The Impact of Social Media on Adolescent Brain Development

Almost 2 billion individuals use social networking sites on a regular basis, making it a global phenomenon. To escape from daily life and engage with others, users may create virtual lives on social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Google, MySpace, YouTube, LinkedIn, Pinterest, WhatsApp, Snapchat, LINE, Pinterest, LinkedIn, Telegram, TikTok, and many more platforms. It is evident how social media has affected many facets of contemporary culture. However, the impact it could have on the composition and operation of our brains is still a major area of research. 

Image 1: A broad overview of global social media usage

Addiction

Social media addiction and internet addiction (IA), which are defined as excessive or poorly controlled preoccupations, urges, or behaviours associated with social media and Internet use that cause impairment or distress, are on the rise globally, especially among adolescents and young adults. These disorders cause major changes in people's lives and frequently impact their biopsychosocial health.

The main worry is the harm that social media does to people, particularly when it comes to addiction. According to our understanding, obsessive usage of social media platforms is accompanied with behavioural addiction symptoms. Salience, tolerance, conflict, withdrawal, relapse, and mood management are some of the symptoms. The legitimacy of social media addiction is still up for debate, despite the fact that withdrawal, negative consequences, and preoccupation are all clear indicators of addiction, according to research on the subject.

Effect on Cognitive Control Mechanisms

Through the various cognitive processes involved in information processing, attention, working memory, organised search, internal models, flexibility of thought and action, and other cognitive processes, cognitive control mechanisms enable an individual to encode information, choose the most appropriate response, and inhibit less appropriate ones to environmental requirements. 

The link between cognitive control and the reward system/executive control system is well supported by empirical data. In particular, functional changes in the prefrontal cortex, extended amygdala, and basal ganglia are crucial for the initiation, progression, and maintenance of addiction. These alterations may (i) make incentives more salient; (ii) lessen the sensitivity of brain systems that experience pleasure or reward; and (iii) impair the performance of executive control brain systems, which are involved in decision-making and the regulation of one's behaviour, emotions, and impulses. 

Interactions between situational and personal factors result in mood swings that prompt people to prioritise short-term gains and take risks. Therefore, it has been discovered that Internet addiction is linked to changes in the prefrontal cortex that result in a diminished inhibitory control that influences decision-making and an increased salience of stimuli.  Cognitive control capacity is influenced by both executive and emotional processes, as evidenced by the fronto-striatal circuit imbalance linked to Internet addiction.

Effect on Attention Span

The quick, fragmented nature of social media information has been the subject of a lot of research, but it's also critical to look at how this steady stream of stimuli may eventually alter cognitive processes. The constant onslaught of information from the internet may force the brain to rewire itself to value speed over depth, making it harder to do jobs that call for prolonged concentration. This theory contradicts conventional wisdom about how attention works by arguing that the changing concentration needed for short-form media may make it harder for humans to focus on more complex activities that require longer, continuous attention.

Furthermore, research has shown that multitasking may further impair attention span, particularly when paired with media intake. It becomes more difficult to focus on a single job when one is constantly switching between platforms, from Facebook to Instagram, and from videos to memes. This is particularly noticeable in contexts such as classrooms, where students may be distracted by various media while attempting to focus on reading or homework. Researchers stress that multitasking with media impairs cognitive control, which may lower productivity and make it harder to engage deeply with complicated activities.

Image 2: Diminishing attention span in humans

Conclusion

Social media is getting better at grabbing our attention as digital technologies become more and more ingrained in daily life. This is causing a global change in how people engage with each other and obtain information. The ways in which the Internet is affecting our brains and cognitive processes, especially in relation to: a) the multifaceted stream of incoming information that encourages us to engage in "multi-tasking" and attentional-switching instead of sustained focus; b) the speed at which we can access online factual information surpasses the capabilities of previous transactive systems and possibly even internal memory processes; and c) the online social world parallels "real world" cognitive processes and becomes entangled with our offline sociality, suggesting that the unique characteristics of social media may have unanticipated effects on "real life."

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