TIKTOK
During the pandemic, the use of technology and social media increased greatly. As the usage increased, it led to a social media app called TikTok to gain a lot of popularity. People all over the world during quarantine were using it to share their dances, opinions, and their skills in a short 15-30 second video. At first it seemed like TikTok had an overall positive effect for teens since this was a way to communicate and be entertained during the difficult times. Except that underneath all the positives there were many negative effects.
Mental health issues have been directly correlated to young individuals using TikTok for an excessive amount of time. It can cause increased anxiety and depression. On most social media posts, the things that are posted are just the highlight reel of their life. This is why when young people compare themselves to these photos, they are comparing to an unrealistic version of others their age. This will affect your mental health because this could make you feel that your life is not good enough and that can leave you feeling negatively. Over time a constant amount of unhealthy comparison can impact your mental health leaving you feeling overly anxious and in some serious cases depressed.
Comparison is a huge issue with social media. When people post, most people automatically compare themselves or something with that post. TikTok is a social media platform with short videos and this leads to having more things to compare with. Comparing can lead to body image issues, and their self-esteem dropping. These things then can lead to a more serious issue which is self-harm. This is not the fault of the platform or the people using it, it’s society that is continuing to normalize unhealthy comparison with others.
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TikTok is known to be one of the most addictive social media apps. With the infinite amount of videos and the satisfaction of scrolling through each one makes it very hard to stop. This is a problem because too much of something is never good.
Asian hate has got progressively worse over the course of the two years because of Covid-19. On TikTok it is very easy to spread misinformation and make others feel belittled because of their culture and ethnicity. This can make young people feel like they are not as important or that they don’t belong, which is not true. This can impact them for the rest of their lives.