Nicholas Monacelli
Mr. Wetherill
25 October 2010
Expository Reading and Writing

				The Adverse Effects of the Social Network

	Since 2003, an issue has been growing in American society. Sparked by the creation of Myspace, the nation has since been swept with the craze known as ‘Social Networking’, defined as “the use of a website to connect with people who share personal or professional interests, place of origin, education at a particular school, etc.” While Myspace itself has died out, the trend has continued and multiplied in intensity thanks to Facebook and Twitter, sites that receive millions of visits per day. While it can be argued that good has come about from these sites, such as reuniting with old friends or marketing a business, this good cannot come close to out-weighing the negative effects of this new fad. These particular sites have led to a deterioration of our everyday relationships, an invasion of privacy, and have only contributed to the fast-paced, succinct lifestyle that we live.
	I find myself in the small populous that fought the concept of social networking as long as I could, sitting by and watching as my friends made Myspace pages and talked about them frequently. After a few years, I eventually broke and made my own, but it was purely there for show. What we speak or write, the direct words, only account for 7% of communication, so I found myself much more effective in direct face-to-face conversation opposed to chatting on sites such as Myspace. As Myspace fell by the wayside for Facebook, the same situation occurred; my fellow students and friends all talk on Facebook while I refused to make an account. And, of course, around the start of my Junior year I found myself with a new Facebook account. This caused me to pose the question, what is it about social networking that draws the attention of so many people? With such frequent visits, what negative effects do these sites leave on our lives?
	One of the most prominent of the numerous effects is how Facebook has changed the way we as a people handle relationships. This is due to the constant access to other people that Facebook has given us. With the new generation of cellphones, internet access and thusly, facebook access is available anywhere, allowing for frequent updates and status changes and messages. Therefore, this network has allowed everyone to be in contact at all times, always aware of what someone else is doing. Part of being a couple now means that it has to be ‘Facebook’ official, for all of ones friends to see. And when a couple wants to be more private, people expect the worse, “Facebook ended Thomas Crampton's engagement. When the international tech journalist and his fiancé, Thuy-Tien Tran, wanted to make their "personal lives a little more private," the happily engaged couple removed their relationship status from their profiles. Jumping to conclusions, Facebook's News Feed quickly alerted their social network that the engagement was off, and the condolences started pouring in.” Clearly, social networks are taking higher and higher priority into our own lives.
	As a whole, how we express ourselves and interact with one another has been completely changed by social networking. While direct conversation is the most efficient method of communication, and the only way to fully convey their meaning through tone and body language, it seems to be falling by the wayside in favor of the faster, more convenient Facebook chat and Twitter. I’ve watched as students sitting in the same room would rather opt to listen to their music with their headphones in, and chat with another person in the same room through Facebook opposed to going through the hassle of engaging in a real conversation. While this seems harmless, albeit ridiculous, the truth is that this form of communication could be greatly harmful in numerous ways. For example, “Mental health professionals worry that these cyber interactions are a detriment to participants in that they discourage traditional human interaction. It is far easier to log onto a website and chat with friends than it is to drive to their homes to see them in person, but physical human interaction is important to one's mental well-being. Also, maintaining contact solely through cyberspace can be damaging in that it is somewhat superficial and not as meaningful as face to face conversation.” And thanks to the short, fast style seen on Facebook and particularly Twitter, with its 160 character or less updates, people find it harder to truly express themselves. A quick update comes naturally, but sitting down and analyzing a poem or writing an essay becomes a daunting task.
	What exactly can be said in 160 characters? Twitter’s character restriction limits speech, limits any kind of information being passed on and instead cuts it down to little bits that barely make a sentene-Oops, over the limit. With the growing popularity of Twitter, that style of speech has grown more popular to the point where not only is it leading to shortened statuses on Facebook, but it’s making our communication as a whole far more superficial. But that is likely why Twitter is so popular; we’re living in a faster society. A society that doesn’t have the time to read long articles, or watch educational videos. A society that needs its news in 60 seconds so it can go in one ear and out the other, besides the occasional comment to a friend at a water cooler. Our society was changing before Twitter came around, so it can’t be blamed for such a shift. But to say that Twitter doesn’t cater to this pace is certainly a lie.
	Not only is Twitter a part of the faster society that we live in, but it is also effecting our emotions and morality. A study was done where men and women were told valorous stories, stories about psychological pain or facing adversity, then were placed an MRI machine and recalled the stories while their brains were monitored. The result was certainly disturbing; it took significantly longer for the brain to react to the emotional stories and deliver the full effect upon the body. According to the study, “Heavy reliance on a rapid stream of info snippets through television, online feeds and social networks may cut down on the time required for feelings of admiration or compassion to sink in fully.” What does this all mean? We’re growing jaded and distant from the world we live in, thanks in part to the ‘wonder’ of social networking.
	For the better part of the decade, I’ve lived through this social networking pandemic, spreading and ‘infecting’ everyone in its wake, even myself. While it would be foolish to claim that these sites, particularly Facebook, have no redeeming value, one cannot turn a blind eye to all of these negative effects that social networking has brought about. My generation is plagued by a new sense of relationships, where ‘Facebook official’ is the new thing. Our ability to socialize has been declining for the last ten years thanks to the popularity of the internet, and I can only see it spiraling down thanks to Facebook and Twitter, where we can communicate without leaving our comfortable chairs. Not only that, but our world moves faster than it has before, where everything has to be quick and concise, lest it be utterly ignored. I know this is certainly something that can’t be stopped; social networking is here to stay. But I also relish my lack of interest in the social network, knowing I’ll never spend hours on Farmville, and can only hope to encourage others to follow suit. I’ll start now.