One of the technological factors that have created a prodigious milestone in the 21st century is the use of social media in communication. The increased use of smartphones, computers, and the extensive internet service across the world has made the globe a village. People can communicate with others throughout the world without being limited by distance. Innovators have also developed various platforms through which people can interact and share ideas. These include Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, and WhatsApp among others. These are used to send instant messages and receiving timely feedback. The efficiency of cost, coverage and an elaborate joining process has made the use of social media a popular method of communication. Although it has been appreciated for bringing groups together to share ideas virtually, it has been criticized for affecting people’s social skills that are used in daily life.
To understand the effect of social media on individual skills and social competencies, it would be prudent to lay insight on the extent of its use across the world. A study conducted by Bolton et al. (2013)reveals that more than 55% of the youths across the world engage on various social media platforms. The study also indicates that 22% of teenagers log on into their favorite social media sites more than ten times every day(Bolton et al., 2013). In addition, of all the people who have signed in to the sites, half of them login at latest once every day. About 55% of the users prefer sending text messages while 24% use instant messaging to communicate (Bolton et al., 2013). The inclination to this contemporary method of communication has various effects on our daily social skills in life.
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First, the use of social media has extended individuals social circles through the redefinition of friendship and acquaintance. Initially, people reserved the names for people whom they have met and interacted physically and possibly won their trust. With the use of social media, people have acquired friends whom they may not have met physically but interacted with them occasionally. This is done through status updates and discussing different topics. Interestingly, social media users can have tens of friends. According to Dron & Anderson (2014), this creates a sense of belonging in the local and global economy. By interacting with people from different backgrounds, social media cultivates not only cultural intelligence but also tolerance. These social skills are essential in the wave of intense globalization.
Secondly, through social mediasites, people acquire competencies toengage in impromptu discussion and expression. The rationale for this is that in the social media platforms, particularly those that allow group conversations, individual feel compelled to contribute to discussions by airing their opinions (Dron & Anderson, 2014). More often than not, people within the group are likely to point some inconsistencies or disagreements with one’s opinions. Rather than bolting and losing track of the input made by others, users tend to defend themselves by justifying their claims or withdrawing their comments. Ceron et al. (2014) agree that such effective and healthy discussions develop people's debating and negotiation skills. Additionally, this can be transferredto real life situations that people encounter every day. For instance, the people using social media hail from different professions and this creates a multi-dimensional team of friends. Therefore, when airing their views in their areas of expertise, one appreciates their input on the basis of their experience. The tolerance of views and knowing when to withdraw are critical social skills in people’s daily lives. These are critical in creating a holistic and accommodative social environment.
The ability to fit in social groups is also developed through social media. It is noteworthy the social sites allow people to interact without uncovering the attributes that they consider detracting. During physical interactions, individuals with low self-esteem and perception may isolate themselves from social groups for fear of being intimidated. As Alberts, Nakayama &Martin (2015) point out, they are perturbed by the thought of meeting new people, and they remain speculative the reaction that they may receive from others. Despite the psychological explanations that most of the idiosyncratic thoughts have a weak basis, they greatly affect people’s interaction with others, particularly in the public sphere. However, through the sites, such as Facebook, individuals can interact without their confidence being lacerated. This allows them to develop their confidence gradually and they transfer this to the real life (Alberts, Nakayama & Martin, 2015). The knowledge that people can appreciate them online without capitalizing on their personal shortcomings helps them to disintegrate the self-constructed cocoons. It is also noteworthy that this social skill has been an indispensable factor in the lives of individuals with different forms of disabilities. While they may appear sequestered in a localized community, they get a chance to interact with others who have similar impairments, and they share experiences. They also get a chance to be appreciated, and this improves their confidence which may not have been possible while living in isolation among friends who do not share in their tribulations. The confidence in communication and interaction become a gateway to other real life capacities in education, family life, politics, and contribution in economic development.
Despite these positive effects on social skills that are applicable in real life, social media has various detrimental implications on interpersonal competencies. First, the use of social sites to communicate has reduced the need for people to meet physically. While sending a message, only needs to press a few keys and wait for a response. This, to a large extent, affects face-to-face communication skills (Litt et al., 2014). Through the sites, the non-verbal cues are not visible, and people only rely on what they can read or view the images. In real life communication, a significant percentage of those who frequently use the social media would exhibit ineffective interpersonal communication skills characterized by the inability to express themselves, lack of fluency and consistency of ideas. The rationale for this is that the communication on the social platforms uses limited words to enhance speed and avoid bulk texts. These may, however, be important during the physical interaction to keep the conversation live. For instance, the wordy pleasantries expected in face-to-face communication when conversing with friends is practically absent in social media platforms. Those used to the mode of communication would run out of words in a physical situation, and this can make the communication strained especially for individuals meeting for the first time.
In addition, forming strong bonds has been weakened by the use of social media. Bridging the distance between people has reduced the number of times that people meet to interact and share ideas. It is noteworthy that not all information can be shared on the platforms due to sensitivity or discomfort and emotional difficulty. Therefore, while people may have hundreds of friends they may only know a handful of them (Kaya & Bicen, 2016).The spineless bonds make it difficult to have friends one can count on when in need to discuss personal issues. In real life, some issues require meeting some trusted friends physically and trying to resolve them. However, the social competence of identifying reliable friends has been affected by the domineering virtual communication. This is evident with the high numerous criticisms and reproach that people get by taking rather private issues of social groups. Instead of receiving the help that they expect, they become frustrated in the knowledge that most of the friends are on-committal (Perloff, 2014). This is different from people who are used to physical interactions because they have strong networks and friends whom they can rely on when they need help outside the online groups.
Conclusively, social media has been improved people’s social skills by giving them a platform to make friends from different backgrounds, share ideas, and hold discussions on numerous topics. This has been instrumental in cultivating self-confidence and ability for people to express themselves. These competencies enable people to engage in other real life activities such as education, economic and political development. However, social media communication has limited communication on the keyboard, and a significant number of its users cannot express themselves in physical conversations. It has also weakened people’s skills in establishing robust bonds and networks that are essential when personalized help is required. These challenges can be resolved by integrating both the physical and social media communication since it is practically impossible to live without each of them in the 21st century.
References
Alberts, J. K., Nakayama, T. K., & Martin, J. N. (2015). Human communication in society . Pearson.
Bolton, R. N., Parasuraman, A., Hoefnagels, A., Migchels, N., Kabadayi, S., Gruber, T., & Solnet, D. (2013). Understanding Generation Y and their use of social media: a review and research agenda. Journal of Service Management , 24 (3), 245-267.
Ceron, A., Curini, L., Iacus, S. M., & Porro, G. (2014). Every tweet counts? How sentiment analysis of social media can improve our knowledge of citizens’ political preferences with an application to Italy and France. New Media & Society , 16 (2), 340-358.
Dron, J., & Anderson, T. (2014). Teaching crowds: Learning and social media . Athabasca University Press.
Kaya, T., & Bicen, H. (2016). The effects of social media on students’ behaviors; Facebook as a case study. Computers in Human Behavior , 59 , 374-379.
Litt, E., Spottswood, E., Birnholtz, J., Hancock, J. T., Smith, M. E., & Reynolds, L. (2014, February). Awkward encounters of another kind: collective self-presentation and face threat on Facebook. In Proceedings of the 17th ACM conference on Computer supported cooperative work & social computing (pp. 449-460). ACM.
Perloff, R. M. (2014). Social media effects on young women’s body image concerns: Theoretical perspectives and an agenda for research. Sex Roles , 71 (11-12), 363-377.
