The Negative Influence Of Social Media On Young Children

Most parents have different opinions on what their child should and should not watch. Most parents do not want their children to be exposed to certain content at a young age. Is not common for a five-year-old to watch the same thing that a sixteen-year-old watches. This is because they are not at same level of maturity. A five-year-old can’t handle the same content that a sixteen-year-old. That is the same reason why we have age restriction on things like drinking and voting. The government feels that at a certain age people are ready to take on certain responsibility. That is the same for parents, they know when their child is ready to view certain content. To make sure that child are not exposed to certain content to early parents should …show more content…
They do what they see. When children play house they are mimicking what their family is like or what they have seen somewhere else. The same thing goes for teens. Teens see things on tv or social media all the time, and most of it is not good for them to be exposed to. Media is a strong influencer for young children and teen, and most of them are exposed to is everyday. If parents control what their child sees then they can prevent risky behavior. Media is similar to peer pressure for teens. It can influence them to do things that they are not ready for like having sex. The media make sex seem better than what it really is. Teens often have sex out of curiosity. They just want to see if it is as great as media makes it out to be. In the journal Watching Sex on Television Predicts Adolescent Initiation of Sexual Behavior by Rebecca L. Collins she talks about how about media as a impact on teen decision to have sex. In her journal she states “ sexual content on TV is far more likely to promote sexual activity among US adolescents than it is to discourage it…. TV may create the illusion that sex is more central to daily life than it truly is and may promote sexual initiation as a result...”(collins, e281). If parents monitor what their children sees on tv they can stop media from having a influence on their children. It will allow the child to make its own opinions about sex, and learn what sex really like. When they …show more content…
14-17 year olds are just now trying to find out who they are and where they fit in the world. This stage in their like life is very crucial. At this time they are building the foundation for the rest of their life, so things like self-esteem are very important. Media can play a big role in self esteem. It has set standards of what a beautiful person is. You have to be a certain height, a certain weight, and a certain skin tone to be concerned beautiful. Many children have low-self esteem because they feel they don 't meet these standards. In a journal entitled The Effect of the Media on Body Satisfaction in Adolescent Girls by Helen Champion and Adrian Furnham, they talk about how young girls feel the need to look like the idea body that the media has created, and how that can lead to eating disorders. In the journal it states “ the media may play a central role in creating and exacerbating the phenomenon of body dissatisfaction and consequently the increase in the prevalence of eating disorders”( Champion,214). If parents monitor the type of media their child is exposed to they can protect their child from having low self-esteem. The parent should know when their child has enough confidence in themselves to view content that displays media’s idea of a beautiful person. When they are old enough and have enough confidence in themselves they will realize that they are still beautiful no matter what anyone else