Beware of danger,DANGER,DaNgEr!!!!
Contribute to Feeling Connected in Social Media
Homophily is developed because people seek to connect with other who has similar or same desires as them. A person is automatically going to gravitate with groups or individual they can relate too. Social media has become a huge part of people lives. Many use it to stay connected to family and friends during this pandemic. Others have used social media to promote their business and network with other business owners. Also, now social media is used more often in the second sense, and the Internet provides an opportunity for anyone to create an online identity,connect with friends, family, and strangers alike, and acquire knowledge, and share ideas and information without having to be physically present. Instead, one’s presence is represented on social media by shared comments, photos, videos, and other images (Psychology today).”
Negative Aspects of Social Media
Social media has positive and negative effects on individuals. For example, one of the negative experiences on social media can possibly lead to lower levels of resilience of the individuals who are extraordinary. Homophily might lead to harassing, fanaticism, and has even been connected to terrorism. It’s not difficult to feel powerful to terrorize or threaten when the individual has a sense of security by being around those who are like minded (Tullo, 2017).
Algorithms are explicitly made for homophily. They take the substance you have looked as well as preferred in your set of experiences and convey that substance to you. For example, YouTube does through music or videos you may have watched before. When you log in again it has the content waiting for you that is similar to what you watched before. Hulu, Netflix’s, Facebook, and Instagram do as well.
Prevent Negativity
When using social media make sure your friends are people you actually know. Join groups that share your interest. Also, be very mindful of what you post. For example, the presidential election was a very touchy subject on social media. People were threaten others for their perspective on the matter or because who they choose. I used that example because I live in Georgia and I had family that were not resident messaging me about voting because we had to do a run off for the election. People showed their true colors during this election and had many of Facebook friends delete friends for the negative post, racist post, and more. As for me I stay away from particular topics for that reason because I’m not going to sugarcoat anything and I have no problem speaking up for myself and what I believe in. People have to remember not to over share because everything should not be put on social media. Make your profile private as well that way you will be able to control who can see your page and who can comment or like your posts and pictures.
References
1. Fabrizio, B., Gualano, M. R., Camussi, E., & Siliquini, R. (2016). Risks and threats of social media websites: Twitter and the Proana movement. Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, 19(4), 233–238.
2. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/basics/social-networking
Week 3 Discussion Link
