The Social Dilemma
The documentary “The Social Dilemma” teaches us how social media platforms can be both constructive and destructive simultaneously. The documentary touches on the various positive impacts these platforms can have such as keeping you connected with your family and friends and helping you stay updated on their lives through stories and posts. It can help reflect on happy and positive memories with them and can act as a tool to make new friends with whom you share similar interests. However, the documentary draws attention to its many flaws. The documentary provides insight from the perspective of former director of Facebook, Tim Kendall who raised his concerns over Facebook’s goal to increase user interaction on the website. Facebook achieves this goal through constant updates to the app that consequentially increase the addictiveness amongst users.
The documentary is based on manipulative techniques and psychological findings that claim that social media and tech companies can lead to social network addiction.s. It shows that users’ online activities are tracked, watched, and observed by companies to build their data which is then used to build AI (Artificial Intelligence) to make predictions of the users’ actions.
The following issues are highlighted in the documentary from the excessive use of social media:
1. Social media addiction can lead the youth towards destructive behaviour which can influence their minds into harming themselves and others around them.
2. It can interfere with day to day important tasks like school homework, meeting assignment deadlines, and paying attention in class as their minds can be preoccupied with the content and comments they watch online.
3. There can be an issue emerging from misinformation and invasion of privacy. The documentary shows that the co-founder of the Center for Humane Technology, Tristan Harris, has analysed that the tech companies have three main goals to achieve:
– To engage their users by increasing usage and giving them some drive to continue browsing.
– To grow by making sure they come back and spread the word about their platform.
– To advertise and make money to support the functioning of social media.
To accomplish the aforementioned objectives, these companies employ manipulation tactics to entice people to use their platform by sculpting the users’ minds to see what they want them to see.
Films like these can help you understand the toll that social media can take on teenagers whose behaviour is influenced by the content they see online.
People who spend a lot of time on social media have performed worse on cognitive tests, especially the part where they test their ability to multitask because they are easily distracted. Excessive use of social media can result in memory deficits (in transactive memory), which is used to determine which information should be stored and which should be outsourced.
Towards the end the documentary shows interviewees sharing productive ways to stop the negative impact of social media. Some of these methods include not accepting any recommendations on these platforms, trying to use search engines that do not retain any history, turning off notifications, and other ways to safeguard their privacy.
In conclusion, I believe it is a great documentary to watch, particularly for students who will become aware of the consequences of using social media because it comes naturally to them and is the only way of life they see around them; they have no idea what life was like before social media, so it is a great reality check. I believe that having children watch this in class and discussing it would be a very informative session.
Thank you!
One thought on “The Social Dilemma”
Thanks, meenu for sharing your blog post. I totally agree with you social media distracts students from their studies and it may affect their performance in the classroom and affect their cognitive abilities and physical health. A social dilemma is a very informative movie because the film looks at how social media is designed to encourage addiction in order to make the most money possible, as well as how it may affect people’s opinions, feelings, and actions while also spreading false information and conspiracy theories. The impact of social media on mental health, particularly the mental health of adolescents and the rising teen suicide rate, is another topic covered in the movie.