Essay on Real World Human Interaction: Essential for Well-Being Beyond Social Media

In today's world, many people rely on social media platforms such as Facebook to find and connect. While each has its benefits, real-world human interaction can never be a replacement for social media platforms such as Facebook. It requires in-person interaction with other people to trigger hormones that make people happy and alleviate stress, healthier, and more positive. Ironically for such a platform designed to bring people close together, spending more time on such platforms makes people feel more isolated and lonely, and this results in mental health problems such as depression.

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Profiles on Facebook are abundant in social comparison information that users use to convey mainly positive self-portrayals. Therefore, social networking sites such as Facebook provide a fertile basis for envy, which has a potentially harmful effect on the wellbeing and depression of Facebook users. Jealousy and social comparison mediate an association that is positive between unwanted affective outcomes such as depression and Facebook use. Facebook has developed into a ubiquitous networking platform today, especially among young adults and adolescents, significantly changing the way of interaction and communication. Social interactions such as face to face communications enhance the wellbeing of individuals as compared to online social interactions. Among the benefits of strong social ties build from social interaction include, lower risk of mortality and morbidity from a wide range of causes, lower probability of adverse health behaviors, a higher likelihood of positive health behaviors and lower risk of mental illnesses such as depression (Mai-Ly, Wickham and Acitelli, 702). Facebook may, at times, make you feel inadequate as you scroll through the posts because your friends always seem to look cute in fancy clothes, eating something elegant and traveling somewhere cool while you try not to envy them. A communication theorist composed the phrasing; the medium is the message, that encourages people to recognize mediums visible properties as well as to be aware of how the chosen media influence culture.

Important technology advances such as Facebook may redefine human interactions because they can become extensions of the individuals using them. Interpersonal relationships can be changed profoundly for better or for worse through technological media that has the authority to organize societies. Technology provides people with the tools of creating a global village, fundamentally altering the dynamics of people's interaction. Facebook use is tied to positive effects such as ego needs fulfillment, greater subjective wellbeing, and relationships of higher quality to those in romantic relationships. However, such cyber exchanges to some individuals may be more dystopian than utopian (Mai-Ly, Wickham and Acitelli, 702). Depressive symptoms across older adults, as well as young people, are associated with an excessive degree of internet exposure. Individuals who befriend strangers and those who spend more time on Facebook are more likely to believe that others have better lives. Moreover, individuals who possess an account on Facebook perceive that life is unfair and other individuals are happier. Finally, individuals tend to underrate the emotions of other individuals, which at times paves the way for emotional pluralistic ignorance that compounds feelings of isolation and loneliness by failing to recognize the internal strengths of other individuals. Also, individuals portray themselves happier than they are, and the perceptions of Facebook friends are likely to be distorted.

More significant depressive symptomology is caused by increased social comparisons among users stemming from spending time on Facebook. Social comparisons arise when people compare themselves with other Facebook friends on attributes and abilities they deem essential. The notion of seeing oneself inferior while making social comparisons upward with others is associated with adverse health outcomes such as lower self-esteem, negative self-evaluations, and more significant depressive symptoms (Mai-Ly, Wickham, and Acitelli, 703). Conversely, seeing oneself as superior or better than others when making downward social comparisons bring about positive health outcomes including, positive self-esteem, less anxiety, and a greater positive effect. On the contrary, downward social comparison is mostly used by an individual with low self-esteem to boost their self-worth, but after doing so, they end up feeling even worse. Therefore, frequent engagement in social comparisons of any kind on Facebook can be harmful to the mental wellbeing of an individual.

An increase in digital media use, such as Facebook, has been concurrent with improvements in depression among the users. Increased use of Facebook through several mechanisms such as interference with sleep, online information about self-harm, cyberbullying, and disruption and displacement of in-person social interactions may influence the mental health of individuals. Many people experience cyberbullying as Facebook use is becoming the norm, and more people are becoming vulnerable for many hours to cyberbullying. Suicidal attempts and ideation are significant risk factors arising from cyberbullying and is a crucial link between mental health and Facebook use. Online environments may become more uncivil faster as compared to in-person settings. Facebook provides an impression of anonymity, which might cause aggressive and incivility behavior is known as the online disinhibition effect (Twenge, 5). Also, Facebook may foster unhealthy amounts of social comparison, such as body image concerns that cause users to feel as if they do not measure the lives of other users. Users may also have instant access to information such as suicide techniques and self-harm that may fuel contagion behaviors.

Time spent on Facebook may displace sleep time as individuals tend to sleep less or also increase sleep quality and sleep latency because devices emit blue light that suppresses the production of melatonin. Poor and shortened sleep are among the risk factors of mental health issues, especially depression. Browsing on social networks such as Facebook decreases pleasant interactions and lessens the enjoyment of activities among people (Twenge, 4). Negative emotions also arise when one's interaction partner scroll through social networks while communicating. Thus, Facebook use can interfere directly with the achievements of in-person interactions when it occurs.

An individual has an innate desire to compare themselves to others socially as a way to evaluate one's abilities, and opinions and people tend to select people to compare themselves with based on perceived similarity. Self-relevant concepts and issues are the ways through which people tend to compare themselves with their friends and peers. Facebook allows individuals to exhibit themselves by creating online profiles with images and life events projected for sharing with other registered users as their Facebook friends (Pera, 2). Casual drivers of depression, such as the higher number of Facebook friends and the longer time spent inspecting posts, increase exposure to Facebook users. Facebook enhances effortless impression management and supply of high comparison criteria.

According to BBC, with Facebook, it all about self-image, who's watching them, whose liking them, who clicked their picture, and everything can change to something negative, and Facebook users are exposed day after day to that which is not suitable for them. Magazines for women and their use of photoshopped and underweight models have been long maligned for causing issues of self-esteem, especially in young women. But now, with lighting, filters, and clever angles on social media sites such as Facebook is taking over as a common concern in some campaigning charities and groups. Social media sites such as Facebook is making more than half of its users feel inadequate as it makes them feel unattractive. Viewing people's selfies lowers self-esteem caused by users comparing themselves to other people's photos looking at their happiest. Also, women tend to compare themselves negatively to other women's selfies. Besides, it's not only selfies that have the potential to dent self-esteem because women reported that the longer they spent time on Facebook, they felt less confident and less happy. Loss of self-esteem, particularly in women when negatively trying to compare themselves with artfully curated images of other women. The latter appear to be thinner, prettier, more prosperous, and more popular. According to the BBC, many women become bombarded when their friends post perfect pictures or following influencers and celebrities who are doing lots of photoshopping and possess hair and makeup teams. If that's normal, their self-confidence is likely to be down. Posts of perfect images may make other people feel inadequate, and it's unhealthy even to those appearing successful. People spend more time on Facebook trying to post what appears to be a perfect life according to their views on how the world sees because they are worried their friends will not accept them. When users compare their experiences with others, who seem to have happy relationships and more successful careers, a feeling that their lives are less successful in comparison may arise. The more time people spend on Facebook, the worse they feel, later on, resulting in declined life satisfaction over time. Scrolling through Facebook can interfere with interactions, especially when people are talking about something meaningful. Thus, scrolling through Facebook in eyeshot when making conversations have less favorable outcomes to individuals when recalling their interactions afterward, have conversations that are less meaningful and causes weaker relationships between partners. Social media sites such as Facebook create jealousy and enhanced concerns about the quality of one's relationship, and as a result, many relationships are ended as partners strive to find better ones. People who spend the most time using Facebook are more likely to report experiences of social isolation, which can include a lack of sense of engagement with others, social belonging, and fulfilling relationships. Spending more time on social media, including Facebook, could replace face to face interactions and also create a feeling of exclusion to people.

Conclusion

More frequent usage of Facebook, defined as emotional connectedness an individual possesses towards Facebook, is associated with higher levels of loneliness that may otherwise lead to depression. Life satisfaction from both intensive and addicted users differ substantially in levels of self-esteem, and the addition of Facebook usage result in negative impacts on life satisfaction. Things that cause envy among Facebook users, such as how well an acquaintance is performing financially and how happy old and new friends are in their relationship, can lead to depression. Platforms such as Facebook that are on the rise in popularity primarily focuses on the physical appearance of people and are contributing to a generation with body confidence and body image issues (Pera, 3). Also, there is a failure to protect the distribution of content online to young people, specifically harm related information that may increase suicide levels. Non-users of Facebook do not differ from Facebook users in most personality traits because the internet somehow makes them feel alienated. The more time people spend browsing on Facebook; the more envious people feel as compared to when people create and actively engage with content. Also, learning about the victories of others hits harder as like-minded peers resemble each other on Facebook. Besides, using the network is associated with addictions that come along with an aching impr...