Facebook Good or Bad For Mental Health
Many psychological professionals have been writing over the past several years of the potential damage that social media like Twitter and Facebook can cause to a person’s mental health. Now it appears that Facebook has conceded it does pose a mental health risk. However, it follows that up by saying that more engagement with it could improve wellbeing.
This seems to me quite the mixed message and rather contradictory. The idea that occasionally dipping in and out of social media is the problem and that more engagement is good for you seems illogical to me. I would like to say that social media is not the problem per se, in the same way that alcohol and food can be abused and misused so can social media.
Being vigilant and mindful should be a help with this. We should be able to moderate our access as to what works best for us as individuals and to not engage when we are feeling particularly low or vulnerable. A bit o common sense using social media platforms should hopefully mean that we can all derive a benefit from this rather than reaping its potential mental health downside.
