Social Media: The Good, The Bad & The Ugly
In 2020, worldwide, around 3.6 billion people were using social media. The average screen time is 144 minutes per day, with the exception of Latin America which had a higher average. The most famous platform is Facebook with over 1 billion registered accounts. The number of social media users in the world is expected to rise to 4.41 billion in 2025. How and where we choose to spend our time is becoming more and more important.
In 2017, the Young Health Movement interviewed 1,479 young people aged 14-24 to understand the feelings that the use of social media brought them. In the study, they found many positive aspects, such as building a community and getting information, but also found that social media make you feel more anxious and it affects your sleep. Just over 90% of the interviewed uses social media.
Included on the list of positive emotions there are the following: maintaining and building relationships; self-expression; peer support; and access to information. On the other side are the negative emotions: FoMo (fear of missing out); cyberbullying; body image issues; sleep issues; depression and anxiety.

They asked the interviewees to rate statements – such as feelings of being on your own – on a scale of -2 for worse, 0 for no effect, and +2 for better. They analysed the following social media outlets: Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat and youtube. Only one of them score higher on positive feelings.
Youtube is the big winner in the competition. It did well when it comes to health awareness; self-expression; community building and more. The downside of youtube is that it messes up with sleep. And the big loser is Instagram, which scored very high on body image issues; sleep issues; FoMo; bullying; and anxiety. However, it performed well as a platform for self-expression and identity.
At the end of the report, they call for changes on these platforms and in education. They propose warnings of heavy usage of social media; also to highlight photos that have been doctored; and one of the most interesting suggestions is to teach safe use of social media in school, for children. That would include bullying discussions and how to look for help when needed.
It seems like we have to learn to live well with these tools because they are very helpful and they’re here to stay. Tristan Harris, former Google Prodigy has tips on how to take control of apps and not let them control you. A very important tip is to turn off notifications from your phone, so you don’t feel like you must answer straight away, you are free to choose when to check your social media.

Another suggestion is to download helpful tools, such as an app that monitors your screen time and allows you to block usage in certain hours. It gives you a breakdown of how many hours you are spending in each app and the results can be eye opening for many. A few helpful apps are listed below:
- Forest: this is an app to help you focus on your work and ignore the noise from the world. You set a time you would like to work and stay focused, for example, 25 minutes. Then a tree starts growing, and you can grow your own forest.
- Headspace: a meditation app designed for beginners and advanced meditators. It helps with focus, getting good sleep, relaxing, and more. A few minutes of meditation a day could make a difference.
- StayFree: Breaks down exactly how many hours and minutes you spent in apps. It’s free for Android phones. If you have an iPhone, it comes with its own monitor app. It’s easy to use and it has graphs to help you see the amount of time you’re giving to each app.
Written By: Amanda Rodrigues
Some mobile phones provide insight/ analytics into the users usage habits depending on the model and operating system, which will provide you with the relevant information to complete the below poll.
Recent Articles

New Podcast
‘Unlocking Ireland’s Housing Crisis’ is the latest episode in our podcast series, which provides an enlightening overview of the historical context of the housing crisis in Ireland. This podcast delves into the potential to integrate policy adopted in Austria, which in the aftermath of the 2008 crisis reacted radically different to Ireland. We explore housing as a whole with two exclusive interviews with experts in housing.
Read More New Podcast
Podcast: Pursuit Of Happiness
The ‘Pursuit Of HAPpiness’ podcast provides a provoking insight into the Housing Assistance Payment (HAP) scheme in Ireland. Do you want to know, what it is like living as a recipient of HAP, the instability, insecurity and uncertainty of the rental market and examining how the scheme is designed more so for the landlords rather than the tenants and the devastating impacts this can have on the people availing of this scheme, who can be exploited at a moments notice.
Read More Podcast: Pursuit Of Happiness
What HAPpens Next Ireland?
If the situation arises where financial aid is required to afford somewhere to live, there are schemes put in place to assist. The HAP scheme is there to help, or at least, it’s supposed to be. The HAP scheme is majorly flawed, and is skewing the market for everyone, not only the HAP tenants. The lack of sufficient social housing has thrown a considerable number of social housing candidates into the deep end of the private rental sector. It’s time to talk about that.
Read More What HAPpens Next Ireland?Article Archive –
- April 2022
- March 2022
- January 2022
- December 2021
- November 2021
- October 2021
- September 2021
- August 2021
- July 2021
- June 2021
- April 2021
- March 2021
- February 2021
- January 2018
- December 2017
- November 2017
- October 2017
- September 2017
- August 2017
- July 2017
- June 2017
- April 2017
- March 2017
- February 2017
- January 2017
- December 2016
- October 2016
- April 2016
- March 2016
- February 2016
Be part of the solution…sign up now for our newsletter!
One thought on “.”