How Social Media Is Linked To Depression

According to CNN the US suicide rates increased more than 25% since 1999 and in 2016 alone, 45,000 lives were lost to suicide. 🙁 With all of the tragic suicides recently, I feel very compelled to share some knowledge about depression. I have had my own struggle with depression and I know first hand how incredibly challenging it is. Especially when you feel like you have no one to talk to. I was there, I know how it feels. It’s so hard. I understand. But there IS a way to get out of it and come out of that big, dark hole of hopelessness and sadness.

Please reach out to me if you need to help. I know EXACTLY how to help you get out of depression and how to manage your anxiety. I did it myself, and I can help you do the same. I think that one of the biggest reasons that people are struggling with depression and anxiety is because of our new world of social media. People don’t truly connect anymore. Instead, they’re disconnecting and comparing. It’s really mind-blowing when you think of just how much most people rely on and utilize social media. A lot of my clients and friends are totally addicted to Facebook and Instagram. It’s actually kinda sad. The way people connect now, versus 10 years ago is TOTALLY different! Back then my friends and I would call each other, talk on the phone for a while, go out all the time, and create awesome memories without the need to be on our phones or to be snapping photos and selfies the whole time.

Social media definitely has its benefits, but used in the wrong way, social media can cause a multitude of mental health and self-esteem issues.

A recent report says that it can actually increase loneliness in certain circumstances; more than two hours of social media use a day, doubled the chances of a person experiencing social isolation rather than reducing it. There’s a very simple reason we’re on social media so much. It feels like we’re connected to others and what’s going on in the world, but most people also enjoy (and sometimes crave) getting ‘likes’ and comments on the posts they make. It feels good. It gives us a high – a real, physiological high – and it’s fundamentally the reason people keep going back to it. “It’s a reward cycle, you get a squirt of dopamine every time you get a like or a positive response on social media,” explains psychologist Emma Kenny, “It’s like a hit, similar to the way you feel when you have a drink. The social media like triggers that reward cycle and the more you get it, the more you want it,” she says of the theory that’s been scientifically researched in depth.

A study confirmed the same brain circuits that are activated by eating chocolate and winning money are also switched on when we see large numbers of likes. Feeding into that, the study also showed that seeing likes on a stranger’s post made participants of the study engage more with it, in a ‘follow the crowd’ kind of mentality. It becomes a vicious cycle.

Check out the 5 social media habits that are linked with depression and be aware of how many of them resonate with you:
1) Compare themselves to others they considered “better off than me.”
2) Score highly on a survey of social media addiction (which included options such as “You have tried to cut down on the use of social media without success,” and “You use social media so much that it has had a negative impact on your job/studies”).
3) Say they were bothered by being tagged in an unflattering photo on social media.
4) Less likely to post pictures of themselves with others.
5) Less likely to have more than 300 followers on Twitter.