3 exercises

English 2100

16 June,2016

Negative Impacts of the Social Media among the College Students

The term social media can be used to refer to that relationship that exists among different groups of persons (Liang, Wang & Chen 1). It can also refer to the system of online communication channels that is usually dedicated to the interaction that is community-based and involves sharing of contents and collaboration (Abdulahi 2). The websites and the applications are dedicated to the forums; social networking, social bookmarking, microblogging social curation and wiki are some of the examples of the social Medias that are used by different group of people today in communication (Liang, Wang & Chen 4). Some of the commonly used social media cites include the Facebook, Twitter, among others. As the popularity of these social media sites grows, the number of students who subscribe to them also grows in the same manner.

This calls for the need a for a proper investigation to be carried out so as to evaluate and to determine the general effects that are brought about by the continuous in the development of the social media sites to the growing population of the college students. This leads us to our thesis statement which dictates that social media sites have several negative impacts on the college students as opposed to the positive impacts on communication, education and privacy.

The majority who are however glued to the social media for a long period of time are the young generation that consists of the youths. These people are usually college students. They spend much of their time creating contents and distributing them using the different platforms all the time. The invention of these social media sites has made it easier for the young women and men to exchange their ideas, personal information, feelings, pictures and also videos at a very high rate. It is estimated that close to seventy-three percent of the American teens use different social media sites currently. Research has however revealed some shocking truth about the negative impacts that the sites have brought on this young majority. Some of the negative impacts that have are believed to arise from the use of the social media sites among the college students include the following: destruction of attention during research, it can lead to ill health which can be due to negative peer influences which advocate for the drug and substance abuse all in the name of catching up with the other friends (Abdulahi 85).

The other impact can be reduction of physical interaction and contacts; they also develop poor writing and communication skills. Many college students do their research using the internet. It is however of much concern that these students get destructed from their research by the numerous amount of time that they spend on the social media sites. This makes them conduct shoddy research and also lose their concentration as well. Such practices make them end up getting poor grades and this impact on their general studies (Abdulahi 24). The relationship that exists between the grades and the social media sites have clearly been brought out by the studies which were done at the Ohio State University. It revealed that those students who study in different colleges and utilize avenues such as Facebook do not spend a large part of their time studying. This has led to poor performance that has been reflected on the poor grades that they get from the subjects that they are taking in the colleges (Liang, Wang & Chen 19). The opposite is true for those students who do not spend much of their time using these popular social media sites. The other study conducted by Aryn K of the Ohio State University also confirmed the notion that those college students who use the 500 million member’s social media sites have lower grade points averages. As compared to those other students who do not use the sites. The study did not, however, find out a significant difference between the individuals who are seen to be heavy users of the social media sites and those considered to be light users of the sites. There is also no direct correlation between any social media sites and low grades.

Uses of the social media sites have to a greater extent impacted on the amount of physical interaction and contacts among the different groups of the college students. The reduction in the contact is caused by the fact that many of the students prefer being isolated and also to be in isolated places as they conduct their businesses in the social media sites (Jennifer 90).

This isolation is the factor that leads to reduction in the physical contact among these students. This has also led to another challenge of privacy in the process of using these platforms.

The social media is indeed controlling the lives of many of the users in the whole world. It has grown far above the expectations of the different groups of scholars and even the founders. It must however not be forgotten that during this era, there are a lot of privacy issues that need to be taken into consideration (Chawla 89). There is a large amount of data that is usually collected by different government agencies, search engines, hospitals, social networking systems, financial institutions among other bodies. The information is usually stored in the data bases. This information as it is very useful to the owners, but have the chances of being misused. The problems that are usually seen in the real world such as that of the fraud, theft, vandalism do exist in the online platforms too (Jennifer 80). As people subscribe to these social services, they tend to assume the issues the threats that are being posed to them. The facts are true according to research that has been done on things such as Facebook which shows that when a user fully fills the profile as required by the site, there are many pieces of information that are usually made open. They include their days of birth, their religious views, sex, political affiliation, relationship status and the sexual preference, their educational background and also the employment profile. Using this data, they also give an option of identifying any potential friends with whom you share the details with. This clearly shows that they have information about a person and the people that they associate with at all the time. This means that it can identify and recognize an individual. There are some people who might use this information for negative reasons such as to cause damage to the life of another person. It is hence important for people to read the security options before going about and giving their information to the site. Studies have however confirmed that there are many people who are not aware of the policies that govern information sharing (Jennifer 16). This is irrespective of the fact that the policies are in most cases clearly states for the users of the sites to preview before subscribing. The other argument can be that if they have read these issues, they might as well not have confirmed the effects that the policies have on them. Many individuals do not have any slight idea that it is possible for their information to be shared. This has made them share their private data with people who are not authorized because of their attitude of being ignorant (Liang, Wang & Chen 70).

The other issue that was noted was the complexity that is involved in the privacy settings and lack of the controls that is provided to the users as being responsible for the information sharing that is unintentional.

The use of the social media sites has also led to poor communication and writing skills among the students. This is linked to the fact that they do not have the time to create interpersonal communications. They also do not have the opportunity to interact with other students. They also spend much of their time creating contents and distributing them in the sites hence they do not have time for creativity, and this subsequently results in the development of poor writing skills among these students. They do find it difficult to express themselves orally or even in written form.

The other negative effect of the use of social media includes the impact on the health of the individuals. These students usually take a lot of time taking coffee and tea. The result is that they consume them in large amount so as to prevent falling asleep. The lack of sleep is what leads to the development of ill health (Chawla 89). There is also another problem that is health related when it comes to the use of the social media sites. This is usually referred to as addiction.

Studies have found out that there are many college students who find themselves addicted to the social media sites in that they do not get the time to do any other activity. These groups of students are usually found to be dormant in performing any physical activity. As a result, they are likely to develop complications that are associated with lack of exercises. They also get a little amount of time to relax their brains. This is likely to make them have other additional complications (Abdulahi 67). These students are also exposed to harmful lights that are being generated by the computers and the mobile phones that they use in accessing these sites. This is likely to impact much in their eyes. Research have proved that majority of the users of the social media sites rely on their computers and mobile phones to a large extent in going around doping their businesses online.

The use of the social media sites has had some negative impacts on the lives of the college students. The majority of them have fallen victims of stolen and leaked information through the companies’ policies of sharing of the members’ information. It is, therefore, necessary that they are informed of these impacts so that a wave of change can be inculcated in them. This is the only reason that can make the eradication of the negative impacts easier. Many of the college students have in the current years been a victim of many tricky situations that have been caused by the attention that they give to the social media sites. They have not only failed in their examinations but also been able to lose some vital information to the fraudsters who use these platforms too. It is in this regard that the different aspects that surround the use of the social media sites need to be understood and more research done with the aim of collecting information that can assist the college students to effectively utilize these sites.

In conclusion, the social media among the college students have several impacts. Such as: reduction of physical interaction and contacts, poor writing and communication skills, and impact on the health of the individuals. Also there are a lot of privacy issues which could fallen students as victims of stolen and leaked information. Destruction of attention. All of these impacts should be considered

Work consulted

Wang, Q, Chen, W and Liang YThe Effects of Social Media on College Students

Johnson &Wales University 2011

Abdulahi A A Study on the Negative Effects of Social Networking Sites Such as Facebook

among Asia Pacific University Scholars in Malaysia 2014

Jennifer G Introduction To Social Media Investigation: A Hands-On Approach Waltham, MA:

Syngress, 2015

Chawla N Applications Of Social Media And Social Network Analysis Cham: Springer, 2015