Social networks and their impact on society
The human individual is a thinking being, who gets carried away by reason and at the same time for his feelings, resulting in the need to relate and feel related in a reciprocal way. That is why it is said that social networks always exist.
Basically, for the aforementioned need, the people mentioned to share connections with the rest of individuals. And it was exactly for wanting to find the people that social networks arose. In this sense, then, sociologically speaking, a social network is defined: “(…) as a set of individuals who are related to each other. User relationships can be of very diverse kinds, and range from business to friendship ‘. (Gallego, 2010 P.176) On the other hand, from the modern and technological point of view. Boyd and Ellison (2007) claim that: social networks are web services that allow individuals to create a public or semi -public profile within a delimited system;articulate a list of other users with whom it shares connection;and see and navigate in your connection list and those of the rest of the users within the system. (p.02)
Now, referring to this point of view, in a segmented and turn. Thus, we define social networks as a set of platforms or websites made up of communities of people who are associated with a common connection, be it language, geographical location, personal tastes, etc. Whose system facilitates communication between users;the exchange of information such as photos, videos or messages;And they also allow us to meet new people. The rapid development of technology has allowed social networks to become something almost indispensable for the person today, the easy interaction that allows us with anyone is so effective and momentary that it gives us the ease of knowing that it is happening in anypart of the world with just seconds of what happened. These and other benefits are those that provide us with social networks, even if they have the same positive repercussions in patients with certain conditions, such as those with brain trauma and the best compensatory strategies. Likewise, through studies, social networks improve many of people’s brain stimuli, so that they increase memory and their learning ability.
Similarly, the proper use of networks has also been associated with the reinforcement of emotional relationships, business growth, health education, promotion, advertising, among other aspects. The same and specific cause a giant impact on people’s daily life, affecting them of different ways. Therefore, it is concluded that social networks translate into a double -edged sword, since they can be very useful and beneficial but at the same time harmful affected by each use and type. In such a way, so that it includes networks in an important way in today’s society, it is essential to segment their disadvantages through the body of this text.
One of the most important and notorious problems that social networks have, is their influence on the identity of an individual. It is known that identity is a fundamental factor in the formation of people’s personality refers, therefore, the same impact affects how the individual develops in his environment and in the definition we have of himself. It is at such a point that social networks influence to favor or hinder the construction of their identity, for example, one of the favoring aspects is the contribution of interpersonal and intrapersonal experiences that networks can offer to the individual, which can enrich iteducational, sentimental, motivational, etc.
However, it can also generate affective distancing and the environment quite important, becoming the individual unable to socialize face to face and palpably, thus disqualifying their personal identification process. In this way, when the networks have a negative networks, they cause a chain of problems related to depression, attentional deficit syndrome with hyperactivity, insomnia, decrease in total sleep hours, decrease in academic performance, school abandonment and psychosocial problems. Likewise, in those individuals addicted to this virtual world, failures in decision making and evaluation have been detected, as well as failures in cognitive learning processes and personality development, as we implied in theprevious paragraph.
Basically, just having a social network profile is exposed in a desired way or there are not many virtual means of violence. It could be said that social networks have such a significant impact that they are even important of inappropriate behaviors in individuals, and also, being a simple means that lends itself to the falsification of identity, scams, deceptions, exhibitionism and aggressiveness. One of those types of aggressiveness or violence is what is known as "cyber abuse" which consists of using media such as social networks to exercise or favor violence on one or a group of specific people. This type of abuse, in some cases it can be a ‘complement’ of the abuse already done in person. Which can be easily identified by publishing images, videos, memes or private data that can harm or embarrass someone. When networks are used inappropriately, the individual in the same way can suffer certain consequences by misuse of them. For example, not correctly adapting its privacy and the type of information you share in your profiles can become victims of ‘grooming’ which are a group of tactics that the aggressor uses to gain the victim’s trust through thenetworks and blackmail it, in order to sexually abuse the individual.
Likewise, excessive use of social networks can cause the loss of psychological control by the user, and also, develop a strong dependence on the point of not being able to be or a few minutes disconnected, which translates into “Cyberaddiction" . One of the most important consequences today. Then, some of the cases that support all these arguments are for example;The case of Romina Perrone, a 10 -year -old Argentine student who had to suffer a classmate, Cleopatra Loyacono, created a group on Facebook giving reasons to hate her, called ‘3 reasons to hate Romina Perrone’. We also find the case of Fatima Andrade, a Venezuelan woman who almost becomes victims of fraud trying to find chemotherapy medications for her husband through social networks. And as a last example, we find the case of anonymity of a young Spanish adult, who due to his addiction to social networks and the Internet losing any ability to relate to his environment in a palpable way.
The voice has been made then, that social networks currently have an important role for society, people who have established a link with them and their way of using, so users are psychologically affected in great way. Although these media provide positive things for society also provide a series of negative things. So social networks can be translated into a double -edged sword: they are useful but also harmful to us.
In this way, we conclude thanks to some of the specific cases and other factors, that social networks have such a positive impact on today’s society. The excessive use of them could negatively influence the life of its users, the abuse of social networks has demonstrated an association with problems of social interaction, depression, cyber addiction, attention deficit, sexual violence, cyber abuse, scamand identity theft. However, the proper and controlled use of networks has determined that they can be useful in many aspects such as entertainment, learning opportunities, socialization, creativity, skill development, low cost advertising, entrepreneurship, distance communication, Among other functions.
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