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Hayley Stout
Professor Adam Padgett
ENGL 1102
April 1. 2014
Premature Internet Exposure
Development is a very important process in every childs life. Everything you are comes
from someone, somewhere, or something. We are all the product of our influences. This day
and age social media has an exponentially growing influence on todays youth. Growing up I
started using the internet around sixth grade. I liked the computer, but it was also just that, a
computer. I couldnt pick it up or put it in my pocket. I couldnt pull it out when I got bored
waiting in line, or riding in the car. I can assume if I had a smart phone back then I would have
been a lot more interested in the internet. Todays social media is so much more popular now
that it is right there at our fingertips. I went to the Apple store last week and met a woman there.
She had brought in her daughters pink iPhoneC. The lady told me that she had taken the phone
away from her daughter because her grades where bad. And then when the daughter had gotten
her phone back she couldnt remember the password and locker herself out of it. I found that
rather interesting and asked the woman how older her daughter was. She said eight. Premature
exposure to social media has a negative effect towards a childs social skills.
Cognitive development is said to be the emergence of the ability to think and understand.
The many different daily interactions that people experience help mold children into individuals.
Not having said experiences takes away from your individuality; it takes away from potential of
who a child can become. You cant become well-rounded if you arent put in situations that
promote versatility. At eight years old a child is still developing theyre cognitive development.
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If the child is constantly on an electronic device they are missing so many day to day interactions
because theyre too busy staring at a cell phone. David Buckingham quoted Erik Erikson in
saying, It also occurs through interaction with peers and care givers. Identity is developed by
the individual, but it has to be recognized and confirmed by others (Buckingham). The it both
men are referring to is cognitive development. Identities cannot be bought or made up, they
must be developed. This is why social media is becoming such an issue. Children grow up
without basic social skills because during development they were never put into situations where
these skills were applied. The social skills children develop should benefit them for years to
come. These basic skills should help one ease through a job interview, or even keep a
conversation going while waiting for the bus. The little experiences someone remembers and
shares mold them as a person; and often they happen when you least expect it. When a child
stops having unique experiences or interactions, theyre throwing their cognitive development
off track.
Constantly using technology limits the amount of personal interactions one has on a day
to day basis. For a child still developing their basic social skills these daily exchanges play a
large role in their growth. The conversations you have on the internet are lacking any kind of
emotion. By just reading a sentence it is hard to figure out the tone, speed and/or dictation of the
statement. Its hard to tell if the person writing or typing is sad or mad, maybe they are even
being sarcastic. These are the type of emotions that one would learn or pick up on from a face to
face interaction. Through daily interactions with others we build our social skills as well as our
manners. If a child never has to interact with others they miss out on a lot of key developmental
points. In an article by Barbara Wilson she states that preschoolers are able to recognize simple
emotions . Emotions like happiness, sadness, and sometimes anger. The child recognizes these
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emotions due to experienced human interactions. During a childs development emotions
learned through human interactions are more recognizable and memorable than those
experienced through technology. Although the child may be able to eventually grasp the
jealousy or greed they see on TV, the face to face interactions are what the inner-self identifies
with. Understanding your mother is happy, or feeling her warmth, those are things that a childs
mind is made to understand (Wilson). If the age a child starts using social media keeps getting
younger and younger, I think the amount emotions the child recognizes will start to diminish.
Social media gives children such a skewed perception of the real world. Celebrities have
millions and millions of young followers on Twitter and Instagram. Although famous people
dont live life like the average person that doesnt always register is a childs mind. The children
cheat themselves out of key developmental points due to striving for the wrong traits. VC
Strasburger goes to say, Research on media violence and its relationship to real-life aggression
is substantial and convincing (Strasburger). The language celebrities use on the internet is
usually crude and not appropriate for many of their followers. Rather than recognizing that as
wrong or inappropriate these actions are usually repeated or mocked. If younger and younger
children use smart phones, than the emotions theyre picking up on are going to be more
negative. Its no longer your mothers love you associate with, but instead the anger associated
with fowl language. Due to the popularity of the internet and these famous characters this is the
behavior that children are idolizing and developing. It goes farther than just the language
though. Young girls and boys are also obsessed with looking and acting like their idols. The age
difference doesnt register in a childs mind. Most young girls dont understand why their bodies
dont look like their favorite model. And the same goes for younger boys that dont understand
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why their voice isnt deeper, or why their muscles arent bigger. It isnt good for a childs
development or self-esteem to be exposed to something that isnt age appropriate.
The lack of self-esteem as well as self-respect developed by children contributes to the
amount of bullying among kids exposed to social media too early. Not only do mature bodies
make younger children feel insecure about themselves, but a lot of the time that insecurity is
projected onto others. One can simply comment something rude on an Instagram picture, or
subtweet. A subtweet is when a person tweets something negative that is obviously about a
specific person, without mentioning said persons name. Its easier for children to take out
aggression through a computer screen than it would be to do so in person. And its also easier
for children to say hurtful things when they constantly read them online. The internet is where
the majority of kids have their first experience with bullying. In D.L. MrBrides journal Risks
and Benefits of Social Media for Children and Adolescents she states, This (bullying) can lead
to anxiety, depression, and suicide. The consequences can be life altering, both for the victim
and the bully. These children may require treatment for mental health issues (MrBride). Not
only are the targets of bullying subjected to the long-term effects of the ridicule, but the
victimizer is also conflicting psychological damage onto themselves without even knowing it.
In an article written by Donald Roberts, he makes a point about how much less privacy
one had on the internet when a house had one family computer (Roberts). When everyone can
see what youre looking at its less tempting to look at things you shouldnt. In this day and age
almost everyone has a smart phone. It is much harder to monitor a handheld object than say a
large computer screen. Having complete privacy isnt a responsibility a child should be given.
Growing up kids dont always know right from wrong. But that is what your parents are
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supposed to teach you; not the internet. You cant give a child that much freedom and expect
them to know what to do with it.
Overall I dont have a negative outlook towards social media as a whole. There is a time
and a place for everything. Part of growing up is learning said time and place. There shouldnt
be a rush or a pressure put onto children to grow up. Younger minds need to spend their time
adapting to the huge and ever-changing world around us before they start concerning themselves
with the internet. Premature exposure to social media has a negative affect towards a childs
social skills.



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Works Cited
Buckingham, David. Youth, Identity, and Digital Media. Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press, 2008.
Print.
McBride, D.L. "Risks and Benefits of Social Media for Children and Adolescents." Journal of
Pediatric Nursing. 26.5 (2011): 498-499. Print.
Roberts, Donald F, and Ulla G. Foehr. Kids and Media in America. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge
University Press, 2004. Print.
Strasburger, VC. "Media and Children: What Needs to Happen Now?" Jama : the Journal of the
American Medical Association. 301.21 (2009): 2265-6. Print.
Wilson, Barbara J. "Media and Children's Aggression, Fear, and Altruism." The Future of
Children. 18.1 (2008): 87-118. Print.