According to the statistics, younger generations are spending almost 8 hours every day on various social media platforms. The numbers are close when it comes to older generations as well. It is not a surprise considering that most people are using these apps to communicate, read various articles, follow news, share various content, play games, and more.
While it is bringing many benefits that are related to the ability to get and share information much faster and with convenience, there are concerns related to the impact of social media on our lives and mental health.
It is also related to how people use social media. As a result, it can bring both benefits and downsides. For example, some research found that it can harm you if you scroll through feeds throughout the day and constantly check what other people are doing. Keep in mind that it can lead to a false image, increased feelings of loneliness, and lower self-esteem, but it can also interact with cognitive features.
These cognitive features are directly related to intelligence. If you want to check out your IQ score, check out iq-online-test.com. In this article, we are going to analyze more about the potential impact of social media on intelligence.
Is There a Negative Impact on IQ?
First, we must mention that this is a highly complex topic that is part of many discussions. Therefore, you will find different opinions about the true impact of social media on your brain and intelligence. While many negative things that you might hear are quite debatable due to lack of research and evidence, one thing is certain, and that is that it may affect people to lose their ability to focus properly.
The reason for that is that you have all information in your hands, and you can search through a lot of different content all the time. The videos, photos, articles, and animations that you can find on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and other platforms are entertaining and engaging. When people get used to that ability to find something interesting quickly, and simply move to another content whenever they won’t can influence the brain to become more passive and lose the ability to focus in the right way.
Source: theconversation.com
The reason is that you don’t need to imagine anything anymore, or struggle with finding the right information. When it comes to high intelligence, people who possess is are excellent in showing high cognitive skills like problem-solving, critical thinking, and more. There is a chance that those who are active on social media all the time could get these features decreased significantly over time.
Furthermore, it can also influence the ability to memorize things, and the simple explanation for that is that you don’t need to memorize so many things anymore due to the fact that you can simply research the internet.
On the other side, there are analyses that are showing that active users of social media tend to be more intelligent as well. The reasons for that are the ability to research various topics all the time, stay in touch with the most recent news, interact with people, play some games that are great for boosting cognitive skills, and more. In that matter, the real impact is very much defined by the methods we choose to integrate social media into our lives.
What Are the Real Negative Effects?
While it is not proven that it can lower your IQ, there are other potential issues related to excessive use of social media platforms. First of all, it can interfere with your ability to think as an individual since you will find a lot of widespread opinions and trends shaping the community these days.
Some of these things are good, such as the raised awareness of tolerance towards different groups of people, religions, political views, cultures, orientations, and more. However, many trends will interfere with people by leading them to reshape in a desirable form or change their opinion about something only because it is widely accepted by the community on social media. While it might not sound so dangerous or even as a problem, it can interfere with mental capabilities and cognitive features, which are directly linked with the IQ rate.
Source: makeuseof.com
An even bigger issue is related to self-esteem. You will find a lot of people who are sharing content where they are traveling to different locations all the time, that are always well-dressed, or hanging out with some people. The fact is that a lot of things on social media are fake, and those who desire to live the same life as someone they are following might have a negative influence on their mental state, self-esteem, motivation, and many other things.
Furthermore, we have to mention the highly popular model of short videos that is introduced by TikTok, and now used by most of other social platforms. Most of these short clips are highly entertaining, and it can be a fun way to spend your free time while watching them. However, there are numerous clips, and there is an effect on our brains made by that where certain chemical reactions will become more challenging to release over time, such as oxytocin.
The reason for that is that people got used to entertainment, and they want to get it instantly without any need to focus or be more patient. The most serious effect is that people could develop issues like anxiety and depression when they are enjoying too much content on social media.
Last Words
It is highly debatable when it comes to real effects of social media on IQ because it is related to individual experience and use of these platforms. The positive side is that you can always improve the way of how you are being active, and you can do that by focusing on interesting articles and challenging brain-improving games instead of watching too much of short clips.
Source: helpguide.org
The internet by itself is providing a lot of convenience to people, and abusing that convenience too much might interfere with cognitive abilities since people might lose the need to focus, be patient, to think individually, and more.
