How Has Social Media Affected Communication

How Has Social Media Affected Communication

This page may contains affiliate links. If you click and buy we may make a commission, at no additional charge to you. Please see our disclosure policy for more details.

Since the emergence of Social Media, our ways of communication have totally changed; before social media, we were limited to interacting with a smaller number of people, but now doors are open to communicating with anyone in the world. 

Also, we can share our thoughts, feelings, views through social media and have discussions over them with even unknown people. 

‘How has social media affected Communication?’ The answer to this question is very simple. Social media has affected communication in both ways, i.e., negative and positive ways. But before having a look at them, let’s know about Social Media.

Social media – Social media includes various online platforms in which users can post, post comments, and engage with each other online to share and collaborate. Instagram, Facebook, Whatsapp, Linked In, Pinterest, Reddit, Snapchat are some most commonly used social media platforms.

Effects of Social media on Communication 

Today, around 3 Billion people use Social Media platforms, which is about 40% of the World’s population. So it means Social Media undoubtedly affects our ways of communication. So let’s have a look at both the Positive and Negative effects of Social Media on Communication!

Positive Effects – 

1) Doors to Communicate with more people are open- With the emergence of Social Media, now anyone using social media apps can communicate and share messages with anyone in the world. Now the distance of exploring new people has reduced with social media. 

Quick Link: Communication Quotes

If you use social media, you surely have someone who lives far away or in another country but is added to your social media. This allowed us to know new people and explore their cultures and other aspects.

2) Sharing Information has become fast and easy – If we want to share a message about anything, we can do that using social media. Like you want to send specific messages to your family members and friends, you can simply broadcast that message. Now you need not call every person and communicate your message. 

Or, in another way, you can see any tweet, picture, or life event of your idol/artist in no time. 

3) Access to Information has increased – The access to information has increased manifold. Now, if you want to learn a recipe for the cake, you can simply search for it on the internet or ask on social media. You will have tons of results for the search. This is also a part of communication but in an indirect way. The recipe you will see is a type of communication with the person telling you in their video. So, in this way, access to information has increased.

4) Social Media can fill physical absence- With the use of social media, the physical lack of a person can be filled, and you can just communicate with them through social media. For example, a person is in foreign and is far away from family. Now with social media, his family can video call him and talk to him. It eases the feeling of absence.

5) Easier to raise voice and join together – With social media, now people of the community, state, or country can quickly join together and raise their voices against any kind of wrongdoing. Before social media, posters, newspapers, phones were the only medium that was very slow. So now communities can join together, which is a good thing that social media has done for communication.

Negative Effects-

 1) Interpersonal Communication- Mostly, the communication ways of adults have changed. For example, adults now prefer to stay at home and use social media rather than going out with friends or family. So it decreases the interpersonal communication between people in real life. This way, social media has reduced communication and negatively affected it.

3) Boredom in Real-Life Communication- Here’s the unfortunate effect of social media on real-life communication. In-person conversations are becoming tiresome. Often, people become bored during real conversation and resort to their phones, as they want instant, colorful feedback available only on social media. The result can be a decrease in the depth and number of meaningful conversations.

3) True emotions cannot be expressed on social media – You cannot understand the genuine feelings of another person talking to you on social media. The feelings that we can communicate in person are hard to express on social media. So, in this way, the quality of communication decreases. Sometimes, social media works as noise as the receiver of a message understands something else without emotions. 

4) No filter on expressing emotions- With social media, people know how to communicate and say anything they want to without even thinking about what the person on the other side will feel or interpret. This leads to unhealthy communication or incomplete communication.

 For example, you didn’t like someone’s photo, and you commented wrong things on the post; this way, the other person may feel inadequate. 

In this sense, social media has decreased the quality of communication.

5) Social media has killed social skills – Since social media has become prevalent, people’s social skills have decreased. Now with only online conversations, you may find it difficult to talk in person. So this way, your social skills, eye-to-eye contact has been reduced. Social media has made us the kind of introverts who can only express their emotions online.

This was our article on ”How has social media affected Communication?” Don’t forget to take a lesson from this article and decrease your dependency on social media. Also, tell us how our article was in the comments. Suggestions are also welcomed.

Leave a Comment

LATEST POSTS