Drowning in the Scroll

As social media apps compete for attention, students lose more than just time – their focus, sleep, and mental health are also at risk.

By: Anex Estrada

What is Social media?

Social media is an internet-based form of communication. There are many different types of social media platforms, the most popular currently being X (formerly known as Twitter), Snapchat, TikTok, and Instagram. These platforms allow teens to have conversations with one another, even creating group chats, and share information and content from others. 

Since the first few years social media started, it has developed into more than just an app to communicate with friends and family. These platforms now show short videos that typically run to a minute long. 

While social media is mainly used for entertainment, it can also be used in the business world. It can be used for marketing, to promote new products, for customer service, and to gain more engagement. 

All of these different social media apps used to have their own purposes, but recently, each one has been adding more updates, that conclude for most of these social media apps serve the same purpose as the others. 

How is social media affecting teens? 

Social media is affecting teens for multiple reasons. Spending an insignificant amount of time on these platforms, indulging in negative content, and even spreading negative content. 

The negative content being spread around the media can lead to suicide, self-harm, depression, feelings anxious, and eating disorders. 

Although social media does have its negative impacts, it can also have its positives. Watching these short videos that these platforms show can, in some cases, inform those watching about some information and fun facts.

“Social media can be a negative place. There are people online who are willing to be negative and just bully people for fun, which is kind of stupid,” said Saul Vasquez, ’27.

The videos that show on one’s feed are typically dependent on what videos the viewer likes, adds to their favorites, and shares with others. 

For example, if you’re adding a bunch of funny videos that you share with your friends and add to your liked videos, there is a high probability that more videos like that will be shown in your feed.

These social media platforms show what the viewer wants to see, making sure you stay engaged in what you’re watching, keeping you on the app for hours and hours a day.

How much time are we spending on social media? 

Typically, the average teenager from 13-17 years old spends 4.8 hours a day on social media, according to cosmotogether.com. These statistics can vary, depending on the person watching.

Those approximately 4-5 hours a teen spends on social media are typically after school hours, after getting home from a long day at school. 

“I have like at least eight hours on TikTok daily,” said Jaxon Ivey, ’28.

Most high schools in the U.S. end school from 3:00- 3:30 p.m. Leading to the fact that most teens spend their time on their phones after school, up until they go to sleep. 

The time spent on phones can be used to do productive things, such as homework, playing a sport, cleaning their room, and doing a hobby they enjoy. 

When asked how many hours a day he spends on social media, Owen Wallace, ’28, said, “Probably two hours.”

A lot of the time, teenagers complain about not having enough time to do any of these things, but most of the time, they do; it’s just being taken away from the use of social media. 

When a teen gets home from school, at approximately 3:30-4 pm, they have 4-5 hours to do all of these things before they eat and go to bed, but most choose to spend these hours on social media, scrolling through videos that intrigue them. 

What could you do instead of spending all this time on social media? 

Instead of spending 4-5 hours on social media, there are multiple things a person can do. They can learn new things, get back into old hobbies they used to enjoy, and even do homework. 

They can even hang out with friends or family members. Hanging out with these loved ones can even make people forget social media exists because of how much fun they can have without it, even if they don’t realize it.

When asked what he could do instead of spending time on social media, Vasquez said, “I could be going to the gym.”

Reading is another thing someone can do instead of using social media. Although most people say that they haven’t picked up a book since middle school, and that books are so boring to them, finding the right book could make them realize that reading can be fun. 

Learning or re-learning an instrument could be another way to keep the mind distracted from using social media and keep a person entertained. People can learn their favorite songs from the internet and be entertained for hours.

When asked ‘Have you ever tried to reduce your time on social media? If so, how did it go?’ Ivey said, “TikTok maybe once, but then I doom scrolled for like a whole day.”

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