Developing sense of self, connections through social media

In the days before social media networks took the country by storm, the media portrayed images of the "perfect body" or "dream house" in magazines, advertisements and on television. Now, with the evolution of social media, the exposure to people around the world, increases the opportunity for connection and comparison. When developing a sense of self, this can be a slippery slope if the road is not purposefully defined.

While science lags in understanding the role of social media in shaping ones sense of identity, image and connection to others, the general consensus is social media has an impact on a person's psychological wellbeing. Whether that is positive or negative depends on multiple factors, many of which scientists have yet to quantify. What is known from science is the importance of connection and relationships to sustain mental health.

"If the world is relationally impoverished - if people are not really talking with each other, if they are not present with each other - you will not get adequate stimulation of the parts of your brain involved in forming and maintaining healthy relationships and you will be fundamentally self absorbed," said Dr. Bruce Perry, a Senior Fellow at The Child Trauma Academy in Houston at the 2015 Roots of Empathy Research Symposium. "We've become so focused on this frenzied, disconnected style of life that we are essentially making ourselves much more vulnerable to the inevitable stressors and adversity of life."

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"Who we learn about, who we are and our sense of self is really key to be learned about through relationships," said Kinsie Dunham, a therapist with the Missoula County Healthy Relationships Project and fourth-year graduate student in clinical psychology. "That includes social media and is a social context that is important for that development of identity and sense of self."

According to Pew Research Center, use of social media has increased from 5% of American adults in 2005 to 72% of adults in 2019. Nearly 75% of users reported using Facebook, the most popular platform in 2019, daily. The Common Sense Census reports teenagers are on screen media, outside of school and work, more than seven hours a day.

Dunham outlined three processes that help develop a person's sense of self. First is seeing one's self as unique and separate from others. Second is a coherent sense of self when in different contexts, roles or in different situations. Third, the sense of self is the same across time. While identity development, sense of self and self-image is a lifelong process, it is really important in adolescence through age 30.

Due to the amount of time adolescence and young adults spend on social media, their time of personal development and social identity formation is now reliant on social media. Dunham said this can be a double-edged sword.

Dunham said part of developing identity comes through comparison to others. Because social media platforms allow for exposure to people around the world, from different communities, values and interests, there is a lot more opportunity for those who engage to compare themselves to others.

Those who can use the relational and connection aspects of social media can enhance their sense of self and wellbeing by building self-esteem and important connections with others Dunham said. Those that use social media to strengthen bonds with existing friends and to form new friendships online, reduce social isolation and loneliness and indirectly improves mental health. Dunham said this is the rich get richer hypothesis.

However, comparison is not always good especially because people have different resources in different communities that is not always apparent on social media.

"It goes from comparing apples to apples, to apples and oranges, or even apples to airplanes," said Dunham.

Someone's body image can also be affected by negative comparisons. On social media, someone can present themselves however they wish. Dunham said this makes it difficult to know if someone is true and authentic and how much their images are filtered or altered. If the comparison is unrealistic to achieve, this can be harmful.

"We can internalize this idea that we are not like this influence or we are not like this celebrity, therefore, we are not good," said Dunham. "That negative self image becomes infused within our sense of self."

Dunham said those that engage in unhealthy comparisons, later on in life develop depression and social anxiety symptoms and are more likely to experience loneliness and a depressed mood.

Several studies have shown that those who are more introverted, have social anxiety or those with low self esteem may feel more comfortable socializing on social media rather than face-to-face. This can increase their social network and mental wellbeing.

This ease and feeling connected to people with similar interests and values that may be outside an immediate community is part of the reason Dunham feels social media has taken the country by storm.

"Social support is one of the most protective factors that we see for mental health. Having people that you can rely on to support you emotionally or even physically or financially is so wonderful in helping people with their mental health concerns," said Dunham. "That is certainly true on social media. Those in the rich get richer category are able to seek that and have that need of social support and are able to create deep and meaningful relationships with people on social media. That can be incredibly helpful and healing."

However, according to a study published by Personality and Individual Differences 153 (2020) poor self-esteem may be associated with social media users if they replace stronger, in-person relationships with weaker, superficial online relationships.

While scientists are still trying to figure out how relationships developed online relate to things developing a sense of self and empathy, Dunham highlighted one of the pitfalls people can fall into when building relationships online is sharing too much information too quickly.

When relationships are built in person, they develop slowly with people sharing and disclosing more about themselves over time. This can be out of sync online when someone shares something too big about himself or herself too quickly making others uncomfortable.

While sharing online may feel safer, Dunham said things like self-disclosure or emotional expression are different on social media because others perceive the context differently. In some contexts, like in a closed group with a common goal, sharing opinions, feelings and emotions can be really helpful. However in a broader, more public context, it puts others in a situation where they don't know how to respond and could degrade relationships.

Sharing about oneself through social media provides positive reinforcement through reaction buttons, comments and shares. Dunham said this reinforces relationships making people feel more connected to each other. However it also increases someone's appetite of behavior that creates a dependency, or addiction, to the engagement. Dunham said when the positive reinforcement becomes the expectation, if it is not upheld, someone may feel sad or self-conscious. Overtime this can negatively affect someone's mental health.

"Relational health buffers you from adversity. It gives you resilience," said Perry during the 2015 symposium. "The more relational health you have the more you are protected. The families and individuals that have a strong relational web will not only be able to buffer some of the acute adversity, they will be able to, over time, take that adversity over time and turn it into wisdom."

Due to their limited capacity for self-regulation and their vulnerability to peer pressure, adolescents may not evade the potentially adverse effects of social media use, and consequently, they are at greater risk of developing mental disorders. Dunham said parents should teach their children good online social skills early in life. As they get older, she said balancing independence but yet keeping youth safe from harmful or unrealistic comparisons and engagements is a balancing act parents must strive to achieve during adolescence. She said when identity development is occurring, it is important to provide support that allows someone to make mistakes and learn from them.

"That is really scary," said Dunham. "It is difficult to know how much privacy I should give my teen that can be helpful and supportive."

Social media is all about boundaries, what is shared, what is not disclosed and amount of time spent on it. Setting appropriate boundaries will look different for each person and family and will evolve over time, but Dunham said it is important to define them. She cautions that parents having access to all of their teenagers accounts may breach trust and harm a relationship. Explicit conversations and discussing it openly can be more helpful through setting limits on the amount of time, access to the Internet and teaching self-monitoring skills which is in turn a helpful life skill.

Intentional conversations about cyberbullying are exceptionally important, said Dunham. Cyberbullying is any exceedingly negative feedback including name-calling, slurs or attacks through social media. Dunham said it can be a single attack but often it is repetitive and can be done anonymously. This makes it difficult to intervene.

Dunham said there could be a lot of shame with cyberbullying making it hard for children and teens to reach out for help from an adult. If someone is internalizing the messages they receive from social media, cyberbullying is a pretty clear message that there is something wrong with an individual. This can have intense impacts on self-esteem, depression and attempting and completing suicide.

Social media use is also associated with a less active lifestyle and interrupted sleep due to blue light exposure. Dunham said these things impact a person's mental health by making it harder to manage stress and worsen depression and anxiety symptoms.

Perry said the exponential rate that the population is growing and rate at which technology is advancing far exceeds humans' ability to cognitively solve problems. Screen hygiene needs to be taught and addressed by both parents and in schools.

"We need to make sure that the problem-solving process acknowledges and respects the need to have relationally, healthy, empathic individuals for part of the problem solving process of the future," said Perry during the 2015 Symposium. "If we don't we are going to get a lot of people who are self absorbed, focused on their self interest and won't be altruistic."

Next week we wrap up the series on social media presenting tips and tricks of how to be a better consumer.