High on Social Media

From the early days of MSN to now sharing reels on Instagram, I think it’s safe to say that the online world is constantly changing, but what do we think about this?

My earliest memory of social media is MSN, which was the 2007 equivalent of Facebook’s messenger. I was in primary school, probably around the age of 9, when I would run home from school, jump onto MSN to then talk to all my friends from school who I had just been speaking for the past 9 hours at school. It’s amazing how we still had things to say, we’d cover such informative topics such as “wubu2? xx”, which is code for “what you been up to?”, as if we hadn’t already sat through Maths, English and Science lessons together all day. My point here (besides a day in the life recount of a year 5) is that I’ve more or less grown up and evolved with social media. I guess in a way we are like sisters, except I’m way more realistic.

Growing up with social media has been an experience, and sadly I think my generation especially will now always have that “I wonder how many likes this will get on Instagram” mentality. We’ve learnt that when we feel sad, self-depreciative or lonely, we should upload an Instagram or Facebook post to get a few likes from some people that we vaguely know, as a sign of social validation and acceptance. What I didn’t know about this is that when someone likes your post, you get a kick of dopamine, which is that happy feeling of acceptance and it’s highly addictive. To put things into perspective, you also get dopamine kicks from drinking alcohol and taking drugs, and it’s this chemical which makes those habits more addictive. This then leads to the question; is social media a drug? are we all simultaneously addicted to the sweet taste of Instagram likes?

There’s a really good video that explains this in more detail, which you can watch below! What do you think about social media addiction?