Social media is a way of  communicating with long distance or nearby family and friends. Social media is a big thing in our world right now, especially with teens. About 4.76 billion people use social media to communicate, see what people do, post pictures of what they are doing and ect. The internet has a big impact on teens and how they are mentally and physically. How it starts, looking at someone  differently, missing out on things, and the amount of likes on someone’s post, are some things that happen when people  get so addicted to social media.

On March 2, 2023 an article from HelpGuide.Org called ¨Social Media and Mental Health¨ by Lawernce Robinson and Melinda Smith, M.A talked about the many ways social media is with everyone in the world and how it affects them . Watching videos or liking photos gets addicting after a couple of minutes of scrolling through. Now every teen gets on their phone after they get home from school and after their done with homework or with practice, we sit on our bed while on tik tok but then sometimes we  realized that we have to study for a test that is happening the  next day and most of the time we say  ¨i'll just watch one more video¨ or ¨i'll like one  or two more video then do my work¨ then after that one video we're talking about goes by, we keep on scrolling for hours and totally forget about studying. The hours of the app goes up more and more everyday because everyone is on the app for hours. Even though tik tok is funny and all it gets tiring for people especially with other  media platforms. That's why some choose to take a break or delete apps  for a while until they're ready to go back on social media and not care how they look compared to others.

January 18, 2023 there was an article from McLean Hospital ¨Social media and your mental health¨ how people are with likes on their posts and people bringing other people down just for their entertainment or to feel good about themselves in any possible way, Every celebrity has over 1 million followers and always gets so many likes on their posts because people like that celebrity. Well blowing up on tik tok is like a big thing for some people because they always try to find a way to get themselves a bunch of followers or likes. When a person’s  video blows up for the first time they  get all happy and stuff because they  have so many views and likes. As that person posts more, the likes will stay the same amount or drop a little. When the likes drop down by a little they  don't care as much because they still have a ton. But later on the likes start to drop even more than it did before and it might be confusing why they are dropping so fast. People  start to do whatever they can to get the same amount of likes or a little more than they had before it all  started dropping down. But then they  stop doing whatever it is to get those likes back up because they’re  too tired or think that they’re  not good enough for people. Or people bringing other people down because they wanted to feel good about themselves by bringing other people down and commenting hurtful things on someone's post. 

  An article from NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness) Copyright © 2023 NAMI, ¨Mental Health and Social Media¨ summarizes how people compare themselves to others and what it does to them. There are many people that post themselves on tik tik and they blow up because of their looks and they get so many comments of how they look. After a while of watching those videos or liking them, people start to look at themselves differently and compare themselves to the people they see on tik tok and wonder why they dont look like that and all these other  thoughts. Mainly teens think like this because we´re on tik tok all the time watching videos and stuff. Later on it gets so bad that people start to feel depressed on how they  look and have so many thoughts. Some try to do whatever it takes to look as good as those people they see on tik tok and others, they just keep on watching those videos to make them feel worse about themselves later on. Eventually, feeling like this creates more of a depression that means never wanting to leave the room, starting to eat less and less and not being able to look at yourself the same because that overthinking that happens takes up in your head saying you aren't pretty  as the other people on any social media platform. 

According to an article from January 20, 2023 from the University of Utah Health entitled ¨ The impact of social media on teens' mental health¨  and it said ¨teens are so focused on social media they forget about their outside life and their friends or other things that they are supposed to be doing like they would on a regular normal basis¨. For example, not going out is something that happens to everyone while they are addicted to any app. Now most people probably had that friend that would go out with friends or sometimes family, but now all they wanna do is be on their phone and do nothing. Next, someone staying in their room is also another thing about missing out on stuff. Being in their  room all day on tik tok and/or watching tv is something that every teen does during the weekend or when they get home from school. Friends ask if they  want to hang out but they  say no because they  are busy or their  parents won't let them,  but in reality they  don't want to hangout with their  friends and they  just wanna stay in their room. Sometimes people forget that they said no to hanging out and then they see pictures of their friends and they get mad or feel left out which is understandable but they said ¨no¨ to hanging out. After a while it gets lonely and depressing because now friends won't ask people  to hang out any more and they  just sit in their  room doing nothing and see all their  friends having fun and hanging out. That's why picking social media over friends isn't always the best idea to do no matter how addictive it is to be on the app.

As you can see there are many ways on how social media affects teens mentally and physically by the likes and how they see themselves and many other things that get into people's heads. Some use it to communicate with long distance family and friends. In the end there are many pros and cons (mainly cons) about using social media. Lastly, it  physically makes people think about themselves differently and gives them the wrong ideas.