others and in turn look down upon our own lives, or the possibility of cyberbullying. Both authors have many years of writing articles and have been working for helpguide.com, which specializes in mental health articles. Which they seem to carry a much more informative tone for this piece as they appear to be writing towards any parents with children who are on social media. This comes for perfect timing as the article was written in July 2021, when everyone was going through the global pandemic. This was a time where everyone was certainly feeling isolated and spending much more time on social media keeping up with loved ones who they haven’t seen in possibly over a year. They certainly seem to follow a stance of we shouldn’t let ourselves be completely wrapped up in social media, and should take our breaks every now and then. 

We can say that social media is affecting our mental health all day, but how do we know for certain? What if we have just enough mental issues without social media. Authors, Dorien Tecla Beeres, Filip Andersson, Helen G M Vossen, Maria Rosaria Galanti decided to make an experiment out of this. The idea behind their experiment was to see “the longitudinal associations between the frequency of social media use and symptoms of mental ill-health among Swedish adolescents.” To which they found out that the more an adolescent uses social media the more prone to mental health issues they’ll be. They necessarily won’t have more mental issues but they’re more likely to have any then those who are not on social media. The experiment went on into the pandemic so it’s even possible that it had some effect on the adolescents’ lives however they studied for two years so I don’t believe it’d have a huge effect. They were clearly writing this piece for any parents who may be worried about their children, as they are speaking much more informative about their research. 

Teachers have even had some problems with students after the rise of social media. As one teacher writes how students have been much more open about their mental health issues. As they’ve “had a student quite candidly (and bravely) open up to me about her suicidal thoughts. Another sought permission to work independently in the library because of the panic attacks brought on by being in the classroom with others.” Teachers don’t feel that equipped to deal with situations like these, obviously, they’ll help the best they can but they weren’t trained for these situations. They feel as if there needs to be some new mental guidance in schools to help these students who have such issues. Social media has opened these students to cyberbullying, and so much more that students are even deciding to leave social media behind altogether. The teacher who wrote the article did not want to be named so they kept their identity a secret, however, they clearly seem to be wanting to inform schools and maybe even parents of how it’s been for a teacher these days. These teachers need help with these situations and certainly, we need to take social media and its effects very seriously. Much more recently possibly due to the ease of access to the internet, I feel as if people have been much more open about their mental health issues than ever before. The idea of therapy and self-care has been going up which is great. It isn’t so looked down upon as it used to be so students who are dealing with issues can certainly have people to talk to with no problem. We just have to make sure to address the issues. This teacher, with along many others I’m sure are worried about the health of their students and are hoping to see the day they get better with their problems. They wrote their piece in the newspaper, The Guardian, possibly to get a broad audience of people, it can easily be accessed online while also being for possibly any parents out there. 

People’s mental health has become such an issue that those even on social media are starting to talk about it. Whether it be celebrities or just everyday people, they’re all talking about it. Singer and actress, Olivia Rodrigo, had recently spoken up about how she keeps herself “separated from all the noise and tabloids or what people are saying about [her] on social media.” Olivia Rodrigo is around most of our age and has quickly risen into fame just this year, and it’s important to see how even with fame, there are still issues with social media prevalent. 

Conclusion

With the rise of users of social media apps, people’s mental health issues have certainly taken a rise. Whether it be because of pressure to always post about your life, jealousy of others’ or cyberbullying, lots of people has many reasons either to take a break from social media or just quit it altogether. Which I would hope to see more of, social media isn’t a necessity and should never be one. Not everyone needs to post about what they’re doing and where they are 24/7 and that’s okay. People shouldn’t be pressured to get their own Instagram page or a Twitter just because their friends have one. Whether it be a celebrity or an ordinary teen, we all have our limits and we should all take any breaks we need and know that that’s okay to do so.