Negative and positive impacts of social media on our mental health

A lot of us use social media, a lot. So what impact is this having on us? We are going to dive into the impacts, both negative and positive...

Negative Impacts of Social Media

Studies are showing us that there is a link between heavy or substantial social media use and depression, anxiety, self-harm, and even suicidal thoughts. The studies categorize heavy or substantial use as 4+ hours a day. You may think that seems an absolutely incredible amount, but if you track the amount of time you use social media each day, you might be surprised by how much that adds up to. And it isn't just heavy social media use which can cause negative impacts, it's any use.

image from cybercrew.uk

So how does this happen?

1. Isolation – anytime you spend on social media, means you aren’t interacting with others face-to-face. So, if your use is heavy, that is going to heavily reduce the amount of time you have for in-person connection. If you are connecting with people by just watching their lives rather than actually interacting with them, that could cause us to feel isolated.

2. Inadequacy vs. self-absorption – on social media we often compare ourselves to others. ‘Everybody else's lives look, perfect, everybody themselves look perfect.’ This can leave us asking, ‘why don't I look like that? Why isn’t my relationship 100% happy or why don’t I have the perfectly behaved child?’ This constant comparison with others leaves us feeling inadequate. And linked to this is a potential unhealthy level of self-absorption developing. If we are very regularly posting pictures of ourselves or things we’re doing, and assuming that our followers want to see that every day, it can create an unhealthy level of self-centredness.

3. Fear of missing out - you see others doing things, what seems like all the time and actually, maybe you're not doing things all the time. Perhaps you see that your friend has gone to do something with another friend and they didn't ask you to go along. Previously, we just wouldn't have had this information, we just wouldn't have known that it was going on and actually not knowing sometimes feels nicer for us. Seeing that people are doing things without us can create really difficult feelings.

4. Disrupted sleep - if you’re using social media late into the evening, or before you go to bed, then it's likely going to disrupt your sleep. This can happen in two ways. Firstly, the light from your phone or your tablet interrupts your sleep patterns in the brain. Secondly, if you are stimulated that close to bedtime, if you see something that causes a certain difficult feeling in you, it's going to be difficult to tell your brain to switch off, to relax and go to sleep.

5. Bullying/trolling - about 10% of teenagers say they have been, or are being bullied online or on social media. It creates a space for a constant bullying; before we had social media, if you were being bullied at school or at work, there would have to be a break when you went home. The person would not be able to get to you. That's not the case anymore. You can pretty much, always be reached online. So, it gives bullies another way to get to you and it gives you less of a break. It gives you less time to wind down and if we're constantly being bombarded by something we are not able to rebuild resilience between incidents.

So, try being mindful this week when you're using social media. What feeling does it leave you with. Notice when you use it - if you are with your partner or family members in the evenings, and you're not connecting with each other, if you're both on your phones, on social media, then stop. Ask yourself, what is that about? Why would you rather look at other peoples’ lives on your phone, than engage in your own life? Make social media a conscious choice, be mindful before you open the app. ‘Why am I doing this? What am I wanting to look at?’

Positive Impacts of Social Media

Social media gets a really bad press when it comes to the impact that it has on our mental health, but it can also have positive impacts on how we are (if we use it in a routine, not a heavy or substantial way).

The main aim of social media is to help us to stay connected to people. That can be especially helpful if we live somewhere remote, have social anxiety or agoraphobia, have limited independence and if there's a global pandemic!

It helps us to stay connected to people we wouldn't ordinarily be able to stay connected to. And it allows us to stay connected to more people over a longer period of time. When you leave school or university or a job, there may be people you had connections with, that ordinarily in life you would just drift away from. Life takes you on separate paths and wouldn't know very much about how they are or what they're doing now. Social media allows us to stay connected in some way to those people; keep an interest in their life and see how and what they're doing.

It can be a great tool for self-expression. Sometimes people don't have the confidence, don't have, the means to express themselves and talk to people about certain things, face-to-face. And this can be a great alternative.

Social media can actually be a way of meeting new people. Places like Facebook have a lot of local community groups where people are looking to make new friends or meet up.  They'll be able to arrange events, for instance, at a local pub quiz or bowling alley and social media is a way to get the word out.

It offers us convenience, and convenience sometimes can actually equal more support. If we've got a friend who we know is struggling, being able to send them a message asking how they are can be more convenient than trying to call them a time that works for you and works for them. Being able to send a message and know they will respond whenever they're able to, is a really good way around busy life.

And it can be a way to try to raise awareness, spread information and learn. It's a way to reach a number of people to try and raise awareness about a topic, teach them something, or a way that we can learn for ourselves.

Suzie Booth

Counsellor/Psychotherapist MSc. MBACP Accred.

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