Has social media become more negative than positive?

I remember when things like Facebook first became popular. People went on about how it was great everyone could be connected.

Since then though a lot of vileness has been spawned from these kinds of things. I realize that vileness is to be expected on the internet, but this is more out in the open and is tending to have sometimes lethal consequences. There have been various incidents of people killed over Facebook posts,like this 13 yr. old kid. http://www.people.com/article/anthony-diaz-shot-killed-facebook-posts

Then there is the fact that social media is just ripe for cyber bullying. Even though there are options to block people out you still hear incidents of kids killing themselves or otherwise being horribly bullied on social media.

This is obviously a small but loud majority, but do you think the negatives tend to outweigh the positives now? Is social media getting out of control or are people just overreacting to a few instances?

I think the problem here isn't even Facebook, or social media in general. It's proper parenting and the children's upbringing.

I think to an extent it's gotten more negative.

In the earlier days, people put less of their lives online. It was less personal. There were smaller social circles. Now, everyone's online, social media covers everyone, and everyone includes all the jerks.

I think at least some of it is merely putting stuff which was always there in how some acted out into the open, but sometimes the formats do contribute to that kind of thing.

Originally posted by AsbestosFlaygon
I think the problem here isn't even Facebook, or social media in general. It's proper parenting and the children's upbringing.

I am severely skeptical of any claim that the latest generation being worse than the prior, on the grounds that that's what every generation claims and they're usually wrong.

Plus I read an interesting story where the people most likely to swear and grief a lot in videogames, the stereotypical 'angry 13 year old'? Are usually older angry people, 30s-40s.

It's not that the latest generation is worse persay, they just have a lot more to deal with. In the past parents didn't have to worry about texting and facebook and all the stuff they could see online and you have ways to block it out but when kids reach a certain age they will figure a way around it or just see it at a friends house.

Originally posted by Q99
I am severely skeptical of any claim that the latest generation being worse than the prior, on the grounds that that's what every generation claims and they're usually wrong.

Well, in 2014, a poll showed that Americans think 18-29 year olds were the most selfish and entitled age group (the millennials).

http://time.com/3154186/millennials-selfish-entitled-helicopter-parenting/

So, really, we could say that the general opinion is that this current generation of young adults is the most selfish and entitled compared to all other generations.

And it may also be true that the previous gen was the same and the previous gen was the same. It is possible that each generation is becoming more and more selfish, entitled, and narcissistic with this generation being the worst. And that's actually backed by research:

https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/the-narcissism-epidemic/201308/how-dare-you-say-narcissism-is-increasing

1. Increases in narcissism: Four cross-sectional, one retrospective, and four over-time datasets are consistent with higher narcissism among those in more recent (younger) generations. These use three different measures of narcissism (the NPI, the California Psychological Inventory, and a clinical interview for Narcissistic Personality disorder) and occur across several age groups and cultures:

Cai, H., Kwan, V. S. Y., & Sedikides, C. (2012). A sociocultural approach to narcissism: The case of modern China. European Journal of Personality, 26, 529-535. (link is external)

Foster, J. D., Campbell, W. K., & Twenge, J. M. (2003). Individual differences in narcissism: Inflated self-views across the lifespan and around the world. Journal of Research in Personality, 37, 469-486. (link is external)

Twenge, J. M., & Foster, J. D. (2010). Birth cohort increases in narcissistic personality traits among American college students, 1982-2009. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 1, 99-106.

Stewart, K. D., & Bernhardt, P. C. (2010). Comparing Millennials to pre-1987 students and with one another. North American Journal of Psychology, 12, 579-602. (link is external)

Stinson, F. S., Dawson, D. A., Goldstein, R. B., Chou, S. P., Huang, B., Smith, S. M (2008). Prevalence, correlates, disability, and comorbidity of personality disorder diagnoses in a DSM-IV narcissistic personality disordered non-patient sample. Results from the wave 2 national epidemiologic survey on alcohol and related conditions. Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, 69, 1033–1045. (link is external)

Twenge, J. M., Konrath, S., Foster, J. D., Campbell, W. K., & Bushman, B. J. (2008). Egos inflating over time: A cross-temporal meta-analysis of the Narcissistic Personality Inventory. Journal of Personality, 76, 875-902. (link is external)

Twenge, J. M., & Foster, J. D. (2008). Mapping the scale of the narcissism epidemic: Increases in narcissism 2002-2007 within ethnic groups. Journal of Research in Personality, 42, 1619-1622. (link is external) (our response to the UC campuses study)

Wilson, M. S., & Sibley, C. G. (2011). ‘Narcissism creep?’ Evidence for age-related differences in narcissism in the New Zealand general populations. New Zealand Journal of Psychology, 40, 89-95.

2. Traits related to narcissism have also increased, such as extrinsic values, unrealistic expectations, materialism, low empathy, agentic (but not communal) self-views, self-esteem, self-focus, choosing more unique names for children, less concern for others, less interest in helping the environment, and low empathy. Studies consistently show increases in these traits, except the data on self-esteem are mixed. Self-esteem increases in elementary school, middle school, and college students, but is unchanged among high school students in 2 out of 3 studies. Many of the studies below use data from Monitoring the Future, the same database of high school students that critics claimed showed no meaningful generational differences.

Gentile, B., Twenge, J. M., & Campbell, W. K. (2010). Birth cohort differences in self-esteem, 1988-2008: A cross-temporal meta-analysis. Review of General Psychology, 14, 261-268. (link is external)

Konrath, S. H., O’Brien, E. H., & Hsing, C. (2011). Changes in dispositional empathy in American college students over time: A meta-analysis. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 15, 180-198. (link is external)

Lindfors, P., Solantaus, T., & Rimpela, A. (2012). Fears for the future among Finnish adolescents in 1983-2007: From global concerns to ill health and loneliness. Journal of Adolescence. (link is external)

Park, H., Twenge, J. M., & Greenfield, P. M. (in press). The Great Recession: Implications for adolescent values and behavior. Social Psychological and Personality Science. (link is external) (uses MtF)

Reynolds, J., Stewart, M., Sischo, L., & MacDonald. R. (2006). Have adolescents become too ambitious? High school seniors’ educational and occupational plans, 1976 to 2000. Social Problems, 53, 186-206. (link is external) (uses MtF)

Twenge, J. M., & Kasser, T. (2013). Generational changes in materialism and work centrality, 1976-2007: Associations with temporal changes in societal insecurity and materialistic role-modeling. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 39, 883-897. (link is external) (uses MtF)

Twenge, J. M., & Campbell, W. K. (2010). Birth cohort differences in the Monitoring the Future dataset and elsewhere: Further evidence for Generation Me. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 5, 81-88. (link is external) (uses MtF)

Twenge, J. M., Campbell, S. M., Hoffman, B. R., & Lance, C. E. (2010). Generational differences in work values: Leisure and extrinsic values increasing, social and intrinsic values decreasing. Journal of Management, 36, 1117-1142. (link is external) (uses MtF)

Twenge, J. M., Abebe, E. M., & Campbell, W. K. (2010). Fitting in or standing out: Trends in American parents’ choices for children’s names, 1880-2007. Social Psychological and Personality Science, 1, 19-25. (link is external)

Twenge, J. M., & Campbell, W. K. (2001). Age and birth cohort differences in self-esteem: A cross-temporal meta-analysis. Personality and Social Psychology Review, 5, 321-344. (link is external)

Twenge, J. M. & Campbell, W. K. (2008). Increases in positive self-views among high school students: Birth cohort changes in anticipated performance, self-satisfaction, self-liking, and self-competence. Psychological Science, 19, 1082-1086. (link is external) (uses MtF)

Twenge, J.M., Campbell, W. K., & Freeman, E. C. (2012). Generational differences in young adults’ life goals, concern for others, and civic orientation, 1966-2009. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 102, 1045-1062. (link is external) (uses MtF)

Twenge, J. M., Campbell, W. K., & Gentile, B. (2012). Generational increases in agentic self- evaluations among American college students, 1966-2009. Self and Identity, 11, 409-427. (link is external)

3. A wide range of cultural data also suggests growing individualism and waning collectivism, including changes in pronoun use in books and song lyrics, agentic words and phrases, decreasing moral words, and more emphasis on fame in TV shows for children.

DeWall, C. N., Pond, R. S., Campbell, W. K., & Twenge, J. M. (2011). Tuning in to psychological change: Linguistic markers of psychological traits and emotions over time in popular U.S. song lyrics. Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts, 5, 200-207.

Greenfield, P. M. (2013). The changing psychology of culture from 1800 through 2000. Psychological Science. (link is external)

Kesebir, P., & Kesebir, S. (2012). The cultural salience of moral character and virtue declined in twentieth century America. Journal of Positive Psychology. (link is external)

Twenge, J. M., Campbell, W. K., & Gentile, B. (2012-a). Increases in individualistic words and phrases in American books, 1960-2008. PLoS ONE, 7, e40181. (link is external)

Twenge, J. M., Campbell, W. K., & Gentile, B. (2013). Changes in pronoun use in American books and the rise of individualism, 1960-2008. Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology, 44, 406-415. (link is external)

Uhls, Y. T., & Greenfield, P. M. (2011). The rise of fame: An historical content analysis. Cyberpsychology: Journal of Psychosocial Research on Cyberspace, 5, 1. (link is external)

4. Individualism is also linked to attitudes supporting equality for all regardless of group membership. Plenty of evidence – both from academic journals and from polls -- suggests that younger generations are more tolerant and supportive of equality. Note that supporting equality and empathy are not the same thing.

Carter, J. S. (2010). A cosmopolitan way of life for all? A reassessment of the impact of urban and region on racial attitudes from 1972 to 2006. Journal of Black Studies, 40, 1075-1093. (link is external)

Koenig, A. M., Eagly, A. H., Mitchell, A. A., & Ristikari, T. (2011). Are leader stereotypes masculine? A meta-analysis of three research paradigms. Psychological Bulletin, 137, 616-642. (link is external)

Pew Research Center (2013). Gay marriage: Key data points from Pew Research (link is external).

Thornton, A., & Young-DeMarco, L. (2001). Four decades of trends in attitudes toward family issues in the United States: The 1960s through the 1990s. Journal of Marriage and the Family, 63, 1009-1037. (link is external)

Twenge, J. M., Campbell, W. K., & Gentile, B. (2012-c). Male and female pronoun use in U.S. books reflects women’s status, 1900-2008. Sex Roles, 67, 488-493. (link is external)

Twenge, J. M. (1997a). Attitudes toward women, 1970-1995: A meta-analysis. Psychology of Women Quarterly, 21, 35-51. (link is external)

Research points to millennials being entitled:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2257715/Study-shows-college-students-think-theyre-special--read-write-barely-study.html

And these children think they are gifted despite studying and scores dropping:

http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2013/01/08/are-raising-generation-deluded-narcissists.html

Also, this generation is the least religious of any generation. That might be a good thing...but maybe not.

I agree with dadudemon, but I'd also like to point out it's not only the youth and millennials acting badly on social media. There are plenty of people over the age of 35 (and 45) acting poorly online. I think what we're really witnessing is more access to the regularly occurring poor judgment and character of our fellow citizens. Social media just provides a venue to display pre-existing narcissism and stupidity. People sucked in the Pre-Netscape Era as well.

Originally posted by MF DELPH
I agree with dadudemon, but I'd also like to point out it's not only the youth and millennials acting badly on social media. There are plenty of people over the age of 35 (and 45) acting poorly online. I think what we're really witnessing is more access to the regularly occurring poor judgment and character of our fellow citizens. Social media just provides a venue to display pre-existing narcissism and stupidity. People sucked in the Pre-Netscape Era as well.

I have to wonder if that has anything to do with the sudden popularity of guys like Donald Trump. He's basically the human embodiment of an internet news comment box.

So everyone agrees with DDM's research, Millennials are selfish entitled shitbags 👆

Urban legends coming to life, at least the Mizzou President could of done at that parade is have security give those protesters a beat down. Then they would have something to complain about. Then again maybe the protesters are just acting "pathological".

Dadudemon has the best chance of being right; I appreciate the citations.

That said, it's a bit hard to corroborate on an anecdotal level. I'm on Twitter all the time, but my feed is overwhelmingly positive. And it's because I carefully curate what I do and don't see. Same with Facebook, where I'm friends with ~600 people, but follow maybe 5-6 of them. So my feed only has those activities/people I'm interested in, and I try to keep it both interesting and positive.

I agree with the parenting/upbringing argument. Parents who give a sh*t are probably the single biggest determining factor in all kinds of positive traits and life successes for kids. Similarly, how we curate our access to social media does a lot to affect our views. There's an accountability involved; it's not always an external question.

It's also important to note that statistical trends aren't individual truths. We can all either know exceptions to those trends, or BE exceptions to those trends. Blaming or damning entire generations is as faulty as ignoring studies on them.

Originally posted by Omega Vision
I agree with this. People were always crammed full of stupid, half-baked, and backward opinions and kneejerk reactions, it's just regular social mores kept them behind closed doors, but social media becomes for most people the equivalent of the inside of their car during a traffic jam.

I have to wonder if that has anything to do with the sudden popularity of guys like Donald Trump. He's basically the human embodiment of an internet news comment box.

I've seen some excellent research on how people tend to insulate themselves online based on both their opinions and how they interact online. Like surrounds like, basically. So there's probably something to this, where the people with half-baked views that want to shout it on the internet, and share it with as many people as possible, find other people and sites that allow them to do so without being significantly challenged. Like an online echo chamber, where everyone amplifies everyone else.

In that sense - and this is a guess, for the record - I suspect that while Delph is right that there are stupid people in any era, social media can and does make the problem worse at times.

Dadudemon

Well, in 2014, a poll showed that Americans think 18-29 year olds were the most selfish and entitled age group (the millennials).

So, really, we could say that the general opinion is that this current generation of young adults is the most selfish and entitled compared to all other generations.

What I mean is, if you made the same poll in 1964, 1904, and 1104, each group would say 18-29 year olds were the most selfish group. It doesn't mean each generation is more selfish than the last, it just mean that younger is the more selfish phase for any particular generation and this gets mistaken for moral decay when really it's just as you get older you learn more empathy, whatever your starting point.

I'd be extremely surprised if Baby Boomers weren't more selfish than gen Xers or millennials when you compare them at the same ages.

I too, think, that the current view of millennials, will show itself to be overblown or fully inaccurate in due time.

Originally posted by Digi
In that sense - and this is a guess, for the record - I suspect that while Delph is right that there are stupid people in any era, social media can and does make the problem worse at times.

From my experience, being 35 now, as a teenager and young adult in the 90s and early 2000s, people were just as shallow then, but the contrast now, however, is you'll have people witness a felony assault and, thanks to social media, they'll either post it to bring light to an injustice or, more times than not (sadly), post it in order to have the bragging rights of having a viral video or being the latest meme, and this is in lieu of simply assisting the person being assaulted. People weren't picking fights or getting fellatio from a "Thot" at an Amtrak Station for the sole purpose of uploading the video to WorldstarHipHop, Youtube, Vine, or Mediatakeout in '98.

I think there were a large number of issues simply for the fact that social media compounded the problem of media in general: the ease of acting as though the person being spoken to or of isn't real simply because he or she isn't in front of the writer's face. It's easy to depersonalize with any type of writing, and social media doesn't offer editors or peers to evaluate what's written before it's published.

As others have mentioned, age isn't a factor in this. Some of those killing themselves have been bullied by adults. Some of those murdered over issues spread across Facebook and the murderers themselves have been in their 30s and 40s. It's the ease of depersonalization that's the issue, and it's something that people have to be proactive about to change.

People are losing their social skills to interact with eachother.
Just go to any cafe or restaurant & watch couples sitting opposite eachother paying more attention to their smart phones than sharing an intimate time together. They're more interested in updating their social status than actually having a positive relationship together.

Christ, I'm so fed up with idiots nearly walking into me on the sidewalk staring at their smart phones than where they're walking.

Inanimate objects don't have a bad or good, whatever people decide to do with them is on them.

You can use the spear to hunt and eat or kill and conquer.
The sword to defend or attack.
The atom to power your home or destroy homes.

Social media is just another tool, pity that teenagers give it a bad rep with their antics.

If it becomes to much a problem then the government might intervene and restrict the age in which you can use it. But I doubt that will happen.

Yeah, those stupid teenagers...

Social media is a great technological invention. It's another great way to make the world smaller and bring people together. Most importantly it's a way to give everyone a voice that can be heard. My friends often argue that a problem with our world today is that there are no social leaders. I argue that's because everyone has a voice, today. Instead of following a single idea or movement, everyone tries to start their own. This isn't necessarily a bad thing because that's one of the manners,social media, was meant to be used for.

Is it being abused? Yes, of course but just like anything potentially positive in life, it's going to be abused and misused. I just despise how established media networks and corporations focus on these negative practices and encourage them.

Originally posted by jinXed by JaNx
Social media is a great technological invention. It's another great way to make the world smaller and bring people together. Most importantly it's a way to give everyone a voice that can be heard.

I disagree about bringing people together.
Social Media has diminished the value of friendships from quality to the quantity of "likes" you have on your status.

It's created online bullying & unnecessary criticisms from people you hardly know or for that matter, asked their opinion.