The Negative Affects of Media on Teens

Humans have been blessed with cutting-edge equipment and facilities as a result of technological advancements that have become integral to their day-to-day lives. By expanding opportunities for global collaboration, the internet is practically turning the globe around. Sadly, teenagers' excessive internet consumption is beginning to affect their overall health.

It is essential to acknowledge that adolescence is a very vulnerable time when adolescents are exposed to a variety of influential aspects of life. Every thoughtful adult ought to pay close attention to the effects that social media can have on teenagers. While social media has the potential to facilitate and accelerate learning, it can also have a number of negative effects on adolescents.

Teens can suffer from the following negative effects from media:

1. The most prevalent emotional disorder linked to social media use is depression. Teens frequently experience depression and feel inferior to their peers on social media. Teens may develop this type of emotional disorder as a result of their need to fit in, be noticed, and accepted by their prominent media friends.

2. Cyberbullying Cyberbullies use social media platforms to disseminate misleading, awkward, and unpleasant information about particular users. Users experience cognitive issues such as anxiety, low self-esteem, loneliness, and suicidal tendencies as a result of cyber bullying, which is a major social media evil. The privacy settings on social media accounts are supposed to limit who can see particular user-posted content. However, on media, privacy is virtually nonexistent. Privacy is compromised by social media, putting children at risk for issues like body shaming and image-based abuse.

3. Addiction to the internet Teenage internet addiction is caused by uncontrolled media consumption. Young children who spend more time online are exposed to novel concepts and tales that encourage further investigation. This exploration can become an addiction if it is not addressed early, and it can have an effect on children's personal growth, mental health, and academic performance. By altering how the brain processes information, responds to situations, and retains information, media can influence brain development. Addiction to the internet may cause structural brain changes and a decrease in grey matter. Adolescents who multitask while using media may take longer to complete their assignments, which also lowers the quality of their studies and homework.

4. Sleep deprivation Social media is one of the main reasons teens can't sleep. Teenagers continue to use online resources, particularly at night. Their sleep schedule is disrupted as a result, which increases the risks of sleep deprivation. Teens who use social media are forced to stay awake all night to check their notifications, which can disrupt their sleep patterns. Teenagers need 7-8 hours of sleep per night, and they can suffer health problems if they don't get enough. They constantly experience feelings of stress or agitation and have trouble learning and concentrating. They might become irritable and have health issues like acne and weight gain caused by viral infections.

5. Low self-esteem Teenagers encounter numerous images of perfection. Images of ideal body types that may have been altered cosmetically are flooding the internet. Teens whose bodies are undergoing unexpected changes suffer from low self-esteem as a result of these kinds of unattainable beauty standards. Teens who see models with flawless skin and complexions may feel insecure. Teens' perceptions of their own bodies can be influenced by constant exposure to unattainable standards. The teen's mental and physical health may suffer as a result of these observations.

6. Social Skills Teens benefit from having social skills because they make it easier for them to make and keep friends with other people. Teenagers end up developing interpersonal skills that may not be useful in the real world because they spend a lot of time on social networking sites. Teenagers need to learn how to have meaningful, one-on-one interactions with other people, even though social networking sites have been shown to strengthen relationships that already exist. Depression and suicidal thoughts can result from social isolation in the real world. Teens are having a difficult time developing effective public skills and becoming more prone to psychological issues as a result of spending more time on social networking sites than with real people in real life.

7. Sexual conduct Images of pubescent women that are overtly sexualized that are shared on social media can have a significant impact on teenage girls who were only children before. The sexually explicit content is prevalent across a variety of social media platforms. Teens who are about to discover their sexual identities may be negatively impacted if they are exposed to erotic content that depicts inappropriate sexual behavior. They may develop irrational expectations as a result, making it difficult for them to have safe or healthy sexual relationships.

Therefore, providing adolescents with a solid ethical framework and encouraging them to develop solutions that enable them to safely navigate user-oriented social platforms is the most effective strategy for reducing the negative effects of the media on teens. It is in the best interest of the younger generation that parents control their children's exposure to the media in order to lessen the negative effects of it.

Parents can control how media affects teens in the following ways:

- The parents might try to understand these effects and how they put their children's mental and physical health in jeopardy.

- In order to shield their adolescent children from the dangers of social media, they ought to develop effective communication skills.

- To comprehend how social networking encourages teen addiction, they can familiarize themselves with the sites.

- To monitor their children's use of social media, parents can download a monitoring app to their children's devices.

- Parents can, if necessary, establish some fundamental guidelines for social media use.

Despite the fact that social media appears to be an excellent tool for networking, its potential negative effects on society cannot be ignored. Teenagers are particularly susceptible to the potential dangers posed by social media use. These negative effects of media can pose a threat to your teenage children's social and health well-being if they are not addressed promptly. Parents play a crucial role in shielding their impressionable children from the negative effects of social media.