Mental Health in Youth

The strong relationship between people and technology is only growing as time goes on. Technology has changed the way that people interact, and the goal of this research is to bring more awareness of the negative consequences that social media has on younger generations’ mental health. Society has personified technology so much that our phones “die”. Children are the most vulnerable and susceptible to influence and when they have the opportunity to explore these harmful platforms at such a young age, it can have dangerous consequences and long-term effects.

This was important to include because originally, phones were only used to call other people. Then, as technology evolved, companies added keyboards and cameras and the Internet. Since my paper is about how social media has affected users’ mental health and the consequences of using it too much, I wanted to see if people still used it for the original reason for its invention. It seems here that although Messages is the most used app based on the data, I have gathered but Instagram is a close second. Therefore, social media is extremely prevalent and considering the majority of children in America have access to the internet either through a computer or a phone, it is important to examine the possible results on mental health from social media.

This question was important because the internet has enabled us to stay connected with each other all hours of the day. I wanted to include this question because I wanted to know how people felt about their phones. Although people used to only receive text notifications or system updates, now platforms like Twitter and Facebook will shoot a notification to your phone unprompted by the user. I wanted to know how people felt when they get a notification because if society has subconsciously conditioned positive feelings with cell phone notifications. I thought that it was interesting three people mentioned that their phone is always on “Do Not Disturb”. I never have my phone on this just in case my mom needs to reach me or there is an emergency. Only if I am home, in a comfortable environment, and/or in a bad mood will I turn all my notifications off.

I posed this question because I think an important thing to note about people. In general, I think that people know what is right but do not necessarily take the right steps to do what is right. It is important to see how much time people are spending on these platforms so that the severity of its consequences can be determined. A social media break means deleting all one’s social media for a month or however long the individual chooses to do so. I thought that this shows not only personal discipline but the fact that 68.4% of people, according to my findings, felt the need to take a social media break means there is a problem that is recognized by this generation.