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Since the creation of social media, we have seen a tremendous increase in the popularity of platforms such as: Facebook, Instagram, Twitter or even Reddit. Nowadays, the use of social media is part of our daily customs. But what is the impact of social media on the population, especially the youth? Social media is having a serious impact on the mental health of young people, leading to serve depression, or at worse even suicide. According to a 2019 Facebook survey “Teen Mental Health Deep Dive”, the impact of social media on young girls is severely damaging, especially concerning their body image, but regardless to demographic, the impact of cyber bullying and mental health from social media worrying. Will it be worse in the future?
The spread of information is not often regulated but in some case, such as when Donald Trump got banned from Twitter, regulation has been done which suggests further improvements in the future. When we can say that spreading information is useful in a way, as we saw with the use of Twitter by Donald Trump, sometimes people are using social media to spread fake news. In the future, information will be regulated better to try to achieve a spread of truthful information.
Stanley Cohen’s theory of Moral Panic can be readily applied to social media and the spread of information. Cohen suggests that the media purposely acts to inaccurately portray “threatening” (to the societal norms) issues which has the impact of causing irrational and widespread fear amongst the public. We can see this most recently with the Toilet Paper Shortage of 2020 which saw mass media attention, which acted to panic shoppers and caused further shortage/supply issues.
To protect user’s privacy on social media, a user must be able to control their own privacy. They are only able to control this privacy if they possess the information necessary to make relevant choices[1]. Consumer knowledge and privacy should therefore be related to a consumer’s concern. If we link this to the platform with 2.9 billion monthly users, Facebook, these concerns have not been fulfilled. Facebook continues to have access to 45% of the population’s personal data and will likely have access to even more over the next ten years. Facebook’s current response to privacy has been inadequate. Data acquired through social media as shown by the Cambridge Analytica Scandal is a tool/weapon of great power. Companies or states are likely to continue to exploit or mishandle this personal data. Therefore, I believe the future impact of social media on people’s privacy in to be one of encroachment, social medias are likely to be more of a threat to people’s privacy in the future.
By Ava Brown, Ben Farrow, Gregor Horn, Justine Denuault and Beth Chisholm
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