When the clock strikes 6:30 am, Katie wakes up and reaches for her phone. She opens her Instagram and scrolls through her feed.
After an hour of mindless scrolling, she gets up and gets dressed, only to find that her jeans aren’t zipping up. She stands there, looking in the mirror, and thinks back to her Instagram feed, filled with photos of girls with small waists and flat stomachs.
When her mom offers her breakfast, she declines and begins to put on makeup. She looks at her skin and bursts into tears. The beauty standard set by social media is overwhelming and feels impossible to meet.
She decides to take a mental health day because the thought of attending school is daunting.
“Every time I open my phone and scroll through social media, I feel like shit. Online… it looks like everyone’s life is perfect and I constantly wish I could have that,” Katie said.
High school freshman Katie isn’t the only girl who struggles with feeling insecure after scrolling through social media. According to dosomething.org, 95% of teens are on social media and 37% have been bullied online.
Social media is a growing issue, with kids getting bullied and addicted to scrolling. Teenagers have begun to transition away from in-person conversation. Many teens would prefer to play an online game with a friend rather than connect face to face.
OVS recognized this issue and hired Robert Brunelle as a guidance counselor to support students’ mental health. Mr. Brunelle’s door is always open for students to come and talk about their feelings. He views social media as a distraction, but also as a tool. Mr. Brunelle has a lot of students coming in with anxiety due to social media.
“Kids are growing up in a fast-paced world with social media. We expect questions and answers and that’s not always been the case,” said Mr. Brunelle
Social media provides an alternative approach to in-person conversations. Teens often use social media as a distraction to avoid having real conversations where problems are resolved, resulting in a lack of social communication skills.
“I think social media becomes an avoidance of things, which means we aren’t practicing the skills to change [them],” said Mr. Brunelle. “Unless you learn skills to actually talk to that person… it’s not going to change what’s going on. So I think it makes it easier to avoid problems.”
Social media provides easy access to dopamine that stimulates your brain and provides pleasure.
“Everyone in high school – their brain currently has an emphasis on seeking pleasure, attention, and emotions that are in the moment,” said Mr. Brunelle. He explained that social media prevents the prefrontal cortex from developing properly.
Sophomore Sarah got social media later than a lot of her friends due to her parents being hesitant to send their daughter into an online world full of hate. Many parents are hesitant to give their kids access to social media, believing they will be bullied or become addicted.
Apple has a feature called “screentime” which allows parents to set a specific amount of time their child can access a specific application. Sarah, like many others her age, has a screen time limit, only allowing her to be on each social media application for 3 hours a day.
“My parents have always been skeptical about social media, and often as a punishment take it away,” she said. “I feel like they don’t understand that I don’t only use it for entertainment, but also to connect with my friends.”
Many teens use social media to connect with friends and family. Sarah believes people have forgotten the positive parts of social media.
“I love hyping my friends up on their posts,” said Sarah. “People are so obsessed with the negative side of social media that they forget about the good side.”
Like Sarah, sophomore Maria views social media as a tool to connect with friends.
“I attend a boarding school… and social media helps me keep in contact with my friends from back home,” she said. “Simply snapping pictures back and forth gives me a small glimpse of life at home.”
Maria’s parents, similarly to Sarah’s, were hesitant about allowing their young daughter to have access to social media and they monitor her accounts.
Many teens often stress out about the number of likes and reposts they get on a post, seeking validation, and compare themselves to others. Katie struggles with this and often has anxiety about posting.
“Sometimes when my post doesn’t get enough likes I think to myself is it because of how I look,” she said. “I think body image is a struggle for a lot of teen girls and social media combined with Photoshop makes an impossible standard,” said Katie.
Many teens receive hateful comments and negative backlash from posting.
“There’s been multiple instances in which I have received a hate comment or heard people making fun of my social media and it has genuinely hurt me,” said Katie. “I swear that if you don’t have a perfect hourglass body, a good nose, straight teeth, and importantly, a flat stomach, you are seen as less than. Kids often care more about looks than personality and those standards are hard to fit.”
Mr. Brunelle believes many teens don’t use social media the right way, making unhealthy comparisons.
“For a healthy comparison we would say ‘I admire this person and how can I maybe do some of the things they are doing because I want to get where they are.’” explained Mr. Brunelle. “You can’t just get the product without going through the process, which often is shown.”
While social media can be used as a reference, you can’t believe everything you see on the internet and doing additional research is often necessary.
However, some teens recognize that people’s lives and appearances on social media often are fake or edited.
“Everyone’s lives look perfect on social media but it’s fake. Obviously, no one’s going to post something they feel ugly in,” said Maria.
Although social media apps allow for communication between friends, they are undoubtedly affecting the communication skills, mental health, and body image of young girls.