You are an addict, especially an over obsessive one, only if you overuse and abuse the usage of social media. Teens from the age of twelve to seventeen abuse the use of social media, and are overly obsessed with it. According to statistics, it states that the use of social media has increased rapidly from the year of 2006 to now (Amanda Lenhart). Teens nowadays feel like it’s alright to start sexting, cyber bully, and just stay glued to their phone because they think they can do whatever they want because no one is watching them. Teens my age need to give social media a break for once, so they can experience the future and what’s coming ahead for them. Even though social media makes it easier to connect with others and finish tasks, teens should use social media the right way and need to set it aside so they can focus on the outside world not the technological world.

Teens should give social media and the internet a break because it can basically give your brain harmful effects, causing physical and emotional damage. Overuse of social media can basically give teenagers an addict’s brain, which is equivalent to being addicted to smoking, alcohol, and drug dealing. Social Media can often give teens the pleasure to share with their friends and family their feelings and everyday task. When they get good feedback from what they have shared, like likes and comments, it gives teens the desire to post more and more so they can still experience that good feeling. When they get into the habit of doing this, it becomes an obsessive hobby. Social Media can also cause memory loss in their brain, especially in their working memory (Smith). When teens are exposed to the over use of social media, their memory tends to get an overload. That’s why teens forget the simplest stuff, like why they needed to go on their phone, an answer the teacher just went over, or why they needed to go to the kitchen or their bedroom. Teens will start losing the ability to store memories into their working memory if they keep overusing social media and the internet. Lastly social media can cause depression because of many reasons. If someone doesn’t accept his or her friend request, or if they don’t get a follow back, they can often feel alone. Also teenagers may feel like someone else is popular then they are because they have more followers and likes than them. Or if someone doesn’t text them back, they often feel, like the person who they texted does not care about them

Teens should give social media a break because of the dangers it can bring to each teenager who is overly obsessed with it. Especially on sites like Facebook, Instagram, Omegle etc.. Facebook and Instagram are set up for people to share their photos with others, like liking and commenting on others photos, and to reconnect with their family and childhood friends. But the teens who are obsessed with it don’t ever think about how much they put their life at risk. Basically these social media and internet sites can give perpetrators the opportunity to feed off teenagers especially the young teenage girls, so they can get what they want, as in sex. Same thing can go for boys too especially if gang members are trying to locate them. To prevent any of this to happen teens need to first set their account to private, disable photo location, and limit the information in what they post. Saying what school they go to, what restaurant they’re eating at, or even a picture of their house, can give harmful people a better clue where to find them. Second, teenagers should not put their address on any part of their profile, pictures or anywhere! Everyone can access your profile. That gives perpetrators the #1 information they need to attack teens. On apps and sites like Facebook, Kik, Instagram etc… People can set up fake accounts with an attractive person as their profile picture, and can basically try to talk to young teenagers and convince them to meet up with them somewhere , so they can go out on a special date, when we all know what the real consequences of that action are. Especially with the site Omegle, which is just like blind dating, but you’re video chatting and texting with a stranger, who could bring harm to you.

Teens should lay off social media because it disconnects them from the real world. Experts say “increased activity on social media networking websites is causing youngsters to loose touch with the real world...” (TNN)Researchers also showed that the more they go on social media, the less satisfied or happy with their own lives, which is not a good sign. That is caused by the pleasure teens have at looking at other peoples great post. Disconnecting with the virtual world and real world causes behavioral changes in teenagers with people who are overly obsessed with social media (TNN, The Times of India, Addiction to social media leaving kids 'disconnected'). The main cause is when you make friends on the online world; it doesn’t match up with your real friends in the real world. It often makes teens feel lonely and depressed. (A. Smith)

Using social media and the Internet is a great way to connect with the world, but teens need to realize that over doing the usage of social media can negatively impact them the wrong way and can disconnect them from the world. Also abusing it can just set them into negative ways and habits. Remember using social media too much can cause Anxiety and Depression, I’m not saying teens should give up on using the Internet and Social Media, but they should just limit the usage of it so they don’t have any harmful effects to their brain, and can affect them physically and emotionally.