Andrea Maliza in Research Paper | December 10, 2020

Research Paper

How Social Media Affects Romantic Relationships

Today social media is a part of many aspects in our lives, in our jobs, in our classrooms, in our families, and even in our romantic relationships. Today many people rely on dating apps in order to find their significant other and start a relationship. The number of dating app usage in the year of 2020 so far is 26.6 million in the US, this is an 18% increase compared to the usage in the year 2019, which was 22.5 million, also note that the year 2020 hasn’t even ended, and these numbers may be higher once we reach the very end of the year. (Kats, 2020) Dating apps have made it easier to make time to get to know people since many individuals have a busy schedule. We see this major increase between last year and this year because of the current pandemic occurring. Being quarantined influenced people to spend more time on their social medias. A survey from The Harris Polls found that 50% of adults were using social media more frequently in 2020, 33% were spending more time on virtual meeting sites and 11% were spending more time on dating apps.(Kats, 2020) This data makes so much sense since individuals are stuck home and aren’t able to go out and therefore are spending more time on social media and these dating sites seem reasonable.

Throughout the years since technology and social media have taken over many aspects of our lives it’s been said that social media has impacted divorce rates in a negative way by increasing them. Yet, in 2019, it was recorded that the U.S has had the lowest divorce rate in a time period of 50 years. This means that for every 1,000 marriages only 14.9 ended, no data has shown lower numbers since the 1970’s when it was recorded that for every 1,000 divorces only 15 ended. (Wang, 2020) Even though divorce rates have decreased in the recent years, individuals’ sexual partners have increased over the years. Between the year 2006-2010, the median number of sexual partners men would have in a lifetime was 6 and for women it was 4. In 2011-2015, it was recorded that men would have a median of 6.1 sexual partners and women would have 4.2 sexual partners. Over the years the number of sexual partners for both genders have increased, but not as significantly. During the years 2006-2010, social media was beginning to become big by that time Gmail had launched their electronic mail app as well as Facebook and there’s where the online connections began to be made and individuals were able to add friends, share photos, share a status, and more. During 2011-2015, you can just imagine how much social media was being used, which means the majority of individuals would have a phone or computer where they would connect to these social media and communicate with others. Since social media has taken over our lives, this is how much it changed our behavior and interaction with it. (National Center for Health Statistics, 2017) Social Media has given individuals this dominant view of the quantity over quality, making it difficult for individuals to choose their partners for a potential romantic relationship. This can cause a series of issues, such as, individuals to feel confused in these relationships as well as make it difficult to maintain a relationship because social media is a world of comparison. Comparing one’s life with others, making us want what others have and not appreciate what we have. It’s important to note the changes social media causes throughout the years, sometimes we don’t notice how much social media influences our lives or how much it impacts our relationships.

A romantic relationship between two beings usually begins with attraction. You are physically attracted to an individual and it’s what provokes this urge inside us to quickly show affection. Later, if given a chance to get to know the other person, you get to build a bond, sharing thoughts, ideas, dreams, fears, things that are important to know by one another. Individuals usually begin to build trust, getting to know each other’s personalities and likes and dislikes. If both individuals are still content with one another after getting to know each other, they usually commit to each other and this is where a romantic relationship begins. These are three main components of an upcoming relationship and it’s how a romantic relationship usually begins or at least what leads to one. (Lyness, 2020)

Many times, in romantic relationships couples face challenges meeting each other’s needs and standards. Many obstacles are bumped into as a couple, such as lack of understanding and comprehending, and sometimes even family may be an obstacle. Challenges are often met in every relationship for sure and it’s important to be able to compromise with your significant other in order to overcome these challenges. Since social media has had a major growth since the early 2000’s, it has impacted these romantic relationships as well as adding on to the challenges and obstacles a couple may face regularly. In a 2014 poll conducted by the Pew Research Center, it was found that “one in four cell phone owners in a relationship or marriage found their partner too distracted by their cell phone”. (GoodTherapy, 2017) Social media has made individuals spend more time scrolling through social media that they don’t find time to spend quality time with their significant other. This issue brings more stress to a relationship because there’s no time for intimacy between two individuals since they’re too busy spending time on their screens. In the poll information it was stated that one in ten couples have argued with a partner about excessive time spent on these devices and that most of those arguments were about deciding the appropriate time to use a device and when not to use it. This goes to show that individuals are obsessed with technology and social media platforms that it becomes hard to control themselves and prioritize their time with their significant others. Since the use of dating apps and social media platforms have increased in the past few years, it’ll most likely result in more issues and more arguments in romantic relationships. Along with social media taking time away from a couple’s intimacy or quality time, social media has also changed a couple’s sexual interactions. There’s a new way to sexually interact through social media and it’s called sexting. Sexting are messages sent with explicit sexual language and content; sexting became very popular among adults in 2012. In 2012 it was recorded that one in five cellphone users said they would receive a sext from their significant other and in four years one third of the data collected in 2012 has increased. These new ways of interacting with our significant other has shown how social media and technology has become a place where we as individuals have become extremely comfortable with sharing sexual content with others. In just four years from sexting just becoming popular, it has increased by a lot and as years continue to go by and there are more social media platforms and individuals become more comfortable doing it. With the use of dating apps and building relationships through social media, sexting will only become more popular and will be done more often. (Goodtherapy, 2017)

Leaning more to the communication and emotional connection aspect of a romantic relationship, social media has had a big impact on these aspects. Social media has made communication quick and inefficient; it’s becoming more difficult to stay emotionally connected to your partner when social media is in between both individuals. In a relationship, what forms the emotional connection between two individuals is the nonverbal communication in between, such as their body language, tone of voice, and facial expressions. These are important factors in a relationship, it helps both parties to understand each other in a nonverbal way and with social media this aspect is affected and even lost. Communicating through social media can often lead to too many misunderstandings in a simple conversation, both partners may be arguing or having a discussion where in-person communication is very needed and here’s where social media isn’t helpful at all. Social media has become an addiction to many individuals to the point where it greatly affects their relationships and in order to maintain a healthy relationship and their social media life, developing routines such as a time in the day where they can take a break from social media is needed. Social media has changed the meaning of our words, our actions, our communication, and the human experience in relationships. We should be aware of this impact because sometimes we may not notice why we keep changing partners or why it seems hard to maintain a healthy relationship or a relationship at all.

Behavioral scientist Silva (2018) was interested in the role that social media plays in an individual’s romantic relationship as well as their self-esteem. She mentions how social media is a big platform where people mostly post their highlights of their personal lives, this may be a dream vacation, having an amazing romantic relationship with their partner, a brand-new car, etc. People like to share the positive aspects of their lives obviously, this would create conflict with one self when scrolling through social media and seeing all these positive things happening to others, one self would start to compare their lives to those who are sharing their positive highlights of theirs. With this self-conflict many individuals may encounter when scrolling through their social media Scientist Silva was also curious on how comparing one’s life with others on social media affect their romantic relationship.

During her experiment method, Behavioral Scientist Silva conducted in-depth interviews with men and women from ages 28-73, who are active social media users, all participants were females and males. She performed a type of survey with specific questions and asked them to answer truthfully. During the study it was found that 60% of media users have reported that using social media has impacted their self-esteem in a negative way, 50% of the participants said that social media has had negative effects on their romantic relationships, and 80% said that it’s easier to deceive other individuals through their social media posts. This leads to social media creating what is known as a paradox effect, which is giving an illusion of many choices making it harder to find successful options. Basically, for some people posting dinner dates, dream vacations, etc. is their interaction, they prefer these types of interactions than an authentic genuine human interaction. In the aspect of a romantic relationship, this paradox creates an illusion to the individual due to having lots of social engagement and popularity that they tend to hide their true self. It was found that many times people prefer interacting socially than physically since it is much easier to pretend to be someone else on the media and this way individuals seek validation through social interaction and may feel more accepted into society. Also it was found that 60% of millennials do have the fear of missing out when comparing themselves with other on social media this connects to romantic relationships in a way where people feel like the need to also keep up with each other’s lives on social media and since only the positives are ever posted we start to compare our lives outside of the media to others media live and this is what causes individuals self-esteem to decrease. With this happening so much on social media it begins to also create fear in social media users making them unable to deal with rejection and detachment. (Silva 2018)

With the finding of the experiment, there are many crossovers and domino effects that are caused and root from social media. Social media seems to be the place where people are able to be whoever they want to be portrayed based on their posts. The person they portray may either be their true selves or it may be the person they’d want to be seen as. It is very common that people post the highlights of their lives and the positive aspects and this causes individuals to compare their real lives with others social life that after all may not even be portrayed the same as their real life. Since this affects an individual’s self-esteem, it creates insecure people, leading them to feel insecure in their romantic relationships as well, it makes it more difficult to deal with the negatives of a relationship such as a breakup or rejections we will definitely face as individuals. With this in mind, society should keep in mind that social media focuses on the way people want to be perceived as, and how it does not determine the success of another person’s life or doesn’t determine your success by comparing yourself. Other studies relating to the use of social media and romantic relationships have unraveled other consequences to the result of high usage of social media.

Psychologist Yacoub, Spoede, Cutting, and Hawley decided to experiment the impact of social media on romantic relationships. They first brought up some points about how social media has affected our lives, for example, our addiction through social media platforms, the increased use of dating apps over the years, and choosing social interaction over physical interaction. These few points actually can lead to a lot of negative impacts in a romantic relationship, individuals are less likely to commit to a relationship especially if the relationship was built through a dating app, it is most likely that even if they find a partner the use of the dating app won’t stop. As well as any social interaction with an ex, social media has made it easier to check up on someone’s life since everything is posted on these social media sites. Even though you may be in a relationship, another individual’s ex may still be present somehow and it’s most likely through social media platforms.

For the experiment conducted, there were 100 participants where there were a mix of genders as well as ethnicity. The participants ranged from ages 18-56, the majority of these participants were in their 20’s. Emails were sent to a college campus and students were given anoverview of the experiment and a few questions. The students who were chosen for the experiment were asked for their age, gender, relationship status, and the social media platform that they used regularly. After having collected this data, they were given a questionnaire called Social Network Site Intrusion Questionnaire. This questionnaire measured the prevalence of social media in these individuals’ lives.

After the experiment and data collection, psychologists came to the conclusion that even though other studies have shown that there is no type of romantic relationship was being affected by the increased use in social media. But in this specific study it has shown a negative impact and relationship between relationship satisfaction and social networking sites intrusion. The data collected showed how individuals who used social media consistently tend to feel less satisfied with their relationship than those individuals who didn’t use social media as often. In other words, the more that social media plays a big role in the life of an individual the less satisfaction they will report from their romantic relationships. The reason that this happens is because social media platforms give individuals the chance to see others’ lives. Most of the time individuals use social media to post the highlights of their personal lives as we previously discussed, because of this individual gets to see other relationships and what they do for each other or what gifts they gave to each other for a holiday or a birthday. These events will then be because individuals will then be compared to others romantic relationships with their own and disregard their partners efforts and therefore cause dissatisfaction in the relationship.

Even though there are negative aspects of the use of social media and romantic relationships, not all aspects. Some individuals do find that social media has been helpful in their relationships. The authors Lenhart, Anderson, and Smith, have collected some data from High school teenagers in order to find the connection that these teenagers have with social media and their romantic relationships and how they use social media in their relationships. These Social media platforms can be another language used to show affection to your significant other but at the same time, they can also bring jealousy and instability to a relationship as well. Teenagers have stated that social media has deficiently impacted their lives as well as their romantic relationships in some way whether it is in a negative way or positive. The authors splits the data into four sections, first they measure how connected teenagers feel to their significant others life, if they view social media as a place to show that they care about their significant other if social media makes them feel emotionally closer to their significant other, and if social media makes them feel jealous or unsure about their relationship.

In their experiment, their focus group to collect this data was specifically High School males and females who are social media users and have experience with relationships of course. I will assume that these four sections that were being measured were put into questions for the students to answer “yes I agree” or “no, I don’t answer” and according to their answer they’d put them in the corresponding category. The results found in this mysterious experiment for the first category of “Feels more connected to significant others life”, 59% teens said that yes, social media does make them feel more connected with what is going on in their partners life, but 15% of those teens say that it makes them feel “a lot” more connected and the remaining 35% states that social media does not make them feel more connected to their partner. The next category of social media makes you feel “like you have a place to show you care about significant others”, 47% of the teens said yes it does, 12% said “a lot”, and 45% said that they feel like social media does not allow them to show that they care. The second to last category of does social media bring you “emotionally closer to significant other”, 44% teen said that it does, 10% say “a lot”, and 50% say no. The last category of social media makes you “Jealous or unsure of your relationship”, 27% of teens say yes, 7% say “a lot”, and 68% say it does not. (Yacoub, Spoede, Cutting, Hawley, 2018)

With the data presented, it did stand out that both females and males have different answers as well as different point of views in these categories/questions. It makes sense to me because the two different genders as well as both genders carry a set of expectations depending on the society they live in. Today, social media plays a big role in people’s lives, with this new generation who grew up with technology and social media, they both have expanded to many aspects of our lives and even our “love life”. Teenagers have taken the advantage of this and are able to develop romantic relationships through social media. Social media is a way to hide your face and in some way make it feel as if you’re anonymous, which is why it makes sense that 45% of teens feel more connected to their partners life through social media, or why 35% of teens feel like they have a place to show that they care about their lover through social media, or why 34% feels emotionally closer to their significant other through social media. It makes sense because they can hide their face and it becomes easier, especially if they are shy individuals, this part of the relationships becomes so much easier since you can show these aspects to one another through social media.

The use of social media over the years has increased and will continue to increase along with the growth of technology. The world has reached addiction with social media and will continue to stay addicted, as well as continue to have a negative effect on their romantic relationships. Social media use has caused individuals to have multiple partners, have less human interaction that is necessary in a relationship, individual’s addiction to social media, and to compare our relationships with these “perfect” relationships we see on these platforms. Social media has caused this domino effect in romantic relationships, one thing leads to another, it’s like a snowball that keeps getting bigger. With this addiction to social media our generation has, it is very likely that the list of negative impacts it has on our romantic relationships will simply continue to grow. Social media changes aspects of relationships, our addiction causes us to pay less attention to our significant other, when quality time is essential in a relationship to keep a healthy communication between the two. It changes the sexual intimacy between two individuals with sexting, making sexual intimacy not so special anymore. It causes misunderstanding in an important conversation, in text or social media, things can easily be perceived differently. Face to face contact can be necessary in these important conversations with your significant other. Social media also causes us to compare our romantic relationships to what we see on these platforms, people will always post their highlights in their lives and can even give off this image of their perfect relationship. We tend to compare our relationships as well as we compare ourselves and become discontent with what we have instead of appreciating it. This comparison issue we have then turns into a discontent in our relationships and a discontent with ourselves and who we are.

Couples who are seeking a healthy content romantic relationship should take into consideration all the factors that social media can contribute to their relationship. Involving social media with their romantic relationship can lead to these factors without noticing and therefore, being aware of this negative impact can help in carrying a relationship in a healthy manner where social media can be present but not allowing it to affect your relationship.

References

GoodTherapy. “3 Ways Technology Can Negatively Impact Your Relationships.” GoodTherapy, 12 Oct. 2017, www.goodtherapy.org/blog/3-ways-technology-can-negatively-impact-your relationships-0919167.

Kats, Rimma. “Love in the Time of the Coronavirus: How Dating Is Becoming More Virtual amid the Pandemic.” Business Insider, 14 Sept. 2020, www.businessinsider.com/dating apps-growing-becoming-more-virtual-amid-pandemic-2020-9.

Lenhart, A., Anderson, M., & Smith, A. (2019, December 31). Many Teens View Social Media and Text Messaging as a Space for Connection, Emotional Support – and Occasional Jealousy – in the Context of Their Relationships, Although Most Say Social Media Has a Relatively Minor Impact. Social Media and Teen Romantic Relationships, Chapter 4.

Lyness, D’Arcy “Love and Romance (for Teens) – Nemours KidsHealth.”, KidsHealth, The Nemours Foundation, 2020, kidshealth.org/en/teens/love.html.

National Center for Health Statistics. “NSFG – Listing N – Key Statistics from the National Survey of Family Growth.” Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 7 July 2017, www.cdc.gov/nchs/nsfg/key_statistics/n.htm.

Silva, C. (2018, February 07). Your Happiness Hypothesis Study Findings Social Media’s Impact on Relationships and Self-Esteem. Retrieved September 10, 2020.

Wang, Wendy. “The U.S. Divorce Rate Has Hit a 50-Year Low.” Institute for Family Studies, 10 Nov. 2020, ifstudies.org/blog/the-us-divorce-rate-has-hit-a-50-year-low. Yacoub, C., Spoede, J., Cutting, R., & Hawley, D. (2018, November). The Impact of Social Media on Romantic Relationships. Journal of Education and Social Development (pages, 53-58)

Summary/ Response

During this FIQWS writing class, I entered the semester feeling very insecure about my work. Sometimes I didn’t even know where to begin or how to start my first sentence. I would ask myself if the structure or outline I created for my paper was good enough. After the readings and discussions we were having in class, my questions and insecurities began to disappear one by one. I was beginning to have a sense of how the beginning of a paper should sound and how I could build up from there. In addition, it also explained very well how to respond to a question being asked and explaining whether you agree, disagree, or don’t know. With these new findings I began to feel more comfortable with writing, I learned that writing doesn’t have to always be formal, of course, depending on the topic. Overall, I am comfortable with my writing and have more knowledge about my style of writing and the aspects of my writing that I could improve in. The readings on They Say, I Say, contributed a lot to the new material I will take with me. With all its templates and explanation, as well as my professor’s feedback, I can say that I am comfortable with writing papers and handing them in feeling sure of my work and its content.

Article Summary

Lenhart, A., Anderson, M., & Smith, A. (2019, December 31) Many Teens View Social Media and Text Messaging as a Space for Connection, Emotional Support – and Occasional Jealousy – in the Context of Their Relationships, Although Most Say Social Media Has a Relatively Minor Impact. Social Media and Teen Romantic Relationships, Chapter 4.

Introduction

The authors Lenhart, Anderson, and Smith, have collected some data from High school teenagers in order to find the connection that these teenagers have with social media and their romantic relationships and how they use social media in their relationships. These Social media platforms can be another language used to show affection to your significant other but at the same time, they can also bring jealousy and instability to a relationship as well. Teenagers have stated that social media has deficiently impacted their lives as well as their romantic relationships in some way whether it is in a negative way or positive. The authors split the data into four sections, first they measure how connected teenagers feel to their significant others life, if they view social media as a place to show that they care about their significant other if social media makes them feel emotionally closer to their significant other, and if social media makes them feel jealous or unsure about their relationship. *No hypothesis was found while reading the article*

Method

Their focus group to collect this data was specifically High School males and females who are social media users and have experience with relationships of course. I will assume that these four sections that were being measured were put into questions for the students to answer “yes I agree” or “no, I don’t answer” and according to their answer, they’d put them in the corresponding category.

Sidenote: This article did not explain the method process almost at all, the most they mentioned was the age group and some qualifications. No survey’s or questionnaires were mentioned, but some student responses were shown.

Results

The results found in this mysterious experiment for the first category of “Feels more connected to significant others life”, 59% of teens said that yes, social media does make them feel more connected with what is going on in their partner’s life, but 15% of those teens say that it makes them feel “a lot” more connected and the remaining 35% states that social media does not make them feel more connected to their partner. The next category of social media makes you feel “like you have a place to show you care about significant other”, 47% of the teens said yes it does, 12% said “a lot”, and 45% said that they feel like social media does not allow them to show that they care. In the second to last category of “does social media bring you “emotionally closer to significant other”, 44% of teens said that it does, 10% say “a lot”, and 50% say no. The last category of does social media make you “Jealous or unsure of your relationship”, 27% of teens say yes, 7% say “a lot”, and 68% say it does not.

In the experiment, the scientist did come to notice that the answers from both genders were different, it was stated that 65% of the males agree that social media makes them feel more connected to their significant others’ life, compared to 52% of the females who also believe this. As well as 50% of the males said that social media makes them feel more emotionally connected with their significant others and only 37% of the female agreed to the statement as well.

Discussion

With the data presented, it did stand out to me that both females and males have different answers as well as different points of view in these categories/questions. It makes sense to me because it’s two different genders as well as both genders carry a set of expectations depending on the society, they live in. Today, social media plays a big role in people’s lives, with this new generation who grew up with technology and social media, they both have expanded to many aspects of our lives and even our “love life”. Teenagers have taken the advantage of this and are able to develop romantic relationships through social media. Social media is a way to hide your face and in some way make it feel as if you’re anonymous, which is why it makes sense that 45% of teens feel more connected to their partner’s life through social media, or why 35% of teens feel like they have a place to show that they care about their lover through social media, or why 34% feels emotionally closer to their significant other through social media. It makes sense because they can hide their face and it becomes easier, especially if they are shy individuals, this part of the relationship becomes so much easier since you can show these aspects to one another through social media.

Persuasive Essay

The Importance of How Social Media Impacts Individual’s Romantic Relationship

Social media has been used in the past years at such a growing pace. Since the late 1990’s social media has been used to connect with others around the world, has made sharing our lives with family and friends easier, as well as to become well-rounded individuals with the events happening all around the world. Social media has played a big role in our lives since it has developed and it still does. Today social media has dominated many aspects of our daily lives, including our romantic relationships.

Social media today can be used by absolutely anyone, anyone at any age can be active social media users, throughout the years many individuals have become addicted to these social media platforms. We keep up with each other’s lives through these platforms and this has caused some type of impacts with ourselves and even an impact in our romantic relationships.A research scientist Clarissa Silva, found a correlation with social media and individual’s romantic relationships, Dr. Silva states that, social media creates this atmosphere of constantly comparing each other, especially our lives, our looks, and even what we eat, etc. these comparisons then lead to us to post more and become more active users as well, to feel as if we’re not missing out. Becoming active on social media leads individuals to physically interact less, Dr.Silva states that social media interaction then becomes a normal interaction for many, leading to only wanting social popularity, social engagement and social capital. Spending too much time on social media also causes individuals to mask their true person, we begin to act as a different person on social media then the person we are in real life. These issues lead to people dating only for social media as well as manipulating individuals easily especially if their interaction is mostly through social media.

Researchers Amanda Lenhart, Monica Anderson, and Aaron Smith conducted a study on the effects of social media on romantic relationships, they state that individuals in relationships view social media as a space where they can feel connected to the daily lives of their significant others, as well as it allows them to share emotional connections, and let their significant others that they care about them. Even though social media does influence these aspects of a relationship, there are also other factors that were found in this study that affects a relationship, such as jealousy and uncertainty, these individuals have stated that social media has impacted their romantic relationships whether it is positive or negative, in a minor way.

In my perspective, I believe that social media has a strong impact in romantic relationships, an impact where it begins with one’s self. I believe that the impact is certainly negative and that it stems from an internal conflict with an individual and social media, this self to self conflict then leads to a number of issues in their romantic relationship.

In Dr. Silva’s research, it is definitely established that social media is linked to envy, loneliness, depression, etc. now the goal of Dr. Silva was to figure out the correlation with an individual’s romantic relationships and how this process begins with yourself and ends up in your relationship. A study was conducted, where adults were interviewed by Dr. Silva, these adults were of both genders and were active media users. After this in-depth interview was conducted, three statements were made and the percentages of these individuals were given, “60% of people using social media reported that it has impacted their self-esteem in a negative way”, “50% reported social media having negative effects on their relationships”, and “80% reported that is easier to deceive others through their social posting” (Silva). The information that stands out from these results is that these three statements that were gathered after the interview were all negative towards social media and its relation one’s self and to relationships, as well as, the lowest percentage score was 50%, which means that most of these individuals strongly believe that social media affects them in a negative way. With these results, Dr. Silva came to the conclusion that social media is changing our ways to interact with one another and this is one of the causes that lead to such a negative impact on relationships, “Posting dinners, selfies, and vacay photos over human interaction for some are interaction. That IS their interaction. The paradox effect in dating is creating the illusion of having more social engagement, social capital, and popularity, but masking one’s true persona… The one you portray on your networks and the true you, for some reason, creates a double consciousness. Your lauded self on social media is constantly seeking more validation through electronic likes, not life” (Silva). Basically, she is stating that with social media, our form of interaction has changed for some individuals, and how for some individuals media interaction has substituted with physical interactions with other people. Also, from being active on social media so much, you tend to act like a different person on social media than in person, this can give you the ability to easily manipulate someone else, especially if they spend more time interacting through social media. Social media use can also lead to individuals seeking validation through likes and interactions when in reality, this makes it difficult for an individual to accept rejection in real life. Later this issue causes individuals to do things in real life just for social media, to gain popularity and to be likeably, this can also lead people to date just for social media, to give some type of “show” to others.

In the research Amanda Lenhart, Monica Anderson, and Aaron Smith conducted they were some interesting findings. These researchers also conducted an interview-like experiment and came to the conclusion that either way if social media has had any type of impact on these individuals’ relationships, it also has brought other outcomes with it as well. “Photos and posts can be used by teens to incite jealousy in others, often former partners, and lead to jealous feelings for some teens… It depends on like what they’re doing in the picture. If they’re just standing side by side, it’s like, chill. But if they’re like … if he’s got his arm on her or something, like, more. … Like I guess it just depends on your jealousy level if you can feel like, ‘oh, I know my man wants me.’ Or if you’re like ‘does he really want me?’ It just depends on the person” (Lenhart, Anderson, Smith). Basically, even though these individuals believe that social media helps their relationships and make them feel more connected to their partners, these social medias can be problematic or bring issues into a relationship, depending on certain publications.

I will agree with Dr. Silva’s findings and her explanation on social media and how it impacts romantic relationships. I believe that the impact of social media on a romantic relationship can be negative rather than positive. There are positives but I believe that the negative outweighs the positive aspects and therefore, I will be agreeing with Dr. Silva completely. The issues with social media with romantic relationships is that social media is world where you can choose what you want to be. Everyone has this option, I believe it can also be a hiding place for many who are socially awkward as well as lonely in real life, with this being said, social media is a huge virtual world that gives individuals the opportunity to be who they want to be. It seems as if everyone was to be the same person, they want to portray themselves as someone who is enjoying life, who gets along with everyone, who travels, who has the perfect love life, someone liked by many. This mindset stems from comparisons, comparing yourself to others people’s lives and their highlights to yours. This is exactly the fact as to why we act one way off social media and another in real life. These characteristics do fool an individual who is just meeting you online through these platforms. Being on social media so much causes you to seek validation from others, individuals struggle to fit in a certain in real life, social media gives them the opportunity to become someone who they are not, and individuals will take the chance in order to be liked by many. This self-seeking validation as well as the world of social media makes it harder for individuals to deal with the ugly, detachment, a negative comment with their partner, or a break up with their significant other. Social media creates this world where you can be who you want and where you can create this perfect world, but it distracts you and later individuals have a harder time accepting what real life has for them.

Others may believe that social media does the opposite, that it has a positive impact on romantic relationships because you can speak with your significant other whenever you want or because it is easier to communicate that way, but I believe otherwise, since social media allows you to be who you want and act however you’d want to act, it also enforces complicated aspects of a relationship. Such as jealous, researchers Lenhart, Anderson, and Smith, had a participate in their study stating that sometimes social media can be used to incite jealousy in relationships, they stated how if “depends on like what they’re doing in the picture” (Lenhart,Anderson,Smith), these types of situations where individuals would have to analyze social media comments, texts, and even a picture, makes a relationships more complicated than what it already is in real life.

I do not want to instruct other couples or individuals with relationship experience to completely get rid of their social media, I understand that’s the way we connect and communicate with one another today, but I do want it to be clear the negative impacts that social media can have in an individual’s relationships due to the fact that they get carried away with the attention, the popularity, and some social engagement. But it is important to prioritize our interactions outside of social media as much as we can, humans are very social, and social media will never measure up to the physical social interaction we experience with one another, especially with a significant other. Next time, you notice spending hours dming your significant other on social media, stop yourself and invite them on a date instead.

Diagnostic Essay

New York City has been my home since the day I was born. I am a Brooklyn resident, born and raised. I say born and raised because apart from being born in Brooklyn and living here my whole life, it is such a big borough and every neighborhood you enter feels so unique as if you were in a different borough. I am proud to be a New Yorker, somehow it always makes me feel cooler or more open-minded than others who do not live in New York City. Once I visited my family in Mexico and other parts of the U.S, they called me “the cousin from New York” and got very excited when they saw me, for some reason they label me as “cool”. What they don’t know is that in New York City, things are a little different than what they think. Yes, they do hear things about New York, such as how there are better-paying jobs, lots of fashion, parties, and nightclubs; what they don’t know is that New York City is also one of the toughest cities to live in, especially as a minority.

I am half Ecuadorian and half Mexican, both of my parents are immigrants, and I have the “blessing” as they call it, to be born in the U.S specifically in New York City, a city of opportunity. Before my parents immigrated to the U.S they both had a different perception of what New York was going to be like. Seeing pictures of the skyscrapers and its attractions made it seem as if that was what New York City was all about and that that was what New Yorkers spent their time at. This perspective that individuals have of New York City is very much related to what Joan Didon in Goodbye to All That was speaking about. How New York is just an abstract to us New Yorkers, that these places such as Radio City, Wall Street, etc. were all just places that New Yorkers know about but where tourists spend their days at. What my parents didn’t know about New York City once living here is that it has five boroughs, 8-10 hour shifts, small apartments, and paying expensive rent every month. Both of my parents struggled a lot in all aspects (language, financially, culturally, etc) in the states. Growing up I have always heard them talk about their countries and how different they grew up from me. They spoke about their culture, a major difference. In specifically Latin American Countries, people seemed to be closer to their neighbors and have the ability to easily trust them. In New York City, it seemed very hard to create any type of relationship with your neighbor or anyone who isn’t your family. Another difference was finance, in Latin American countries financial stability is very difficult especially with large families, and in New York, there is more financial stability with the income that is received (even though many things are awfully expensive such as rent). Even though growing up seeing my parents struggle with these hardships, they somehow always pushed forward and always found a better job to be more comfortable with their hours and expenses. We aren’t rich or wealthy, we didn’t inherit any money from our families, my parents did not have a career, they were laborers. Even though we are not any of those things, we were always comfortable, we have a place we call home (our tiny apartment), space where we would make ours and make memories and we were thankful for it. I always had everything I needed, even had everything I ever wanted. My parents never made it feel as if things were impossible in New York, instead, they showed me that in New York everything was possible if you work hard for it. I have always had this image of New York being the city of opportunities where I was able to grow and be whatever I want or everything I want to be.

The city has many options. So many you would not know what to choose or what you would want to be. As a first generation young adult in New York City, it is difficult to network your way in a big city with different kinds of people. It can be scary or exciting, I feel like it always depends on the type of person you are. Many first generation adolescents seem to be embarrassed to get out of their bubble and try something new or even explaining where their family comes from, Me? I am the opposite. I embrace my background and my culture (whatever it may be, since I have a mixture of three different cultures), I’m daring, I love to try and learn new things. I feel like that is very important especially in a city that offers a lot to those who seek what they want or need. For people like me, first generation students it is hard to know where in society you belong, especially when humans love to put a label to everything. Many first generation students have a mixed background due to having parents from different countries, you grow up with a New York culture and the culture from your parent’s country . There is a big mixture there and you would not know what to call it, sometimes I question myself, What do I say when someone asks me Where are you from? This question can mean so many things, like ethnicity, nationality, the city you are from, or even the borough. I guess that is part of being in a melting pot, and a New Yorker.

New York City has a mixture of every culture, “no wonder it is called the melting pot”, I said when I first learned the term. This is the reason why I am in love with the city, I can be whoever I want to be or whoever the world made me be, and there will always be people who can relate to me as well as I can to them. This idea definitely makes me feel free, free from whatever expectations I have to carry from my immigrant parents, free from whatever anyone wants me to live up to. The city gives you that escape and I appreciated it, I appreciate it giving space for everyone who comes to New York City, that is what the city can promise. What it can not promise is the way you will be treated, yes there are some negative aspects of New York City. New York City is known to be The City that never sleeps and it is mainly because there is always something happening, there is always a movement from people. The city is known for its never stopping pace. I have noticed how people do not care about you unless you can benefit them in some way. That goes for any type of friendship you have with anyone in New York City. People seem to be in their own bubble. Always focused on their plans. They do not care who walks by them, what you have to say to them, nor if you are in need of help. Many times on the subway I have noticed how people ignore incidents very often. One day while I was on my phone waiting for the train, I saw an argument happening in my cart. This was between two grown women, one of them disrespecting the other woman’s child, and of course like any mother she defended her child. There was yelling, chasing, and hitting between the two women. Even though there were plenty of people in the cart, no one tried to stop or break up the fight between them, people preferred watching two women hurt themselves, all because as New Yorkers we should “mind our business”. This is not the only problem we have when we live with this norm of “minding our business”. So much social injustice exists and when we have these conflicts no one steps in. My parents have both encountered racism at their jobs, in my father’s case he had physical fights with people and when he told me this story, he also mentioned how no one bothered to step in and help solve the conflict and settle differently. People seem to not care and continue walking to the place they need to get to, they get on with their pace and their routine. This is a major issue that should stop in New York City but after all, it is the rudest city in the world, because I have no hope that these issues would be fixed. In a city where money drives people, people are no longer caring for one another, instead, they prefer having people get out of their way to keep them from succeeding.

The city has been good to me, despite the cons it has. I have been able to experiment and be a part of a city so powerful, and so known across the world. But I do think at some point I will leave. Sometimes feel when you outgrow your environment and you feel like you have to move in order to keep growing in the right environment. New York City has the best environment for young adults. People who are new to adulthood are trying to figure out what they want from life, students who want to enter into the best schools in New York and finish their studies here, to workers who want to make more money to support their families, and more. At some point, these tasks will be complete, then what? Personally, I feel like New York City is a phase, a phase where you spent some of your best years figuring out who you are as a person, who you want to be, and work on your future. Once that is sorted for me, I feel like that is when I close a chapter in my life. Life in New York City right now simply looks like an apartment, monthly rent, monthly bills, and work. These are a list of things I do not want to spend the rest of my life doing. I would like to have peace when I grow up and tranquility. Once I graduate from grad school, I would like to move to another state that is calmer and buy myself a house, for myself and my future generations. I would like to be able to have more than just a little apartment in Brooklyn, I want my own property under my name. I definitely wish I could stay in the city and live my best life, with my career, and my family. Sometimes it is better to move to an environment that suits your lifestyle. New York City has a specific lifestyle, a unique lifestyle that can be exhausting at some point. I do not want to get exhausted in New York City. I do not think I ever will, but at some point, my phase here will be done and I will make the decision to leave and make of my life elsewhere. A place where I can continue to grow as a person, but the credit of the great person I will become will always go to The City that never sleeps.

Introduction

My name is Andrea Maliza, I am a student at The City College of New York, majoring in Biology. The sciences have had my interest since my early years and ever since kept amazing me. I love how science works especially human anatomy. While in college, I wish to exceed in all my academic skills as well as become a better version of myself, I wish to not be afraid to write my assignments with fear of getting a low grade but instead feeling proud of the work I am handing in. I hope to become very involved in the student body and build friendships with students who are aspiring biologists as well and who wish to exceed as much as myself. I wish to build bonds with my professors to make my college career easier and be able to network. After my bachelor’s degree, I am hoping to attend medical school in the future to become a pediatrician. I wish to help and attend those children in 3^rd world countries who don’t have access to health care by offering my services and providing children with the care they deserve. I want to be able to help those families in need by at least take care of their children and making sure they are healthy. With college, I also wish to demonstrate to my family that education is important, and educating yourself can take you places in life. I want my family to also realize that in life nothing is limited and that you can accomplish your craziest dream even if they seem very far and difficult to do so. I want to keep my word to my family and show them that my dreams and goals are serious and that it was possible with persistence.