Negative Effect for Social Media on Kids

The new wave that has taken over the way people socialize is social media. Social media platforms enable everyone to become a member of a wider community. The social media society includes both children and adults. Social media has fundamentally altered the way information is disseminated. While it is easy to recognize the beneficial aspects of social media, there is a negative aspect that has a huge impact on youngsters. The knowledge that children are exposed to has the ability to shape their minds. Social media is a source of information that might impact a child's thinking and conduct. Social media negatively affect kids by exposing them to uncensored information, cyber bullying, and time wasting.

Social media exposes kids to uncensored information that is harmful to their development. It is an unregulated free for all market. Most people on social media are there to interact with others with little regard to whether they know each other physically or not. This makes it difficult to determine whether the consumers of the shared information are of the right age. Since it is difficult to control what is shared, most kids bump into obscene, graphic and harmful information that is inappropriate for their ages. For instance, a kid may be exposed to images of violence and pornography. Such exposure may affect negatively the way they think and behave.

Children are the most likely victims of cyber bullying on social media. Besides the careless users of social media, there are those who are there to intentional victimize other users. Children are easily controlled and harassed by such people to a point where they harm themselves. There are instances where kids have suicide because of cyber bullying on social media.

Social media has become the single most engaging activity in the current lives of kids today. Before social media, a child’s day was often a balance between schoolwork, play, and sleep. Social media has now taken over and now consumes the time for schoolwork, play and sleep. It takes too much of their time and negatively affects their physical health. There performance in school is also affected negatively.

Social media is powerful socialization tool that has changed the way people interact. However, it also has negative effects. While it is easy for adults to select what is good and leave the bad, children cannot and therefore experience the negative effects. One of the negative effects of social media on kids is the availability of unfit information such as pornography and violence images. The other negative effect is cyber bullying which sometimes causes kids to kill themselves. The third problem with social media is eating into the children’s learning, play, and sleep time. It is necessary that measures be put in place to safeguard children from such negative effects.

Oversharing

When kids spend too much time on social media, there’s the risk of sharing information that should not be in the public domain. Children will often provide details of their whereabouts, which creates the potential risk of being followed by stalkers. Owing to their young age and vulnerability, cyber criminals may take advantage of kid’s vulnerability to obtain private information that can be used for fraudulent activities. It’s not uncommon for pedophiles to create fake social media accounts to gain vital personal information about kids, such as the places they hang out. Such information can be used to make sexual contact or expose kids to explicit imagery and or content.

Emotional implications

Psychologists and early education experts warn that unguided exposure to social media can have dire emotional implications for kids who are already suffering from low confidence or self-esteem. Children are likely to judge their success by comparing themselves with their online friends and that may have a negative impact if they feel either inferior or excluded as part of a group.

Poor interpersonal skills

Too much time on social media sites, especially for kids, creates the perception that virtual relations are a substitute for real ones. The negative impact is that children who spend too much time on social media sites, rather than spending time with their peers, lac proper interpersonal skills. Social media undermines the importance of appropriate behavior related to real physical interaction. Research findings have established that, over time, kids who spend most of their time on social media sites begin to show signs of depression such as a change in eating and sleeping habits, social isolation and mood swings.

Risky behavior

Exposure to risky online content has been established to have a direct negative impact on kid’s risk behaviors. Children are likely to be highly influenced by their peer’s online behaviors. Experts agree that one of the most critical steps parents and guardians should do to minimize the risk associated with social media is to start by curtailing their own consumptions first. Smartphones have become a huge part of daily life and it’s up to parents to take up the mantle of change by setting a good example.