Impact of Social Media on the Youth

Social media has become one of the most important part of our life. It has become a general trend of sharing each and every event of our life on the social media. Sitting at home one can know where the other person is, with whom, in what mood, what is he eating, when did he slept, woke up, etc. etc. People have made their life like an open book on the social media.

The social media has not even spared the youth. I can see the extent to which this social media has made an impact on the life of the young children and teenagers. This is the age when their young mind cannot differentiate between what is right and wrong. Poor little children have fallen in the various traps through social media.

There are many negative impacts of social media on the young children and youth. Let us discuss some of them.

1. The biggest disadvantage is the wastage of time. These young children spend too much of time on the internet. This affects their studies and leads to scoring less which will definitely impact their career.
2. Social insecurity is one of the negative impacts of using social media. The fear of having less online friends, less likes, comments, less shares, creates a kind of social insecurity among the youth which may even lead to depression. Due to social insecurity they start feeling uncomfortable while socializing in the real world also.
3. Online traps are also increasing day by day. There are many rackets who create fake accounts and trap the teenagers. Once fallen in the trap, they try to take out personal information from them. Sometimes these innocent kids get into the wrong doings also.
4. One may get addicted to the nature of sharing each and every thing of their life on the social media. This information may also reach to unknown people who may use the information in a wrong way.
5. There are lot of people speaking very negative about religion, country, political party etc. on the social media. Reading too much such negative information, may impact their young minds and create a wrong opinion about such things. Sometimes it can become too severe that they develop criminal thoughts.
6. Cyber stalking has also very common. The victims of such stalking can be mentally impacted and generate a fear of someone stalking in the real world also.
7. Online relationships through social media is also very dangerous. Getting into a relationship with someone by just chatting and seeing each others profile is very common. This can be very dangerous if the profile and the person on the other side is fake. This may impact the young minds of the children emotionally and may lose the faith in the real relationships in the real world.

Well these are only few of the negative impacts of social media on the youth that I am observing these days. I am not saying that social media should not be used by the youth, as it also has many benefits for them. But awareness and proper education is necessary before using the social media. Parents should keep a watch on what their kids are doing online. Help him keep the balance between the real and the virtual world. Any change in the kid’s behavior should be taken seriously as it may be due some trouble in the virtual world.

Proper counseling, monitoring and education will prevent the youth from getting negatively impacted by the social media.

This blog post is inspired by the blogging marathon hosted on IndiBlogger for the launch of the #Fantastico Zica from Tata Motors. You can apply for a test drive of the hatchback Zica today.