Do you have an addiction you don't know about? Many people may have this addiction, and they may not even see it. Social media is something that can not only be an addiction, but can cause problems in everyday life. Even though social media addiction isn't clinically diagnosed, it is definitely real and can cause problems in your life. Over the past few years, social media use has gone up in crazy amounts, and because of this, social media has become more of a social norm and people are becoming more and more reliant on it.
Social media addiction isn't clinically diagnosed, but it is definitely an issue. According to netaddiction.com, “Social media addiction not a formal clinical diagnosis, it is fair to say that many people spend far too much time on social media and may at the very least describe themselves as being “obsessed”, if not addicted.” This shows how social media addiction is definitely a widespread issue. So let me get personal with you, when I had a phone, I used to always be on instagram, snapchat, facebook, you name it. I was on it constantly, and I would constantly look down at my phone even when I cross the road. There has been a few instances where I almost got hit by a car because of it. Also, whenever you go out in public, what do you see when you observe what people are doing in their free time on the bus, at school, at work? They are always on their social media doing useless things.
Social media use has been going through the roof in the recent years, and it is probably not a good thing for this new generation. For example, according to pewinternet.org, “65% of adults now use social networking sites- a nearly tenfold jump in the past decade” and this article was referring to the time frame of 2005 to 2015, which is semi recent, but isn't as big as the number currently may be. Whenever I go out in public, I almost always see someone on their phone using social media. It is a 100% guarantee you will see it. For example, this morning I went to the bank with my dad, and almost everyone waiting in line was using snapchat, instagram, or some form of texting. Social media usage has definitely been on the rise, and is actually sort of scary how glued people are to social media, its almost as if they aren't living real life.
If you don't see it, more and more people are becoming socially reliant on social media. People are definitely becoming socially reliant on social media, for example, when I used to go to public school, my friends would always have to check their social media in class in order to “fit in” and it just became a social norm amongst us. Honestly, when I used to use social media a bunch, I couldn't control myself. I used it to try to find new friends and talk to people I didn't know, and I got more and more addicted to it. I felt reliant of social media to fulfill my social interaction needs. Nowadays, the first thing people do when they wake up is check their social media.
In conclusion, I firmly believe that social media can definitely become an addiction and can cause problems for people in real life, even though social media addiction isn't a clinically diagnosed issue, it is definitely a real thing. And the use of social media has been going through the roof over these recent years and people have become more and more socially reliant on it to the point where its unhealthy. I don't think it's fair to say to everyone to stop using social media, but I think people should give it a break. Perhaps leaving their phone at home every so often and go out for a walk, or not open your phone unless you feel the real need to. Give the social media a break, and interact with real life family and friends.
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