Applications of Psychology: Social Media, Self-Esteem, and Adolescents

This essay examines the intricate relationship between adolescent self-esteem and their engagement with social media. It explores how the constant exposure to curated online content and the pursuit of social validation can impact the development of self-identity, self-concept, and overall mental well-being. The essay delves into the psychological motivations behind adolescent social media usage, including the desire for peer acceptance and the construction of online identities. It also discusses the potential for both positive and negative influences, such as the formation of online communities and the risk of addiction, anxiety, and depression. The essay analyzes the impact of social media on the four types of identity statuses, and provides references to the latest research to support its arguments.

The relationship between adolescents
development of self-esteem and their addicting
social media usage
Applications of Psychology
Task 2 Essay
Afra Afra
55671960/28048287

When we look around our surroundings, we always notice 9 out of 10 teenagers
holding their technological devices such as their phones and laptops while browsing through
different social media, always surfing the internet or using Instagram to capture an iconic
scenery. In reality we all know and feel that those who put priority in social media, usually
are the ones who feel the least happiest no matter what we see on their social media
profiles. Adolescence tend to post about their lives or daily activities to portray about their so
called ‘perfect ‘lives but what type of self-image are we actually developing? Or is the
adolescence portraying a false image on social media to make themselves feel better? Even
though social media has a lot of its great influences on the lives of us adolescences, but the
negative effects could affect our self-identity development in various of different ways.
Before we move onto the relationships between social media and the self-identity of
adolescents, we first need to understand why they use such internet communities. As
advances in technology continue to evolve, it has become more readily accessible to the
public to access technologies that link one to social media. Most teenagers who are in
different social groups say that using internet media devices is very important for them to
strive in those social groups, there can be a lot of harmful effects on the self-identity
development as well as their self-esteem due to the heavy unnecessary use of internet.
These Social networking sites that adolescents these days use called Instagram and
Facebook serve as gatekeepers for harboring online inter-user relations. The most important
type of communication is meeting and socializing in person contact but it has now not
become that essential as nowadays a lot of us adolescents are able to get information or any
type of data to reach a lot of people on these social networking sites through just one tap of
a button. These social networking sites leads to a lot of devastating psychological effects if
they are all used to creating a fake sense of self identity, having a completely different
mindset about how communication and interactions are viewed and even creating
psychological reactions that are not positive to these type of communication methods.
According to a general article, Majority of adolescent’s respondents nowadays mentioned
that they would rather send one text message a day to their peers rather than meeting in
person while the very small minority of the respondents mentioned that they were still having
face to face connection with their peers. Straightforward interaction is no longer viewed by
adolescents to be the most popular way of connection, especially among adolescents as
they don’t view in real life contact as we once did.

The relationship between online networking is an important factor in improving the
adolescents' self-identity. Digital communication and exchanging of knowledge and ideas
helps young people to have a clear understanding of who they are. According to an
international study on internet use among adolescents, internet communication as an
adolescent experience and as a link with the social group community is significant in the
creation of adolescents' self-identity. Online networking and interaction is becoming more
frequent because of the development of the technology. Hong Kong as a developed city has
become one of the places in the globe when compared to the other Asian region, the
amount of internet use is huge. The messages from others and the post on the social media
may be a tool during the online contact to influence the identity of who adolescents really
are. Online information material directly influences how they perceive themselves, and how
they understand each other. However, another research indicated that exchanging opinions
online could lead to depression due to confusion of identity. (Vernuccio, Pagani, Barbarossa,
& Pastore, 2015) Teenage internet addiction in Hong Kong is serious. Various kinds of
information will be known due to the flow of opinions and information online. There is more
perceiving form of identification. Teenagers may be confused about who they really are,
particularly their position in the group. Confusion of identity leads to mental distress in the
future so that It has a negative impact on their perceptions, emotions and behaviour. They
can also feel nervous and depressed. It is no doubt a big component of the growth of self-
identity. If teenagers aged between 12 and 14 years communicate online, the impact of the
formulation and creation of their identity is greater
Another main factor to adolescence is their self-esteem, A great emotional well-being can
lead to a very positive and effective self-esteem. We need to understand that one small
Decision could have a great effect on their mental health. The major ones from this group of
people is similar to self-concept which is the acceptance from peers, they would love to feel
included in popular friends group. For example, A new school student in a private expensive
school would feel the need to post about their lavish lives on Instagram and show to his
peers that he or she has bought a lot of designer items in order I to feel accepted by the
peers and not feel left out.
Therefore, the use of online interaction lower the development of the self-concept and the
esteem of the adolescents. According to an international journal, online communication
makes conception of the self of teenagers aged fifteen to eighteen indistinct due to
inconsistent online information.

The world of social networking does have some positive aspects. For example, some teens
and young adults from social media outlets such as Instagram and YouTube became
popular online. The web-famous teens are trying to build a good self-image and demonstrate
to our generation that perfection does not matter. Many of the popular teens often say, "be
yourself." Some of these teens encourage others to be confident and have helped them
figure out who they really are through their peers' encouragement who want to accept
themselves.
Although Social media may have a lot of benefits to the developments of self-identity, every
pro come with its great cons. Social media creates an atmosphere in which disordered
thoughts and actions flourish. Adolescents are continually exposed to having this "perfect
picture" of who they ought to be, all made accessible via social media. When they cannot get
to be the "perfect picture," they feel that they are not good enough for others or oneself.
This relentless access to social networking "perfection" impacts the self-identity, self-esteem
and can even cause depression for an adolescent. Adolescents who choose these so-called
objectives may be forced into being uncertain who they really are whom they want to be.
Another disadvantage is the addiction that an adolescent may have to these social media
sites. It may cause adolescents to have anxiety, sleep problems and struggle to work in the
real world.
Taking on the things that cause adolescents to feel this way is crucial and this involves
getting the support that they need. The adolescents have the ability to stop using social
networks or take a pause from it if it brings damage to them, the adolescents have the option
to continue to use it and figure out how to make it work.
On the whole, social media has both positive and negative consequences to the self-esteem
and wellbeing of adolescents; it is up to our future generations not to let them take over.
Social media robs adolescents of who they are, and it is up to adolescents to change their
beliefs and what they perceive.

We all know about the 4 types of identity status being identity diffusion, moratorium, identity
foreclosure and identity achievement and how important is it to the development of
adolescence identity.
Firstly, when it comes to social media leaving a bad effect, most adolescents fall in the
category of identity diffusion and identity foreclosure and you may ask why? To start off,
identity diffusion describes the adolescents who have not explored or has committed to any
specific type of identity so that they represent a very low level of exploration and
commitment while they haven’t really established any life goals so they usually react very
passive or a term to describe those type of adolescents are ‘ floating through lives and
dealing with any issues slowly when it arises’ It isn’t necessarily bad but in cases when you
develop to a young adult It could be very detrimental. On the other hand, identity foreclosure
adolescents are not actively trying to find what is important to them and that they do not
question any beliefs, but they will always accept anything assigned to them. How social
media may have affected adolescents that have these types of identity status? When
influencers of the social media apps post about their lavish happy lives, adolescents feel that
they would never succeed like them as their lives are completely different so due to that,
they lost the self-motivation to achieve anything for themselves and would dwell on it.
Also, social media comes to good hand when it comes to both identity achievement and
moratorium. It affects Moratorium as they have learnt to keep their options open instead of
just accepting everything that is given to them and that they are willing to learn more and
more about other cultures or even societies. While Identity achievement being similar where
they have decided with a complete open mind what their goals and achievements are and
what is important to them. Information on social Media is very diverse. There are opinions
and emotions of people from all different kind of background. When we are invested in a
background or we follow an influencer on the social media apps, we always pay attention to
what they have achieved, their advices, their decisions and how they have impacted
everyone around them. We adolescence aspire to be as motivated and aspirational with high
goals like those social media influencers we see on the internet. So therefore, we follow the
same way and set the same type of goals as them.
All in all, adolescents should pay close attention to the decisions they make and that there
could be a lot of disadvantages which are cause by social media due to the reasons of
adolescents trying to follow the standards reflected on social networking sites, individuals
may tend to undermine their unique features and leave no room for genuine happiness.

References:
Brown, Cecilia. 3 May 2013. “Are We Becoming More Socially Awkward? An Analysis of the
Relationship Between Technological Communication Use and Social Skills in College
Students.” Connecticut College
Vernuccio, M., Pagani, M., Barbarossa, C., & Pastore, A. (2015). Antecedents of brand love
in online network-based communities. A social identity perspective. The Journal of Product
and Brand Management, 24(7), 706-719. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1108/JPBM-12-2014-0772
Barker, V. (2009) Older adolescents’ motivations for social network site use: the influence of
gender, group identify, and collective self-esteem.
Leung, L. (2008) Linking psychological attributes to addiction and Improper use of the mobile
phone among adolescents in Hong Kong. J. Child. Media,
Chang, M.K. and Law, S.P.M. (2008) Factor structure for young’s Internet addiction test