Review Article
Social & Medical Impact of Social Media on Youth
Swati P* and Vikrant M
Corresponding Author: Swati P, Assistant Professor, Rajkiya Medical College, Jalaun Orai Uttar Pradesh, India.
Received: August 17, 2023; Revised: September 02, 2023; Accepted: September 05, 2023 Available Online: September 22, 2023
Citation: Swati P & Vikrant M. (2023) Social & Medical Impact of Social Media on Youth. J Nurs Occup Health, 4(3): 483-486.
Copyrights: ©2023 Swati P & Vikrant M. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
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Social networks allow people to participate in the communication process as both recipients of information and creators of messages. They provide a platform for people to reach global audience at minimal cost. Social networking sites (SNS) are comprehensive social media that allow people to create their own web pages, share content, and communicate with people online. SNS allows users to regulate their social networks by providing a visible list of online connections. The main objective of the article is to find out the negative impact of social media networks on young people, emphasizing the socio-psychological aspect in India that obstructs the path of acquiring skills among them. social networking sites have drawn away the attention of the youth, basically the students, from the study to inappropriate measures like passing time on social media by skipping study and work. Consequently, these lead to lower educational outcomes and decreasing productivity among the students. The youth have become self-centered and think about show-off on social media. Furthermore, the founders of various social networks should take the initiative to design them to disseminate relevant information in education along with recreational activities. If young people can understand the pessimistic side and socio-psychological problems of social media and use it to develop their identity, then the road to developing their skills is not far away.

Keywords: Social media, Impact, Communication, Skills
INTRODUCTION

The rapid growth of new communication technologies has reduced the geographical distance between "internet users" in the virtual world. The Internet is a new communication technology that offers immense possibilities for the social, emotional and cognitive development of young people. In recent years, a large number of online applications have appeared on the Internet; Of which social networks are highly appreciated by young people. The advent of social media has influenced people's face-to-face interactions and provided opportunities to expand their social networks with other people. Not only the tech-savvy young generation but also the older generation are also turning to social media for various purposes. Even kids watch their favorite TV animation shows on YouTube using smart phones. Social networks allow people to participate in the communication process as both recipients of information and creators of messages. They provide a platform for people to reach global audience at minimal cost. Social networking sites (SNS) are comprehensive social media that allow people to create their own web pages, share content, and communicate with people online. SNS allows users to regulate their social networks by providing a visible list of online connections. Out of the Internet users in India, about 84% use social media, which represents about 110 million social media users in India. They are users of Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube, etc. [1]. The socio-psychological impact of social networks refers to both the social and psychological factors responsible for changes in the behavior, thoughts and feelings of young people that are influenced by the real or imagined presence of other people on social networks. As such, social networks are defined as electronic communication that facilitates interaction and communication between young people through the Internet. According to the National Youth Policy, 2003 of India, youth constitute a section of population who fall in the age group of 13-35 years.

This age bracket is further sub-divided into three age-groups:

13-18 (adolescents) 

19-25 (early youth age group)

26-35 (later youth age group) years.

OBJECTIVE OF THE STUDY

The main objective of the article is to find out the negative impact of social media networks on young people, emphasizing the socio-psychological aspect in India that obstructs the path of acquiring skills among them.

METHODOLOGY

In this research paper, Descriptive method is selected. The study is on the basis of secondary sources like, Articles, Journals, Expert opinion, Books, University News, websites, Thesis, Newspapers etc.

PSYCHOLOGICAL IMPACT OF SOCIAL MEDIA ON THE YOUTH

The contemporary Indian society is moving towards the digitization process. Consequently, one cannot stay away from the driving force of social media. People are motivated to use these media due to the ease of advanced communication, expansion of bonds of friendship, connection with someone in a relationship, ease of use and keeping pace with the changing world. Also, the harmful effects of online social media cannot be denied, such as time wasting, distraction of students, lack of learning habits, lack of offline communication with people, shorthand phrases for chatting and messaging. use, ill health, cyber-crime, obtaining personal information by anonymous people, etc.

REVIEW OF LITERATURE

In the Indian context, a study was conducted on 120 youth (60 each, male and female) from higher education institutions in Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh to explore the impact of SNS on social issues and mindset change. The study revealed that among men, the issues that emerged on social media were harassment and bullying (85% each), followed by breakup (81.7%), uploading unwanted videos (75%) and excessive sharing (61.7%); While the majority of women (85%) faced harassment, it was followed by bullying (83.3%), spam uploading (75%), and relationship breakup (68.3%) [2]. Online social media captures students' concentration and leads them to waste time on non-academic, unethical and undesirable activities like meaningless chatter and random searches leaving their work aside. Teenagers often use social networks to pass the time and have fun. Although Internet access was appropriate for educational activities such as online tutorials and lectures, and for downloading study materials, there was no advantage to using it only for social media [3]. In the context of Northeast India, a study was conducted on mental health problems arising from social media use among 56 adolescents aged 13-19 years in Tinsukia district of Assam, India, through a field survey. It showed that teens in the age group of 13-15 were addicted to Facebook and the rest of the teens in the age group of 16-19 preferred WhatsApp due to privacy concerns. Socio-psychological problems associated with social networks include cyberbullying, depression, anxiety, isolation and suicide, online bullying, obesity, psychiatric disorders; Namely, FOBO stands for fear of being offline due to lack of internet connection, sexting and related health problems [4]. A study on the impact of social media on the educational efforts of 40 students from various universities in Guwahati, Assam, selected using a decision sampling technique, was conducted. It showed that Facebook was the favorite SNS among students (90%), followed by Twitter (10%); The top purposes for using social media include making new friends (55%), followed by sharing ideas and learning from people's experiences online (50%), and enjoying recreational activities (5%); Chatting with friends online via social media among 40% of students, resulting in lost study hours, cyberbullying on social media, and privacy concerns, which has detrimental effects on the mental configuration of 30% of the students, 20% of the students. it is scarcity. Initiative to disseminate relevant academic information among 10% of students had difficulties using social networks as a learning tool [5]. A sample survey was conducted among 200 Guwahati residents consisting of students, teachers, engineers, marketing professionals and businessmen to find out the impact of social media on the society and its utility as a means of communication. The study revealed that although social media was widely implemented as an influential means of communication among various sections of society in Guwahati, problems such as online bullying, cyberbullying involving electronic means of communication such as email, messaging snapshots and websites or messages posted on the discussion. Groups are used to harass people; family distance and low employee productivity have emerged as barriers to capacity building among youth [6]. A study of 60 randomly selected university students from public and private universities in the city of Karimganj, using a descriptive research design, aimed to identify the distracting nature of social media in education. It showed that Facebook was the most commonly used social network among students; The majority (68%) used mobile phones to access these media, followed by laptops (18.18%); 40% were regular users of social networks; 43.18% used them to keep in touch with friends; 77.27% maintain privacy while updating information on social media platforms; 31.81% students could not maintain social connections with offline friends; 43.18% preferred to use social networks at night from 10:00 PM to 1:00 AM, followed by 11:00 PM to 4:00 AM (18.18%); And the use of social media caused their writing skills to deteriorate due to grammatical errors, as a result of which they became addicted to the attractive features of social media while chatting and browsing at night, which affected their physical and mental health. an effect [7]. Briefly, social networking sites have drawn away the attention of the youth, basically the students, from the study to inappropriate measures like passing time on social media by skipping study and work. Consequently, these lead to lower educational outcomes and decreasing productivity among the students. The youth have become self-centered and think about show-off on social media.

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

The findings of the reviewed literature bring out the following points:

  1. Stress or Depression: - Stress or depression is a fluctuating state in which rewarding emotions and feelings diminish or disappear. The state of depression refers to two extremes of emotion, where the positive state is depressed and the negative state affects the development of different psychological symptoms such as anguish and depressed mood, anguish, and physical and mental health. So, teens are using social media and have become addicted to it. That is why many behavioral changes can be seen in adolescents. they feel lonely; Irritability, sadness, etc.
  2. Anxiety and Insomnia: social media is a ubiquitous technology and anything related to anything can be accessed at any time. Teenagers spend most of their time on social networks and exchange their personal information on them. They are not aware of the privacy policy and hackers misuse your personal data for illegal or illegal purposes. Another major risk of anxiety is the fear of missing out.
  3. FOMO can cause insomnia; Poor sleep quality. Binge Purge Syndrome and Low Vision: Both Binge Purge Syndrome and Irritable Bowel Syndrome are caused by unhealthy disturbances in eating behavior. The aforementioned syndromes can be observed mostly in adolescents as a result of the neglect of their diet by adolescents. Device and media use can affect your eyesight at a young age.
  4. Obesity and other diseases: Overeating, unhealthy diet, inactive lifestyle and lack of regular exercise all contribute to weight gain. Obesity is known to lead to high blood pressure, high cholesterol, diabetes, osteoarthritis, asthma and other diseases. Obese youth brains may have less dignity which affects their emotions and social life.
  5. Facebook is the usual social networking site used by young people. They can't think of living without it. Undoubtedly, Facebook has won the minds of the youth of the society due to a number of functions such as creating personal portfolio, providing information, promoting business and hosting of images and videos in addition to networking. Unlike Facebook, WhatsApp maintains more privacy between its users within the contact list of the mobile phone only and there is no advertising on the display screen. Thus, the excessive use of Facebook, WhatsApp and other social networks has made young people addictive by nature.
  6. Cyber bullying is a form of bullying in which mobile phones, instant messaging, email and chat rooms on social networking sites are used to harass people. Research shows that this can lead to unhappiness for social media users, which can lead to social disengagement.
  7. Apart from this, nowadays taking selfie and posting it on social networking sites has become a trend among the youth. Cases of young people dying while taking selfies are also coming to light. For example, on January 14, 2017, Debanjan Roy, a university student, was killed while taking a selfie in front of a moving train on a railway track at Chandrakona Road in the West Midnapore district of West Bengal.
  8. FOBO is another emerging psychological disorder in young people clinically known as "Nomophobia", ie no mobile phobia. This is an advanced concept of FOMO, ie fear of missing out. In this in this case, the person feels anxious when he is left without mobile phone or internet and cannot communicate with other people.
  9. Today, young people use distorted words on social networks, which affects their language proficiency. They have weak writing skills due to misspellings and grammatical errors. Ultimately, the negative influence of social networks has become an obstacle to the development of the skills and personality of young people [8-10].

CONCLUSION

In short, it is based on the perception of young people taking to social networks in a positive or negative way. Social media can increase self-affirmation in youth by making them aware of their self-worth and preserving their social connections with friends, family, and acquaintances. Furthermore, the founders of various social networks should take the initiative to design them to disseminate relevant information in education along with recreational activities. If young people can understand the pessimistic side and socio-psychological problems of social media and use it to develop their identity, then the road to developing their skills is not far away.



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