Social Media today has a big impact on teenagers’ lives. Some teenagers with social media experience stress, anxiety and depression. Blue Valley North Psychologist Sarah Dockendorf believes social media and general phone usage contribute significantly to mental health issues in teenagers’ lives.
“This is my 6th year at North, and so I feel like it hasn’t changed much in the 6 years,” Dockendorf said, “Like social media has been pretty prevalent for all of that time. I do think students are coming for help more than they were previously, which is great. I think they know that these resources exist at school, which is wonderful, that’s what we want for our students.”
Dockendorf believes the social media apps that are the most harmful for students are the ones that use photos as their base of attraction. These include Instagram, Snapchat and occasionally TikTok. Senior Sid Linafelt claims he used to have problems with social media and his mental health. He often used Instagram and Snapchat for quick dopamine and quick gratification.
“I would say, particularly the photo-based social media like Instagram and Snapchat are the ones that I hear about the most,” Dockendorf said, “I know Twitter and some of the other ones are maybe not as damaging because they’re less likely to be strictly photos, um, but the ones with photos for sure.”
Dockendorf thinks that having an understanding of your screen time habits and taking control of that is a good way of keeping a healthy relationship with your phone. She also believes that having conversations about social media and balancing it with other activities is a good way to keep control of students’ social media habits. Linafelt believes that you should be more proactive about keeping a healthy relationship with social media.
“We know you’re all going to have social media, but how can we kind of balance that with other things and how can we, again, know that what you’re seeing are people’s best images and people’s favorite things.” Dockendorf said, “I think that’s really cool to be able to share that with people. But also knowing that everybody has struggles and we’re not seeing everything behind the scenes and just kind of having that conversation is really important.”
Linafelt believes that you should be more proactive about keeping a healthy relationship with social media. He believes that you should set limits, be aware of your digital footprint, block people who are just there to bring you down and be confident in yourself when comparing.
“Strategies I use are setting limits, blocking trolls, and being confident in myself. Also by being cognizant of my digital footprint,” Linafelt said.
Linafelt believes that social media is addictive because the algorithm knows what keeps you returning to the app, combined with certain features that make it a quick dose of dopamine, which makes teenagers keep coming back to social media apps such as Instagram or TikTok.
“There’s a ton of things that make social media addictive, but like when you pair the targeted content with how short the content is, with features like auto scroll, two times speed and being able to skip through videos, it gives a certain instant gratification aspect that wouldn’t be normal in a YouTube setting,” Linafelt said.
Social media can take a toll on self-confidence and motivation. Dockendorf believes that teenagers should remember that all the posts on social media are the best parts of people’s lives, and comparing their normal life to somebody else’s best moments isn’t going to make them feel good.
“I used to let social media and how I was perceived online affect me a lot, and I would think about it and try and change it,” Linafelt said, “But something I realized is the more you embrace your weirdness, be yourself and do what you think is funny, you’ll find your people.”
