Like, Comment, Depression: Understanding how acceptance on social media affects the psychology of youth

Being a generation born under the dominance of social media, the opinion of ‘The viewers’ has started governing our lives more than our own conscience. Most of the people today wake up to the face of their smart phones, scrolling through the public life of other people, unaware of what is going on in their immediate vicinity. Being a social media addict was not considered a problem until it groped the youth into a corner of extremely low self esteem bordering at self pity.

Comparing our ‘behind-the-scenes’ to the ‘final cut’ of some random person on the internet is leading to psychological troubles that are irreversible in nature. A study based on an experiment revealed that we are immensely affected by the social media opinions of others, often confusing them with facts, while we as a viewer are hardly affected by what other people post about themselves.

Posting pictures with infinite filters, going through tedious processes to make sure we find that one particular picture bound to make people jealous, even when we hate the entire practice, is one of the negative psychological impacts that social media has on us. It is this ‘Need for Approval of your personal life from strangers’ that forms the root cause of the negativity that blooms on the internet today.

It is imperative that out generation acknowledges this high time and puts a stop at the ‘image-building-for-others’ trend to bring out a permanent solution for this crisis. What goes on in ones life is not bound by the approval of random strangers, that too when that anonymity provides for only a temporary high in the form of dopamine, not resulting into a long lasting state of happiness.

Watch this video for ways to deal with this problem.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n96l-yj01wE&feature=youtu.be