by Pedro Teixeira

Social media can be both a wonderful and a terrible thing. Once you get access to the web, a whole new world of possibilities can and will be created. This could go smoothly or backfire. Either way, it will probably have some sort of impact on the child’s life.

A recent study done in Britain shows that “(…) spending one hour a day chatting on social networks reduced the probability of a kid being completely satisfied with his or her life overall by about 14 percentage points.”. But why does this happen?

The Internet is a hideaway for introvert kids who find it hard to keep up with a world where everything seems to be happening so fast and everyone else appears to have no problem at all socializing. The anonymity that the Internet world provides allows people to be whoever they desire and to hide their insecurities and fears, thus becoming a lot easier to make friends online. It is also a lot easier to find people with similar interests to yours, especially for those who don’t conform to society norms and aren’t interested in appealing to a hegemonic ideology. And there’s so much you can do – so much, that the real world might start to pale in comparison.

On the other hand, anonymity also has a dark side. It could bring out the worst in some people as it gives them the false impression that they can do whatever they please without having consequences. The Internet could go from the safe-space that they originally intended it to be to an anxiety-filled hell in an instant. Cyber-bullying is real and it’s hard to escape it. They say that “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words could never harm me”, but is that really true? Words are powerful weapons and they might hurt youngsters, who are still growing, still trying to build self-confidence and still trying to figure out the world around them. In this situation, how are they supposed to react? There is no doubt that their everyday lives will be affected and they might stop themselves from doing other activities that they love and that would bring them joy.

Happiness is key. Children should be enjoying life to the fullest without having to worry too much about other things while they are still able to and it’s important to pay attention to how they are feeling. As with everything that we encounter on our journey, there is always a good and a bad side. But the bad side shouldn’t stop us from enjoying the good one. Kids may take advantage of all the positive things the Internet has to offer and parents can choose to accompany them and tell them to turn it off at the slightest sign of aggression. They can always go back the next day.

Source