It seems that in today’s world, many people seem to turn to technology and social media as opposed to simply talking to another person. We seem completely obsessed with technology and rely on it to keep ourselves entertained or stay connected with others. And for the most part, social media does a good job of doing these things for us. But could it also be a bad thing and lead to more negative consequences than positive consequences?
The article “Saving the Self in the Age of the Selfie” by James McWilliams discusses the negative consequences of being digitized as much as we have. He starts by talking about Paul Miller, a journalist who began to notice these negative consequences on his own. “His ability to read difficult studies or to follow intricate arguments demanding sustained attention was lagging. He found himself easily distracted and, worse, irritable about it. His longtime touchstone—his smartphone—was starting to annoy him, making him feel insecure and anxious rather than grounded in the ideas that formerly had nourished him.” (McWilliams). Miller also said that if he lost his phone, he’d feel like he could never catch up and his attention would just bounce all over the place. Our need to stay connected can cause us to lose focus and make us feel anxious all the time.
McWilliams also talked about a full-time college student named Erica and the compulsive need to check social media and stay connected. “The first thing she does when she wakes up in the morning is check her smartphone”, McWilliams says. “She checks texts that came in while she slept. Then she scans Facebook, Snapchat, Tumblr, Instagram, and Twitter to see “what everybody else is doing.” Throughout the day, she checks in with social media roughly every 10 minutes, even during class. “It’s a little overwhelming,” she says, “but you don’t want to feel left out.” Erica’s experiences can show us what social media can do to us mentally and her experiences are not just unique to her life.
This seems to be the case with many people these days. Everywhere you go, you always see others looking down at their phones, scrolling through social media pages, and checking on their own pages. While it is good that we are able to stay connected, and we are more globally connected than ever before, it is also stressing us out more and more as we get deeper and deeper into this digital age that we live in.