Psychology and hygiene of social networks

Study
" Life on the air "

Once the editors of Samizdat tried to abandon social networks, but could not. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and VKontakte undeniably absorbed us all, and now we need to learn to live with it. In the framework of our study “Life on the air”, we talked with the psychologist of the Main Clinical Hospital named after Burdenko Mikhail Kozlov about how social networks influence our choice, why dependence and why memorize many memes.

The popularity of social networks

A completely obvious answer: the possibility for communication. People have a biological need for communication. This is absolutely natural. People want to come into contact with other people. And social networks allow you to implement this as efficiently as possible. This is like a question: "Why became McDonald's popular?" People have a need for food. There, this need is quickly and efficiently satisfied. Also social networks.

Before their appearance, there were analogues, such as interest clubs. The same social networks, only in real life. Now it has digested and moved to the network. And by and large, the structure and crushing on the communities remained, the search for common interests and a certain share of anonymity - have been preserved. It is not about qualitative change, but about more accessibility. The fact that you can communicate right from home is comfortable and fast.

The Internet is a product of our psyche and our natural needs. Feedback, of course, is available. But the power of these influences should not be overestimated. Changes are rather quantitative. The speed is greater, there is more accessibility, more people, communication longer. We just follow the path of strengthening what was used to be less accessible. This is the desire of human intelligence, with its minuses and pluses.

Influence on humans

Social networks affect a person differently. The superior effect is directly related to human individuality. Each person sells his needs on a social network. Since the service provides satisfaction of many needs, the requests can be very different.

There may be a global therapeutic effect: people who are difficult to communicate in real life can calmly communicate on the network. It becomes easier for them. This is a positive side of accessible communication.

Negatively, the Internet can affect people prone to introversion and social shyness. They can be absorbed in them. They can put virtual communication in the first place and only on the second real. Because the costs are less and the risks are less. It is impossible to say that this has some kind of global effect, definitely good or unambiguously negative. The medal has two sides.

Teenagers and socialization

In a professional environment, many psychologists curse the word “socialization”. Honestly. Because this is a word from a very old paradigm. From the paradigm of social relativism or social reductionism. When we reduce everything to society. Here is a boy or girl, and how they develop, depends entirely on stimuli from the external environment. And there are ideas that, influencing these social stimuli, you can manipulate the process of development of the child. To some extent, this is true, because there is the effect and influence of the upbringing of parents, school, environment or group. A teenager is looking for groups of interests, makes a choice. This all affects his personality. But ultimately, modern science comes to the fact that personal, biological, genetic plays a large role in this matter, and social simply allow this to manifest itself. The concept that pornography affects social disorders, and shooters make adolescents aggressive, at least strange. Now they almost do not adhere to her. There are experimental data that aggressive computer games or the availability of erotica do not affect much. If a person is constitutionally not aggressive, then no matter how much he plays in anything, he will not be aggressive.

Next, apparently, there will be a question about the "blue whale"? There is such an idea that when a fox says to a teenager on the Internet: “Let's wake up at 4:20 and start performing some suicidal tasks,” all teenagers will buy and run. In fact, the topic is complex and ambiguous. For example, in the XIX century, the book “The suffering of the young Werther” was written. It was a book dedicated to "World sorrows." The fact that the world is fundamentally cruel, the world is a series of suffering. This book reflected the oppressive era of the world longing of the late XVIII - early XIX centuries. And this book really provoked a huge number of suicides. Psychiatrists of the 19th century drew attention that there were fewer suicides before the release of the book. And then all the youth from the salons, reading this book, began to cut out actively. On the one hand, such an epidemic of suicides can be socially determined. For example, we know for sure that war reduces the number of suicides. If death is everywhere, putting your hands on yourself - madness. Of course, there is social influence, but very insignificant. The threshold of perception simply rises. That is, a teenager who ended his life suicide would do it a little later or for other reasons. But a person has some kind of personality position at this point should already be formed. No matter how much a healthy person who has no such thoughts has no such thoughts about suicide, he will not commit suicide. If there is a healthy family, adaptation, there is a girl or guy, there are prospects, then such a person is difficult to knock out on suicide. On the other hand, if a person has some initial brittleness, he has already become thinned somewhere and is ready to break, then the additional factors of this popular culture can master it. This is a problem of not social networks, it is an internal problem.

Acting in a macrosocial environment is quite pointless. The fight against such phenomena is not effective. Moreover, they begin to withdraw the “young Werther” - they still read it even more. They are trying to fight the fox, it becomes so popular that the force of action is equal to the power of counteraction. But you can fight with microsocial factors. With the family, with the personality of the child, with the circle of his friends. At this level, a smart parent and/or a social worker can do something. But global measures are not just “from a gun on sparrows”, it is pointless.

Trends are set from below. When people try to systematically affect the very complex systemic processes below on top, they, as a rule, are ridiculed. And they make even worse. Shoot in their leg. For example, the state begins to tell teenagers that a blue whale is not cool. Some forty-year-old women from strange psychological organizations tell how to behave-this causes fierce rejection and a desire to get to know counter-culture. Over the past two hundred years, the situation has not changed in any way.

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Influence on the choice

To a certain extent, of course, social networks affect the choice. We create our own microworld, which reflects our inclinations. There is a reverse development here. That is, we influence the Internet, and it somehow affects us, but cannot radically change our interests. This is the law of the psyche: when a person is placed in an unknown environment, he tries to find something familiar in it. For example, a person who has fallen into a foreign country is trying to be guessed to local community. Once on the Internet, a person is looking for any books, favorite films, friends and information of interest to him. Ultimately, it becomes more conservative. His interests have a tendency to reinforce more and more.

If a person is an extrovert, inclined to a new experience, then social networks will allow him to penetrate a variety of communities and try a variety of classes. It depends on the person himself: what is his temperament, what personality. If a person is anthropologically inclined to dreary music and black clothing, a very depressive type in itself, then by methods of social engineering to try to make him a cheerful and optimistic hipster is crazy. And vice versa, too.

Influence on memory

Our memory has natural valves. She stores information in the form of the standard. It makes no sense to remember every day for eleven school classes. Our memory would drown in impressions, and we would go crazy very quickly. Our memory retains a certain standard: this is some kind of abstraction, for example, I got up in the morning, went to school, talked with friends ... This series of three hundred and sixty-five days is grasped into one very stereotypical image. Therefore, our memory can store a large amount of information. With the Internet, the same thing. Memory sorts information by significance. We will not remember some trifle if this is not useful to us for some purposes. You can remember a huge number of memes if they increase your social status, help to find a sexual partner if they help to strengthen group identification and so on. In this case, this becomes an important social marker, and a person will remember this. And a person to whom these meaningless gigabytes do not bring any benefit can be stereotypically remember: there are pictures on the Internet. And a couple of pictures for example. And that's it. This is how human memory works.

I myself notice that some kind of information metabolism exists. A person needs to consume more information. Then more and more. This is called stimulus hunger, which activates search behavior. I want to somehow stimulate myself, put on my visual nerve. I look at social networks and leaf through the tape. So I quench this stimulus hunger. Accordingly, the more you consume, the more you need. There is a certain strengthening of information metabolism, but it is difficult to say definitely.

Addiction

Now they revise the international classification of diseases. A number of Internet addictions can also be included in the list. The problem is that dependencies, like phobias, are formed from everything. It makes no sense to even list. This is a hundred items. Of course, there is something, especially in social networks. Sources that cause a large number of positive emotions are more likely to cause addiction. Social networks including.

The laws of dependence are for vodka, what for the casino, what for sex, what for the Internet are the same. The stages of addiction may change slightly, but the concept is the same. Fighting real dependencies is difficult and pointless. It is easier to legalize and relax.

In narcology there is a concept of an addictive personality, that is, a person who is dependent. Today it is dependent on vodka, he was encoded on vodka. He hooked on drugs, cured. He began to play, played. Then he became violently religious. He believed. Tired. He became an athlete, killed by sports. Such a person will form a dependence from everything that she does. Fighting all this is pointless. It is necessary to understand what is the problem of a particular person, why he does not have a golden middle, why he forms these dependencies. If a person is not addictive and sitting situational, then he can get rid of addiction. For example, a person has a free week, there is no money, plans or deeds, then he can embarraf some game, sit, sit in chats, and so on. As soon as the circumstances change, the dependence passes. Everything is deeply individual.

Life for show

Deep cultural roots of this phenomenon. Firstly, this is a demonstration of its social status. Show how you are rich, that you have money, time and resources. This is a marriage advertising - sorry for the sexist remark, especially young girls or rich middle -aged men suffer from this. This is a social demonstration. She has always been. There is no much difference between the sherring of photos on Instagram and luxurious outfits, rimming, tattoos and jewelry. All this is alarm about the status. It has always been and will always be. In the XXI century, this took the form "sushi on Instagram." What will happen in thirty-seconds of years? It is unknown, but the concept will not change.

Fear of missing important information

Neurotics or people with neurotic needs forms a fear of missing something in social networks. The roots of this fear are very branched and go to different areas. For example, a person has a need to hold a hand on a public pulse. It should be in the rhythm and spirit of time. If there is no rhythm, then a person may develop depression. He may feel that life passes by him. And behind this is a deep personal fear.

On the other hand, a person can have a very strong dominant. He must have friends, contacts. He is all the time in horizontal connections. Naturally, he needs to track it all. He needs to know the dynamics of those groups inside which he consists. This is the personal problem of the subscriber, not the telephone station.

Impact on sleep

We cannot fall asleep if we use social networks before going to bed because of the emotions that they cause us. It is easy to imagine how hard it is to fall asleep when the head works. Plus a dream is a subtle physiological process. The XXI century is a century of insomnia: someone cannot sleep with torn curtains, someone without a TV, someone-without sitting on the Internet. Sleep is a brittle process. In order not to spoil it, you need to observe the psychohigien sleep and not to scroll the tape under the blanket.

Time and emotions

The more we are engaged in our favorite pastime, the better for us. The main thing is not to cross the natural limits. In Japan, there are people who are marathony for a whole week, and then die of exhaustion. There is no better death from binge. But it causes more indignation. When a person thumps and dies, we perceive it normal. We are used to it. And when he doesn’t sleep and does not eat for a week, sits at the computer, and then dies, for us it is a breakup of the template. And the essence is the same. It all depends on the natural emotional background.

If a person is sad, he will select the information of a sad sense, listen to sad music and strengthen in his state. A person in a good mood, on the contrary, will look for funny pictures, series and so on.

Network behavior

All tips are not based on psychology, but on common sense. For example, a person with a very fragile ego, who is easy to offend, is definitely nothing to do on the Internet. It is advisable not to participate in conversations in the comments. He needs to constantly update black lists, put filters, set privacy. The Internet for him will be a source of constant collapse of hopes. Do not lead to trolling. Many people do not know how to do this. If a man-narcissus under the photo will write that he is a freak, then that's all. He can cut out of the Internet forever. If a person is aggressive, and he was written something about his mother in the comments, then that's all! The end of the calm Internet. There are trolls that gives pleasure to these fragile psychotypes to mock. Make stuffing and get a sophisticated psychological pleasure. If you are not capable of endurance and irony against yourself, then the Internet is unfriendly.

To give “ten rules, how to behave on the Internet” is like “ten rules, how to conquer any man.” It doesn't work.

If a person likes to show his life for show, set photos in underwear, and so on, then he gives in the hands of unscrupulous trolls the opportunity to ironize. If this is psychologically important information - especially. There must be hygiene. You can give only one advice: be trained and know how to learn lessons. If you were offended in a conversation, then, obviously, to answer with a caploc is a bad idea. And you will be given to understand this.