Social Media Essay
Jordan Procter
Jennifer Browne
Essay #2
Social Media Destroying the brain
Social Media, one of the world’s greatest innovations, has molded the 21st century into one in which communication throughout the world is happening all day, every day. It’s has created an outlet for news to be spread at a blistering rate, taking only a certain number of characters and a click of a button to share. A power like this has taken the world by storm, causing people to devote countless hours and amounts of energy to keep up with the latest happenings. But this power has come at the expense of our mental health and production. Although social media has created an amazing outlet for us humans, it has also hurt us, most notably young adults, by shortening our attention span, deteriorating social interaction skills, and is changing the way we think. With the constant checking of different types of Social Media and websites, our ability to focus on one thing has almost become nonexistent. We are in the day and age of multi-tasking and a fast moving world, where spending your time trying to accomplish one thing at a time is viewed as inefficient and wasteful. Instead, we try to accomplish two or more things done at once, not letting a second go wasted. This has as much to do with Social Media and the presence of the Internet as anything else. In the piece “Is Google Making Us Stupid” by Nicholas Carr, he talks about how his constant Internet use has affected his attention span, most notably when reading. He states, “ Immersing myself in a book…used to be easy. Now my concentration often starts to drift after two or three pages. I get fidgety… I feel as if I’m always dragging my brain back to the text” (P.150) Also in the piece is a quote from Bruce Friedman, a pathologist working for The University of Michigan Medical School, who states, “ I Can’t read War and Peace anymore. I’ve almost lost the ability to absorb a longish article on the web or in print.” (p.152) The Web and
Jennifer Browne
Essay #2
Social Media Destroying the brain
Social Media, one of the world’s greatest innovations, has molded the 21st century into one in which communication throughout the world is happening all day, every day. It’s has created an outlet for news to be spread at a blistering rate, taking only a certain number of characters and a click of a button to share. A power like this has taken the world by storm, causing people to devote countless hours and amounts of energy to keep up with the latest happenings. But this power has come at the expense of our mental health and production. Although social media has created an amazing outlet for us humans, it has also hurt us, most notably young adults, by shortening our attention span, deteriorating social interaction skills, and is changing the way we think. With the constant checking of different types of Social Media and websites, our ability to focus on one thing has almost become nonexistent. We are in the day and age of multi-tasking and a fast moving world, where spending your time trying to accomplish one thing at a time is viewed as inefficient and wasteful. Instead, we try to accomplish two or more things done at once, not letting a second go wasted. This has as much to do with Social Media and the presence of the Internet as anything else. In the piece “Is Google Making Us Stupid” by Nicholas Carr, he talks about how his constant Internet use has affected his attention span, most notably when reading. He states, “ Immersing myself in a book…used to be easy. Now my concentration often starts to drift after two or three pages. I get fidgety… I feel as if I’m always dragging my brain back to the text” (P.150) Also in the piece is a quote from Bruce Friedman, a pathologist working for The University of Michigan Medical School, who states, “ I Can’t read War and Peace anymore. I’ve almost lost the ability to absorb a longish article on the web or in print.” (p.152) The Web and