Exploring the link between Social Media, Social Comparison, and Mental Health

'Nosedive' (Black Mirror Series 3, Episode 1), October 21, 2016

   

   Most recently I have been checking out the research of various organizations and institutions around the idea of social media and social comparison. Not to my surprise, there is emerging evidence that links social media and social comparison with mental health problems and how increased virtual opportunities to make virtual comparisons contribute to these problems. In other words, some of the psychological issues that we see broadcast across social media, and within our communities, are directly tied to folks comparing themselves to others on social media. According to one source, "Social media undoubtedly offers huge benefits for society by providing access and connection to people, services, information and opportunities that would previously not have been possible. However, evidence is growing, particularly in adolescent mental health, of an association between greater social media use and higher depressive and anxiety scores, poor sleep, low self-esteem and body image concerns." (Kelly et al, 2018; Royal Society for Public Health 2017). I mentioned that this is not surprising to me because I have witnessed this increase in mental health issues linked to social comparisons, especially during the 2020 Shutdown and Global Pandemic, and I have engaged it directly on multiple occasions. 

   Sean Parker, the former President of Facebook, once described the App as a "social-validation feedback loop." When people are coming from a place of low or vacant self-esteem, they don't know their value and often use social media to be acknowledged and seek approval. In the world of social media, getting a "LIKE", being liked, and receiving a comment is often enough for people who have low or vacant self-esteem. Thus, these social interactions, and the billions of potential social interactions, become a quantifiable measurement that folks use to determine their value. A value that they are sometimes financially rewarded for with sponsorships, product placement, brand ambassadorships, cross promotions, etc. by sharing the most vulgar, controversial, click-bait content. Think about the numerous people who became celebrities based on sex, violence, and other dysfunctional social media content. This is to say that people can become, and do become, anyone online and literally make a living for themselves. In my sixth-grade class a couple of years ago I had a quiet student who only wore black whom I will call Aiden. When I say quiet, I mean this dude may have spoken one sentence the entire school year. Aiden only nodded and gestured to basically communicate. One day a group of my students came excitedly into class sharing with me in confidence some information about Aiden that floored me. They told me to take out my cell phone and proceeded to show me Aiden's TikTok profile. This dude, posing as a Russian-based Influencer, had almost a half-a-million followers! Long gone are the days of selling youth the idea of going to college, getting a trade, doing manual labor, or going to the military as career choices. Why should they if they can become a celebrity making ASMR videos eating Takis?

  Biochemically speaking, the dopamine people get rewarded with from these social media interactions is a driving force that keeps them seeking validation. Dopamine is a type of 'feel-good' neurotransmitter that plays a role in many important body functions, including motivation and pleasurable reward. Produced in our brain, dopamine is a chemical messenger between our neurons; released when our brain is expecting a reward. On a psychological level, even the anticipation of certain activities associated with pleasure can raise our dopamine levels. Activities such as smelling food, anticipating sex, hearing about a promotion, getting a "LIKE", or receiving an encouraging comment on social media... High or low levels of dopamine are also associated with several mental health and neurological diseases. Having high levels of dopamine has been linked to a person being more aggressive, competitive, volatile, manic, and having poor impulse control. Having low levels of dopamine has been linked to a lack of motivation, apathy, moodiness, obesity, and depression. While all of these symptoms are visible in the everyday world, they are also visible across social media as evidenced by what people share, and how they react/respond to what other people share. What we may write off as people "trolling", being extra, smart-shaming, and soliciting for pity may be real biochemical imbalances. 

   For many, social media becomes a dopamine addiction. According to a Nursing.com article, "The number of hours worldwide internet users spend on social media is increasing and in 2018 averaged 136 minutes a day (Clement, 2019). Social media has been described as more addictive than cigarettes and alcohol (Royal Society for Public Health, 2017), but the nature of addiction is complex and the idea of it being more addictive may relate to the fact that it is available without restriction and is accessible and socially acceptable." In considering this growing social media use, that is often driven by a dopamine addiction, these social interactions amplify social comparisons. 

   Social comparison is defined as a form of sociological self-esteem, where people derive their sense of self through comparing themselves with others. These are comparisons that people make when they begin to measure themselves against unrealistic social media standards of financial success, beauty, health, family, happiness, intelligence, influence, and every other aspect of life that other social media users often LIE about. Comparisons that are virtually impossible to live up to that can impair a person's mental health. While social comparisons in our everyday world involve a limited number of folks that we come into contact with, social media gives us infinite opportunities to compare ourselves to billions of people who we don't even know. If we are insecure about our appearance or body type, there are countless examples on social media to help magnify that insecurity. If we are financially challenged, there are an infinite number of pseudo-entrepreneurs on social media to show us just how broke and unsuccessful we are. Regardless of how beautiful our vacation was, there are millions of folks going places more exotic and extravagant and they look better than us in an unfiltered bathing suit photo. For any person who is already coming from a place of low or vacant self-esteem, who is struggling with their identity and finding their life purpose, the social comparisons they encounter on social media are not healthy for their mental state. In many instances, it can be seen as masochistic for folks to constantly subject themselves to such humiliation; like the people who consistently read these articles, watch my videos, check out my social media posts, etc. but always has something negative to say. 

    So here is the problem: folks are being algorithmically hardwired and biochemically attracted to watch something, and someone, on social media that is impossible to be, and processing this virtual reality negatively affects their mental health. This is no different than an alcoholic, or drug/sex addict who is constantly looking for a fix that cannot fix anything. Some of you who are reading this are social media immigrants. We were born into a pre-cellphone society where there was no internet or social media. Now consider this problem through the lens of children who are born into this landscape as social media natives. They only know of a world with the internet. Imagine the degree of social comparison they are subjected to 24/7 in an already vulnerable developmental state. Now ask yourself the question, does our youth's growing virtual exposure intersect with the increased diagnosis of children between the ages of 3-17 with anxiety and depression, and the increase in substance abuse, sexual activity, and suicide among 12-17-year-old's? From a global citizen perspective, has China, the inventor of TikTok, done this research, and has created countrywide limits on youth social media exposure and gaming because of the potential mental health risks? 

    In closing, this is not a doomsday message. There are many positive applications for social media use and social comparison can be inspirational. We have to be very intentional with its use in order to maximize these social interactions. What I strongly caution people to do, especially with our youth, is to limit our internet screen time. As I shared, it is algorithmically hardwiring  us on a cognitive level. In my article Is Social Media The Digital "Turn on, Tune in, Drop out"? I wrote, "All social media formats use a scroll screen model. This enables users to easily scroll through pages without the cumbersome task of reading anything. If reading was not considered cumbersome, social media Apps would not limit the character count to convey a thought. Consider the following character count limits and ideal character count: Instagram = 2,200 characters max (144 ideal); Twitter = 280 characters max (71-100, 85 ideal); Facebook = 63,206 (40-80, 60 ideal); LinkedIn = 700 (50-100, 75 ideal). While some people have learned and are learning to use these limited/ideal character counts to refine concise truncated thought, many others have found themselves becoming less and less equipped to communicate, online and offline." 

     This society and its technology are not going backward; the internet, and social media, is here to stay in some form or fashion. Thus we must always explore ways to use it in a positive, progressive way, and not allow it to use us, our children, and compromise our mental health. The high propensity of social media use, especially by our children, means that adults need to stay aware of this growing evidence tying mental health problems to social media use. I cannot stress enough the importance of limiting our screen time, and investing more time in everyday life unplugged from our devices; engaging in activities that help build a positive self-image and sense of self-esteem. And if and when we do choose to use our devices, we must be deliberate about willfully engaging in progressive content that reinforces our positive self-image and sense of self-esteem. 

Peace,

Saladin

Digital Missteps in a Cancel Culture Industry

   

   The Internet, and social media in particular, is doing more than reshaping our brain architecture and how we explore and attend the real world. 

     In my article Is Social Media The Digital "Turn on, Tune in, Drop out"? I wrote, "Fifteen years ago National News was a mainstream talking point for at least a week. Nowadays National News has about a 48 hour life unless other information is shared in connection to that information. This is why stories are now shared in segments and you rarely get all of the details when a story breaks. This is not because of lack of information, it is often done in parts to lengthen the life of a story. Sometimes the wrong information is deliberately shared in order to retract it 24-48 hours later, which insures web traffic for another two days. Keep in mind that I am speaking from personal experience, as a writer and as a subject who was catapulted into the spotlight in 2014 when I was cited by as a subject matter expert by the international and national press on Jay-Z's Five Percenter Jewelry." 

     In regards to this digital landscape I went on to elaborate that, "All social media formats use a scroll screen model. This enables users to easily scroll through pages without the cumbersome task of reading anything. If reading was not considered cumbersome, social media Apps would not limit the character count to convey a thought. While some people have learned and are learning to use these limited/ideal character counts to refine concise truncated thought, many others have found themselves becoming less and less equipped to communicate, online and offline. This technological shift coincides with what we are also seeing across the country with the closing and defunding of libraries, the historically low ELA competency levels in primary school students and the moving away from handwriting in exchange for typing."

    With these changes and the creation of D2C [direct-to-consumer] mediums where people can interact without middlemen, there has also been a paradigm shift in how people navigate the digital landscape, interact with one another and engage the media. With the proliferation of Cancel Culture, these mediums have become problematic for many people, especially public figures, who feel as though they can Like/💓/😂, tweet, post/repost, comment, inbox, DM or LIVE Chat whatever they want. Sha'Carri Richardson is just one example of numerous athletes, entertainers, public officials and etc. who have found themselves in hot water because they clearly lacked "professional advice" on what to say, or not say.., publicly. Some people have literally lost their careers, and the ability to financially support their loved ones, because of digital missteps. Many athletes, entertainers, public officials and etc. have been lured into the illusion that because social media enables them to directly connect with people, investing in professional consultants to help curate their content and engagement is not necessary. In regards to freedom, I understand. Paying folks to give their professional advice on some of our thoughts before we share them may feel like a lot. Yet it is not nearly the price many of us end paying without that advice. 

     Gossip Blogs, Podcasts, Reaction Videos, LIVE Streamers, Mainstream Media and etc. all thrive on Digital Missteps; resharing, recreating and recycling it as traffic driving monetized content that they feed off of. This is an entire billion dollar industry based upon digitally amplifying imperfections. An industry that Generation Z [Zoomers] now look at as a viable career like my Generation X looked at college. And hey, I understand. YouTubers like DJ Akademiks don't even need to spin records to make a living. All you need to do is talk about people and instigate beefs; the same thing some of my elementary school students like to do. Now adults make money doing it. 

    As a cultural content creator I could share a different article, video, book, class, presentation, animation, album, song, poem, news story, podcast, interview, project, program or initiative that I have created/co-created every single day for the next 5 years without reposting anything. I am not talking about posts or tweets just sharing my thoughts. I am talking about sharing a different example of actual work that I have successfully completed, every day of the week, for 5 strait years without fail. Being a Five Percent pioneer in this space, this has enabled me to establish a global digital footprint that pushes our culture forward into uncharted territories. I am very proud of that. I am especially proud of the fact that none of my content is based upon gossip, instigating beefs or ambulance chasing for views. 

     For over a decade now I have also worked as a professional consultant. In this capacity I have had the opportunity to advise many athletes, entertainers, public officials and etc. on how they should best answer interview questions, respond to panel discussion topics, craft email correspondences, pen think pieces, issue public statements and etc. Because of the confidentiality of this kind of work I would never betray their trust and share who I work with. Yet if people are observant enough they could possibly tell who these people are based upon my global digital footprint and self-styled wisdom. So it is from this vantage point of view that I am assessing this changing digital landscape and what I see as a vital need for folks to invest in professional consultants. If not, we will continue to see the best of our athletes, entertainers, public officials and etc. living with a Cancel Culture sword above their heads.

Peace,

Saladin

Shootin Ya Shot.., As A Five Percenter

Customarily, when a brother within the Five Percent was interested in knowing the status of a sister he would simply ask, "Do you have a God?" This is appropriately done in a shared environment of Five Percenters such as a Rally, Parliament, Family Day, Show & Prove or other environments where we get together. This is done face to face. Nowadays with the growth of the Digital Age, particularly with SNSs [Social Network Sites], customs such as these become more difficult to express. Because of the nature of SNSs as a platform, appropriation of the English vocabulary and introduction of social media slang, a "Do you have a God?" Facebook inbox or Instagram DM can easily be filed under the folder of thirsty or jumping/sliding in somebody's DMs. Regardless who this brother or sister may be in real life, that brother or sister may not know how to appropriately engage one another using this platform, and social media vocabulary, from a Five Percenter perspective. Much can get lost in that translation. I've seen brothers naively poking brothers without knowing what the Facebook "poke" function implies or the digital reputation they're creating. I've also experienced one of my sisters "❤" a photo of me and another woman assume she was my Queen. It's a dilemma, like with some of our other customs of engaging one another, that have become challenging to express under these virtual conditions of technology often veiled as progress. I say "veiled" because many of us, especially Millennial social media natives who don't know of a world without the internet, are becoming more and more detached from certain customs that maintained our relationships.

Many Moons ago I had one of my first online experiences of a woman being interested in me who was once connected to a brother I didn't know but heard of. He was also a Five Percenter so I took the liberty of reaching out to him to find out the status of him and this sister. This is something we customarily do, yet the medium of the internet complicated it. He told me they were working on it, she said it was done and I found myself in the midst of an unresolved issue that I actually strived to investigate before getting involved in. The brother tried to accuse me of trying to get at God's Earths and if it wasn't for the printed screen copies of our online correspondences showing people the truth, people may have believed him. In this regard the internet saved my reputation but at the same time I could see how some of our customs began to be lost. A new technological language and social media etiquette was evolving and many of us were simply unprepared for what was on the horizon. Many of us are still unprepared and we find ourselves falling a victim to this every day.

The Online Dating Sites of the mid 90's were the morning star of the SNSs movement. At one point people frowned upon folks using dating sites because of their -social- awkwardness of meeting people. Nowadays maaaaaany people connect using social media, which are like dating sites on steroids. Even if they meet people in real-time, they still may defer to deal with them in a social media context. What we began to lose in the 90's when folks chose to use dating sites instead of meeting real people, is the same thing we're losing with people who choose to exist in a virtual reality today; human contact, intimacy, social etiquette, reading body language and the overall ability to effectively communicate. In fact, studies have show that only 7% of all communication is written or verbal while 93% is based on nonverbal body language. As I've shared, even as a Five Percenter, many of us aren't exempt from this either. 

So the logical question is, "What can we do about?" The first step is recognizing that our method of communication, and the etiquette that goes along with it, has changed. Twitter now allows people to use 140 characters text + image or gif or video or quote. Some of those characters can substituted with emojis; such as the secret emoji language many youth use. The good thing I've learned about using 140 characters to convey a thought is that it challenges you to be more concise and truncate our ideas. As a writer and public speaker this can help in the area of creating effective soundbites that Spin Doctors have a hard time remixing. On the other hand it does truncate our ideas and can have a negative impact on a person's attention span [because of excessive stimuli], ability to communicate, write, read and ultimately relate to others. As Author Paul L. Guthrie remarked about this technological paradigm shift in our Table Talks Interview, "Since the rise of the internet, literacy has been in decline. And even literacy itself, is changing. Reading words printed on paper (in books) is a different process than reading online. When I first began to read online I had to almost re-learn the kind of thought processes used while reading from books. It took me several months to re-learn how to mentally process online information. Computers throw the information at you at a different speed and with a different flavor. It's not the same; it comes at you from a different angle. I promote that people use paper printed books (while they’re still available), and maybe supplement their reading with online sources." 

Cultural Catfishing

Realizing that this poses some serious psychological and social issues, especially for our youth, the next step is making sure we reinvest in real-time connections with one another as opposed to using the internet, particularly social media, as mental and emotional retreats from everyday society. Keep in mind that there is nothing inherently bad about using SNSs. When people primarily rely on them to "virtually" socialize instead of actually socialize, that's a problem, for humanity and the environment. In regards to Five Percenters specifically, this article highlights a larger ongoing discussion on SNSs protocols and cultural rules of engagement we need to have within our respective ciphers. Five Percenters need to learn appropriate ways to DM a potential Queen or Earth outside of the context of thirsty or jumping/sliding in her DMs. Sisters and Brothers need to learn appropriate standards to engage each other publicly and privately on social media that upholds the level of integrity we see in actual ciphers. Our Parliaments are a legislative body of Five Percenters that come together by consensus to enact and modify rules that help regulate our collective cipher. For example, any issues or activities going on in my region of Western New York and Southern Ontario that impact us and our communities, positively or negatively, is addressed at our Parliament. Even though a virtual Parliament model has not been established, I have been a part of closed, secret and open Facebook Groups that have been able and unable to serve a very limited parliamentary purpose -based upon the integrity and protocols of those maintaining these internet ciphers [Administrators]. These and many other customs we express offline, such as verifying a person's identity, length of study, lineage and cultural understanding, have been challenging to ascertain using SNSs as a platform. "Building" in person allows us to gather much more information about each other as opposed to corresponding in Messenger or replying to questions on a Facebook thread. In these and other instances it's hard to verify or even validate if people are who they say they are, especially if we've never met them in real life. In real life if I asked a person to quote a lesson or share their understanding of something I can see their response in real-time. If I inboxed that to someone or asked them on a social media post it's easy for them to copy and paste an answer, or get someone to respond for them, to appear genuine. Cultural Catfishing is much harder to pull off in real life. What many of us are growing to understand is that some of our customs are nontransferable, meaning, there are limits to what we can actually express using SNSs as a platform. The limit is the platform itself, not us as the Five Percent. People reach out to me from around the world all of the time that are interested in learning the culture of the Five Percent. Many ask for books, documents or even a desire to speak on the phone. In most instances it doesn't occur to them that they're asking to learn an entire "way of life"; everyday living that doesn't have a page count, that isn't a bunch of documents and is not something you just email or talk about over the phone. This misconception of culture and assumption [and presumption] of access is the direct result of SNSs and the shift into a Digital Age. Like I've said on many occasions, all of the services I share using the internet [articles, books, radio shows, music, videos and etc.] are routing devices to everyday reality. What I share online is virtual evidence of what I do offline.

As Five Percenters we're in a state of transition where learning to repurpose some of our customs in a virtual reality can successfully or unsuccessfully alter our cultural life expectancy, change our real-time sex ratios and set a socioemotional and economic trajectory for our future generations. It is not beneficial to entirely denounce the Digital Age as many of our Baby Boomers have, or be totally immersed in it as many Generation X and Millennials are; both are too extreme. We must strike a healthy balance. A balance that empowers us to engage each other with technology to continue building brick and mortar institutions, concrete relationships and solid communities where our families thrive.

Peace,
Saladin