How to Avoid the Pitfalls of Social Media

 Overview

In a previous blog post, we discussed the benefits of social media use, and I still genuinely believe that social media is a positive thing if used correctly.  In today's blog post we are going to talk about the downsides and pitfalls that many people encounter while using various social media platforms.  

Social Media and Professional Jobs

Social Media is something that the vast majority of us invest time in daily, but a lot of times we do not put enough thought into the content we are posting to the internet.  Posting careless or controversial content to our personal social media accounts can seem inconsequential at the moment, but we often forget to think through the long-term effects.  

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According to a study to a 2018 CareerBuilder survey reported by businessnewsdaily.com, 70% of employers will use social media pages to screen potential hires.  This article states that employers are checking to ensure that the candidate has sufficient knowledge of the internet (knows how to use social media), a professional image, and sometimes even posts that back up the accomplishments on their resume.  Of the employers that utilized social media to screen their candidates, 57% of them reported that they found content that led them not to hire that individual. It is important to be mindful of what you choose to post to your social media because it could affect your future career endeavors.  

Social Media Privacy

Social media accounts are often easy targets for hackers and scammers.  Phishing has become a large problem on social media.  "Phishers" often use fake ads or messages to trick the users into sharing personal information with them.  Over the past year, it has become incredibly common for social media users (Instagram specifically) to receive direct messages or emails asking for you to enter your account password.  These messages are then used to hack back into the user's social media account and the password can be changed.  The "phishers" then have the ability to direct message or post anything they chose using the hacked account.  Social media also opens opportunities for unknown individuals to access information about who you are.  This is why it is important to be mindful of scams and have appropriate privacy settings on your social media accounts.  

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Social Media Comparison

Mental health studies have shown a strong correlation between certain mental health problems and frequent social media use.  Social media promotes showing the very best of your life and the better the post, the more likes it gets.  This can be great when you have just posted a picture to your page that is getting tons of likes, but it has proven to be a very toxic mindset.  Pictures that are posted are often photoshopped and filtered, and the people that are viewing the content often forget that.  

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It is easy to compare yourself to these photoshopped and retouched pictures and it can lead to serious confidence and body image problems.  In some ways, these problems are inevitable with the use of social media, but we can minimize the effect that it has on us by being mindful of the angles, cropping, filtering, and retouching that goes into those pictures.  We have to keep in mind that we only see what the user wants us to see which is the final product, or the very best.

Summary

These are just a few of the pitfalls that social media presents.  These are all problems that can be avoided (for the most part) if we are aware of them.  Social media is virtually unavoidable so it is important to form healthy and safe habits.