“Beyond the Screen: Unmasking the Impact of Social Media on Mental Well-being”
Introduction:
The phrase “social media” refers to a computer-based technology that makes it possible to share concepts, ideas, and knowledge through online groups and networks. Social media is internet-based and allows users to share anything quickly, including movies, images, documents, and personal information. Users interact with social media through web-based software or applications on a computer, tablet, or smartphone. It is being widely used in America, Europe, Asia, etc.
The use of social media enhances issues with mental health. This comprehensive research provides an overview of the impact of social network use on mental health. The use of popular social media applications like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc., has created many health issues in young as well as adults. This research is being conducted to analyze the harmful effect of social media. The main purpose of this research is to see how social media has created and impacted our lives and how dependent we are on social media. People are now using social media on a routine basis; many of them spend hours on Messenger, Instagram, Facebook, and other well-known platforms. People see things on social media and consider them to be true. A point comes where they think that another person is living a better life than they are, and they start to compare themselves with the other person, which creates problems and might lead to different issues related to self-image and mental health (Jan, 2017).
Hypothesis:
1. There exists a relationship between social media and mental health
2. There exists a relationship between social media and self-image
Research questions:
1. Are people facing mental health issues due to social media?
2. Do people have a lower self-image due to social media?
LITERATURE REVIEW
The younger generation of the present era is acting as active users of social media, which has an affinity towards the problems of mental health. Social media users have speedily adopted online social communication as an essential part of daily life, as evidenced by the increasing figure of daily users. The use of social networking sites has globalized immensely in the past decade. Facebook is the most widely used social networking site, as it has more than one billion users worldwide (Richards, 2015). Apart from being the medium for the expression of opinion and a platform for sharing knowledge and moments, Facebook has also reduced distances by making people feel more connected and helping them build new relationships and maintain the existing ones. Facebook alone reported an estimated 1 billion active users on 27 august 2015. It means one in seven people on earth uses Facebook in a single day to stay connected with their friends and family.
The use of excessive Social media leads to problems like anxiety, depression, stress, loneliness, etc. Moreover, Social media has gained immense popularity in the last decade, and its power has left certain long-lasting effects on people. The upward comparisons made using social networking sites have caused people to have lower self-esteem (Bhat, 2017.).
Social media usage has dangerous effects on the younger generation because problems related to mental health, which gets develop during the young period, can act as an epidemic for any individual throughout life. To fulfill their affiliation needs, the majority of humans get possessed by an elementary drive that forces them to make social comparisons between themselves and others. These affiliation needs are triggered by many social networking sites. It is claimed that these social networking sites lead many people to do self-evaluations and make social comparisons between themselves and others based on social classes, social roles, beauty, popularity, wealth accumulation, and other social functions (Braghieri, 2022).
The significance of continual inquiry and examination of this construct can’t be overstated. Young adults face many problems due to the use of social media; these problems can be identified as online harassment, depression, stress, fatigue, loneliness, a decline in intellectual abilities, cyberbullying, emotion suppression, and lack of concentration. These all things directly or indirectly affect the mental health of the younger generation (Richards, 2015). Literature summed so far reveals that the younger generation operates susceptibly. As a confronting population of the present era, the younger generation is experiencing the emerging stage of life and is at higher risk of serious mental health problems. Proper steps should be taken to reduce these risks, and information and counseling sessions can be structured at schools and colleges. A proper awareness movement can be organized to understand the effects of the usage of social media on the mental health of the younger generation. Social networking sites should be constrained to a certain age limit. Any social media application that has a net positive effect, like discrimination, violence, racism, etc., should be dissolved completely at once.
The studies found that social media use had a negative impact on children’s and young people’s mental health, particularly in the areas of self-esteem and well-being. They also found connections between social media use and issues related to depression and anxiety, as well as a negative impact on self-esteem and body image. It is challenging to pinpoint the source and effect, which is probably tied to the personality of the young person. There is little work on the impact of social media on younger children. More research is needed on this topic (Wolfers, 2022).
METHODOLOGY
Primary data will be collected for the research. The process of acquiring data through surveys, interviews, or experiments is known as primary data collection. Household surveys are a common type of primary data. Primary data can be individually checked by researchers to make sure that it satisfies the criteria for quality, availability, statistical power, and sample needed for a specific research issue. The research methodology that we will use to identify the harmful effect of social media on mental health and self-image will be either survey in which we will have different questionnaires (rating scale) filled from young as well as children, or we can interview different people and ask them about the problems that they are facing due to use of social media.
Both qualitative and quantitative data will be collected and analyzed. In general, quantitative research tests hypotheses to understand the causal or correlational link between variables, whereas qualitative research uses interviews and observation to understand a phenomenon in its real-world setting. As we are conducting interviews(qualitative) in nature and questionnaire filling (quantitative), we will collect the data from different age groups and diverse people. We will distribute these questionnaires and also take interviews from the random sample to have good and error-free data collection. This choice of methodology will be appropriate because we need a face-to-face interaction with the person we are taking the data from to know how they feel about the whole situation of the negative impact of social media, and interviews will be the best option for that and to get a more rational data collection we will be using the questionnaires.
The strength of the interviews is that they will help us explain, understand, and explore the research subjects, behaviors, and phenomena better, while their weakness is it’s difficult to convince people for the interview and takes lots of your time. On the other hand, personally administered questionnaires are easier to make and can be made electronically and have a wide geographical range but can be biased.
FINDINGS
After doing the research and making the hypothesis, we are most likely to get a negative relationship between mental health and self-image and the use of social media. They are indirectly related to one another. The increase in one decreases the other variable and vice versa. For example, the excessive use of social media(increase in one variable) leads to a negative impact on mental health(decrease in another variable). So we are more likely to accept both the hypothesis that we made and consider them as true as the previous research also supports these findings, so there are fewer chances of errors which will make our research more testable and objective. Once all the data is collected, it will be analyzed on the software, and based on the results, the hypothesis will be either accepted or rejected.
SIGNIFICANCE OF THE RESEARCH
This study is relevant because social media is and always will be a part of our lives, but it has created many problems for us related to our health, mainly our mental health and our self-image. Most of us now use our smartphones or tablets to access social media. While this makes staying in touch very convenient, it also makes social media always available. This constant, high-speed connectivity can lead to issues with impulse control, damage your ability to concentrate and focus, interfere with your sleep, and make you a slave to your phone. Social media has a significant negative effect on people’s self-esteem. These social networking sites are used by students for information sharing, relationship building, and maintenance. But the majority of people eventually compare themselves to others on both an upward and downward scale. People get envious of other people’s lifestyles and are less obliged and appreciative of their blessings as a result of the upward comparisons. So through this study, we will be able to find out that are the major problems that are being faced by people that are using social media and how we can overcome these problems, what solutions can be implemented to reduce these problems effectively, and how our parents and adults can play a part in helping us with this issue. This research mainly focuses on the younger generation, which was not present in the previous research, this will help us understand the problems of the Gen Z, which might be different from the generations before, and with an open mind, we will be able to find out a solution to this problem.
CONCLUSION
The project was about social media usage and the dangers on mental health and self-image
The following dangers were concluded by the research due to the use of social media:
• Depression and anxiety
• Inadequacy about your life or appearance
• Comparing yourself unfavorably with others on social media
• Having no time for self-reflection
• Being distracted at school or work
After conducting this research, the hypothesis that we initially made first hypothesis which states that there is a relationship between social media and mental health, is true; there is a negative relationship between mental health and social media usage, and the second hypothesis, which states there is a relationship between social media and self-image is also true, there is a negative relationship between these two. The increase in one decreases the other and vice-versa.
According to studies, social media has increased the number of friendships and relationships and strengthened existing ones. By providing forums for interaction and the display of creativity and intelligence, media has also been successful in bringing like-minded people together. Additionally, social networks offer a relatively simple means for people who have trouble interacting with others to express themselves, develop their social skills, and discover who they are. Technology, like social media, has many fantastic advantages. Individuals may interact and exchange, learn news and information, and even meet new people because of it. However, there can also be a drawback, particularly for college-age young adults who were raised in a screen-centric society. The use of social media has been connected to loneliness, anxiety, and depression. People who often use social media may feel more unhappy and less satisfied with their lives than others who spend more time engaging in non-screen-related activities, according to recent studies cited by The Child Mind Institute and The National Center for Health Research. This research has studied all the harmful effects of social media on the mental health and self-image of young adults and provided ways how to overcome them.
