Overview
It is perhaps the most defining social aspect of the 21st century. It’s everywhere. It affects everyone. It features seemingly everything. And with a medium so advanced and complex, stemming from the apps themselves to their real-world consequences, the implications of social media are immense.
Nowhere is this impact more pronounced than in the lives of high school-aged adolescents, who spend a daily average of eight hours and 39 minutes on screens, much of it on social media. Having increased by 17 percent from 2019 to 2021, the duration of screen time usage by teenagers is showing no sign of stopping — even as an increasing number of studies indicate that social media’s effects have major risks.
Adding to this research was a recently released report by the Center for Disease Control, which found that among teenage girls, “persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness” increased by 60 percent from 2011 to 2021.
The timing of this marked change points to a potential culprit. The popular social media app Snapchat was released in 2011; today, it is used by 59 percent of teenagers. Likewise, according to the Pew Research Center, rates of Instagram use among teenagers have risen from 52 percent in 2015 to 62 percent in 2022.
With the ongoing rise of social media, this correlation is of growing concern. To examine this evolving issue, the Bark explores the impact of a uniquely impactful social media platform, Snapchat, and, generally, how social media affects everyone’s interactions.
Pixelated communications in an era of new uncertainties, relationships and tech
By Lili Hakimi
Originally introduced in 1975 by Charles Berger and Richard Calabrese, the Uncertainty Reduction Theory (URT) explained a “theoretical perspective for dealing with the initial entry stage of interpersonal interaction.”
According to the URT, people gather information in three ways; passive, active and interactive strategies. An example of a passive strategy could be observing someone from a distance, an example of an active strategy could be googling someone and an interactive strategy could be a face-to-face interaction where basic information is exchanged, thus, reducing uncertainty.
The URT implies that humans are uncomfortable with uncertainty and that we actively try to reduce uncertainty when meeting new people. By attempting to predict the trajectory of an interaction, we begin to warm up to the other person and feel more comfortable around them.
Uncertainty reduction occurs during the initial stages of interaction, but over the past several years, technology has altered how we attempt to reduce skepticism about people we don’t know. Due to social media, the way we form new social relationships and maintain current ones has changed enormously. Social media has forced our brains to engage in an entirely new mode of communication, one that we weren’t designed for.
Platforms like Facebook and Instagram embody the URT by encouraging users to share a lot of personal information. Social media invites users to interact with people they don’t know. This normally results in people being more direct and disclosing more information about themselves since they have a screen to hide behind.
Dr. Allan Gold, has worked at Del Mar Middle School for 47 years and has a doctoral degree in educational psychology, has observed a change in kids’ interactions, specifically how kids’ relationships have altered as a result of social media.
“[Kids] use social media as a tool for creating relationships, and it is not just an in-person relationship anymore. Kids will have contact with people on the other side of the country or [other] countries. There is a vulnerability there. But you also don't have to interact with people on a daily basis. Does it mean there is an advantage? Is it necessarily bad to have a friend across the country? Probably not. But it [begs the question]: is it a friendship because you only have one kind of interaction with them?” Gold said.
Rabbi Paul Steinberg, who has a bachelor’s degree in psychology and a doctoral degree in education, believes that social media has limited the effort we put into forming relationships.
“[Social media] has short-changed the deep work of real relationship building. In other words, when you have [in-person] conversations, you have to look people in the eye and you don’t have a limited number of words. There is feedback you get from people that is not merely written. Facial expressions, the sound of somebody’s voice, how somebody says something, all of those things are really important forms of human communication,” Steinberg said.
Both Gold and Steinberg have observed social media’s impact on conflict and conflict resolution, primarily due to misinterpretation of content and a lack of impulse control.
“You are communicating without social-emotional feedback when you are just looking at [someone’s] words or pictures. It is easier to objectify [someone], dehumanize [someone], become more volatile, raise the stakes of conflict and be more comfortable settling into conflict,” Steinberg said.
With in-person disputes, Steinberg says we see the full human being.
“You empathize or sympathize at the very least on a much different level. [Social media] has not caused more conflict, but it has diminished the desire to work towards conflict resolution,” Steinberg said.
According to Steinberg, social media impacts our interactions with ourselves, especially when it comes to the younger generation.
“There is a certain trauma [Generation Z] has experienced because of the heightened issues around conflict, bullying, body shaming, political divisiveness and [fear of missing out due to social media.] … It’s a question for [Generation Z] as to whether the generation is going to have some of the coping skills, resilience and grit,” Steinberg said. “[When kids go off to college], all of a sudden they are on their own, and for the first time, they get a bad grade or their boyfriend breaks up with them, and they are in the nurse’s office because they physically can’t handle the emotions they’re having. Social media contributed to this because some of the social-emotional development has not been as full-throated.”
When it comes to mitigating the effects of social media, Gold says that schools have a big responsibility.
“It used to be less than 10 years ago that if there was an incident that happened online outside of school we would say ‘Oh well it’s not at school, so we can’t do anything about it.’ That’s changed because [social media] has so much impact on kids’ feelings at school. I feel a responsibility to tackle it,” Gold said.
Steinberg notes the immense impact that social media and technology have had over such a short amount of time, given that trends usually take hundreds of years to create permanent advancements in society.
“2007 was when the iPhone was created. It’s only been in existence for 16 years and has changed everything,” Steinberg said. “Steve Jobs said it was going to change the world. He was right.”
Have Snapchat’s features provided opportunities to socialize? Or to stalk?
By Rori Anderson and Elsa Block
Snapchat is a social media platform that allows people to chat as well as send pictures and videos (known as snaps) with their friends. In 2020, over 85 million people in the U.S. used the app. That is a large percentage of the U.S. that can readily communicate with each other through Snapchat. That percentage is likely even higher for teenagers as Snapchat is incredibly popular among younger age groups.
One notable feature of the app is Snapchat Map, or Snap Map, which allows users to share their location with others on one central map. This feature can be altered for users to select certain friends to see their location. While Snap Map can have its benefits, local therapist Julie Greenberg notes that more often than not, it fosters feelings of insecurity.
“If someone is already in a low mood and then they see on Snap Map that their friends are hanging out, it could increase symptoms [of anxiety, depression and a fear of missing out (FOMO)],” Greenberg said.
Margot Johnson, a Redwood alumni, looked into how Snap Map at schools in Marin affected students differently for her Advanced Placement Research project. Johnson found that the larger student body of Redwood made students feel anxious about social situations and that Snap Map added to this anxiety because it meant students could see what more people were doing, leading to increased FOMO.
“[Experiencing feelings of FOMO] doesn't even have to do with whether you really want to be doing what other people are doing—it's more that you're just not invited, or you're not there. That's what makes people anxious. Snap Map basically feeds that anxiety because it makes [the viewer] so aware of what everybody else is doing,” Johnson said.
Greenberg also noticed how social media in general can influence teens’ desire to fit in – meaning Snap Map likely exacerbates this desire even more.
“Needing to be liked and accepted is a very normal desire for anyone, especially in high school when [teenagers] are trying to learn their self-identity and how to be a part of a group, [as well as] learning where they fit in that group. Not being invited may somehow make [teens] feel like they are accepted less,” Greenberg said. “Fear of missing out can make teens feel more self-conscious and it can lower their self-esteem. If [teens] feel like they are not being invited, they can start to have negative thoughts about themselves. These negative thoughts can alter their behaviors and they might feel more self-conscious, [possibly leading them] to reach out less.”
A commonly used feature on Snap Map is choosing who can view your location. Users have the option to set their location to ghost mode (where their location is off for everyone), select certain friends to see where they are, or turn their location on for everyone they have added on the app. While monitoring who can view one’s location can increase a teens’ safety, Greenberg notes that limiting who has your location can sometimes intentionally cause harm.
“There [are] a lot of situations where [choosing who can and can’t see your location] can be misused. For example, if somebody just broke up with someone, and they want to make them feel hurt. They want to show that other person that they were with a bunch of people, and that they were happy and fine. If somebody is using it as a way to get back at somebody [else], this can be hurtful in a way for people that creates anxiety and depression,” Greenberg said.
Another way this can be intensified is through Snapchat Premium, a subscription-based upgrade to Snapchat that was released June 2022 and allows users to pay $3.99 a month to have access to exclusive features. Senior Chase Cordova has Snapchat Premium and has seen the difference in the ways it can be used.
“If you click on anyone who has [their] Snap Map on, you can see [exactly] where they've gone for the past 24 hours,” Cordova said.
The location-sharing upgrade and other aspects of Snapchat Premium could change teenagers' social life in high school by giving them more information.
“With the new updates, it kind of keeps on getting crazier and crazier. [For example,] if you press on a group, you can get directions to where they are. It'll give you driving location [and] walking location. I think that is a really scary feature. It also could add to the FOMO or [even] the stalking part of it,” Cordova said.
Johnson had similar thoughts about Snapchat Premium when she first heard about it.
“I think that sounds like hell. … [Snapchat Premium] is basically doing the stalking for you,” Johnson said.
Scary as it is, Snap Map has a prominent place in Redwood’s own community: 53 percent of students check their Snap Maps at least once each day, according to a March 2023 Bark survey. Students use it in various ways, from looking to see who is around them to checking who is with big groups of people. According to freshman Nina Erwig, many people allot chunks of time to scrutinize Snap Map everyday.
“I check Snap Maps whenever I’m bored; I probably check it around seven times a day. … I look to see if certain locations are full of people, or if there are big groups of people together [and] who’s in them,” Erwig said. “Usually when I’m going to certain places, I will turn my location off if I don’t want people to know I’m there. If I know that a bigger group is there, I’ll turn my location off so people know I’m not associated with them. If I’m with my friends, usually if one person turns [their location] off, everyone will turn it off. It’s really calculated.”
Over 250 million people use Snapchat each month. The app has reached multiple millions of people and has been around for over 10 years. That impact alone is vast and immeasurable – add in Snap Map, and Snapchat becomes even more evasive, almost alarmingly so, in society, especially among teenagers. Johnson touched on how that was changing Generation Z’s relationships and mental health.
“[Snap Map] causes conflict between our generation because we're able to really see everything everyone else is doing. And so it can make people feel jealous or left out or have their feelings hurt,” Johnson said.
Many teenagers are aware of all of these issues and still choose to use Snapchat every single day. They use Snap Map to see where their friends, crushes and even enemies are at any time. Knowing all this information gives teenagers power, but can also cause harm that is still being unraveled today.
Cyber Security:
While Snap Map can create mental health problems, it can also be dangerous in other ways. Location sharing, which Snap Map utilizes, can be very complex. Marie Kacmarek has worked in information security management and has her own company called Mariqua Inc. and explained the different types of location sharing.
“[The first is] geo-referencing or geo-positioning [which figures] out the physical location of a person relative to a map. The second one is called geocoding [which searches] for information regarding an object or service on a map. And then the third one is called geotagging [which adds] geographic location information to an object,” Kacmarek said.
Location sharing in general can have issues, and Snap Map is no different. But one aspect of Snapchat that is different from other similar apps is the option to share where you are with anybody you have on the app. According to Data Reportal, 20 percent of Snapchat users are under the age of 18. This means juveniles can share their location with adults without realizing the risk. This can be very dangerous. Most Redwood students are under the age of 18 and according to a March 2023 Bark survey, 27 percent of students have their Snap Map on for everybody and 37 percent of students have their Snap Map on for a small group of people.
There are many obvious risks to having your location shared with anybody on Snapchat, the extremes including being kidnapped or robbed, even if you’re on ghost mode. Since the app still has your location, even when you are on ghost mode, hackers could still find your location.
The data that is collected when somebody uses Snapchat is stored in many different places, thus a number of “data controllers”, anybody or anything that are in charge of processing data, have that information. Not only does Snapchat have this information, but so do wireless access points and people who work on or created the app. Kacmarek saw a lot of issues and questions raised from this.
“We're not able to easily identify where that data is, who owns it, where it's gone, who's collected it or who's had access to it. So, this is where you get privacy concerns, such as, ‘How is your data being used?’ ‘Who will the company share it with?’ ‘Is Snapchat selling this data to other companies?’ ‘Will there be a transfer to other parties?’ And the fourth thing that is really important is, ‘How long do they hold the data?’” Kacmarek said.
The more people that have the data the more likely a user’s data is to get hacked. Snapchat not only has data on people's locations, but also has personal information stored, such as their age, birthday and gender. So, if Snapchat were to get hacked, criminals could readily access all of this data and use it for many different things. Criminals can use all of this information to find out different people's routines and who they are, which can in turn be used for robbery, stalking, kidnapping or domestic violence.
Beyond those concerns, Snapchat Premium allowing people to follow old locations, proves that Snapchat stores location history. Therefore, if criminals hack the app, they could access those prolonged location trends for all Snapchat users, potentially leading to more dangerous situations.
“That's like a stalker's dream come true,” Kacmarek said.
While this may seem scary, there are ways for users to protect themselves. The main thing is to think ahead and be aware.
“Think like a criminal. What would they do?” Kacmarek said.
Changing passwords often, and making sure nobody knows that password also helps. More than that, keeping location sharing completely off in the app settings, not just on ghost mode, unless in specific situations can limit the amount of data Snapchat stores. This is true for all apps though. Snapchat is not the only application with personal information or with data on locations, so being aware of the ability to get hacked and using preventive measures for all apps is a great way to start.
Over 250 million people use Snapchat each month. The app has reached millions of people and has been around for over 10 years. Its effects can not be limited to just the map section as people use it in many different ways. Snapchat as a whole is not a bad app, but it does have risks and negative effects that are important to be aware of.
Illustrations by Carsen Goltz and Calla McBride