How Instagram is Impacting the Minds of Adolescents in Today's Digital Age
The purpose of this guide is to explore Instagram's affects on the teenage mind. It will include aspects about brain development, cognitive functions, behavior, mental health, and other related issues.
The research thesis of this guide is to examine how Instagram's negative influence on teenagers' brain development and cognitive functions has detrimentally impacted their mental health by distorting body image, promoting self-esteem issues, and increasing levels of anxiety and depression.
The research questions addressed in this guide are:
In a digital era where social media heavily influences the lives of adolescents, there have been multiple studies done on how it affects mental health and behavior. However, despite the widespread usage of Instagram, there is still limited information on how it affects the teenage mind in a critical developmental period. This research paper aimed to investigate the harm Instagram may cause to adolescents, specifically in areas such as brain and cognitive development, body image, self-esteem, anxiety, and depression. The methodology used was a wide search of the published works in SVC databases, scholarly journals from the National Library of Medicine, the Pew Research Center, scholars' archives from universities, and credible health websites. 14 sources were compiled and annotated. The results and concluding paper indicated that there was a significant connection between high Instagram usage and increased mental health problems among teenagers. Many teenagers who used this app reported negative impacts on their body image and self-esteem, likely due to the idealized nature of the platform. The research also suggested effects on brain development and cognitive functions, such as decreased attention span, addictive behaviors, and stunted growth in the prefrontal cortex. These findings emphasize the need to develop possible strategies to reduce these impacts on adolescents' minds.
Instagram is a popular social media platform in today's digital age. It's escalation came along with the recent rise of social media over the past decade. This is due to many variables like advancing technology and COVID-19. This has allowed for Instagram's user base to grow, particularly among its younger demographics. Many adolescents use this platform on a daily basis because of its extremely addictive nature. It's extensive influence in teenagers lives is constantly impacting their brain development, cognitive functions, and their mental health. Issues associated with over-usage of Instagram among adolescents include issues with self-esteem, body image, and increasing levels of stress, anxiety, and depression. Many groups play a role in the whole social media debacle. This includes teenagers, parents, educators, social media companies, and mental health professionals. It should be a common goal amongst each other to address and mitigate these negative impacts for the sake of adolescents today.
Image:
The image below is from the FHE Health website. It is important because it gives valuable data about social media's negative impacts on society. The percentages are helpful to understand how Instagram affects deception in the online space, self-esteem, and interpersonal relationships.
Source Citation:
Foy, Chris. “The Rise of Social Media Correlation with Mental Illness.” FHE Health, FHE Health, 23 Nov. 2018, fherehab.com/learning/increase-social-media-mental-illness/.
Video:
The video below presents ideas around the influence and impact of social media on the lives of adolescents. Kelly Troczynski, a former student at Oak Knoll School, explains how constant exposure to edited content and pressure to present a perfect online persona can affect self-esteem and mental health. This resource is important to the topic because it provides a connection between social media (Instagram) and affected self-image and mental health.
Source Citation:
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