Our Relationship With Techonology

There are many different positive and negative effects that technology and social media in general has on the world today. Technology is continuously expanding and morphing as new things are being invented, some things having potential to negatively affect the emotional and physical health of people while others could potentially be improving their lives. Technology plays a role in every part of people's lives for educational reasons, health reasons, and even general welfare. The feeling of being attached to the lives and people on our phones is great, however it does disconnect people from the real life surrounding them that is beyond just a screen. It starts to become a problem when it is interfering with people's everyday lives and making them disconnected from their surroundings.

I believe that technology has taken up too much of my life for the social media aspects of it. I will catch myself getting distracted by starting to look at one thing on a social media platform such as tik tok, instagram, or snapchat and then noticing that hours of my day go by doing that. This makes you have a feeling of disconnection with real life surroundings and noticing that there is so much more out there rather than just staring at a screen all day and feeling unproductive. There is a way to know how much screen time you personally use a day, some days are more than others, however I personally believe that I need to cut down on it. I believe that managing your notifications is super important to avoid any type of distractions and getting caught up into using any type of technology for a long period of time.

Technology overall plays a great role into my personal relationships, whether it’s with friends or family. This is due to the fact that if I am ever long distance with someone close to me, it is an easy way to stay in touch via text, call, facetime, etc. However, the bad effect that technology can play into my personal relationships is being a major distraction for either side of the relationship. It is distracting because it takes away from having important conversations with one another due to checking social media platforms constantly or just becoming too focused and consumed by your phone in general. Technology does in fact interfere with having face to face conversations, which is a social skill that people should be gaining.

Social media and the internet is a great way to stay in touch with others and to learn new information, however it does in fact open the pathway to cyberbullying. A major negative effect that technology can have on the world today is cyberbullying. Cyberbullying has been continuously becoming more and more common especially for people in their teenage years because the things that they can say to others are behind a screen and can be anonymous. The statistics of victims who have been reporting some form of online harassment have been increasing greatly throughout the years. The impact of certain things being said and posted anonymously makes harassment more effective because these comments can be read by people all across the world and it can also be an easy way for others to try to join in and become a part of the bullying themselves. Cyberbullying can include posting incriminating images, spreading certain gossip about others, and cyberstalking. Once certain types of information is posted online, it is not easy to be removed and can be posted at any time during the day or night.