Joshua Lanius

May 8, 2025

Social Media's Social Effects



At the time of this writing, I am sitting in a lecture hall with 30 other college students (yes, I counted). One of our classmates is giving a presentation, but only the professor is listening. About ten students seem to be working on homework. Me? I am typing out these words. The majority of students are scrolling on their phones—scrolling through social media.

When we modern-age college students came in and sat in this classroom, our eyes were on our screens. We watched reels, posted stories, and sent snaps. There was a time—one I have only heard of in myths—when students would sit and talk to each other as they waited for their professor to arrive. They would give more than a nod or an uncaring “how are you?”.

Social media was created for connection and communication. It was made to make us more social. It's in the name. 

Andrew Weinreich, the founder of the first social media platform, SixDegrees, said, “I thought about how networking had played a central role in my life and I came up with the idea of indexing everyone's relationships. At its core, I figured that if everyone indexed their relationships online, you could meet the people you didn't know through the people you did.”

After Weinreich came Zuckerberg with Facebook and Jobs with the iPhone. Soon, everyone had seemingly limitless connections to the world around them. This connection created the epidemic I described above. The epidemic each of us are part of.

So what went wrong? How did these harmless, nay, beneficial platforms turn so very bad? What effect is it really having on us?

Is social media making us less social?

In an article published by Cambridge University Press, the authors outline “the advantages and disadvantages of social media use on three key aspects of social connectedness: social capital, sense of community, and loneliness.”

Oxford Languages defines social capital as “the networks of relationships among people who live and work in a particular society, enabling that society to function effectively.”

Social media was built on the idea of increasing social capital. Facebook has groups that connect us to other members we have not yet had the chance to meet. Instagram has tags that allow us to see who our friends’ friends are. Weinreich’s idea for SixDegrees, indexing relationships online, is still present in nearly every social media platform. 

Social media improves our social capital. That is what it was made to do. 

The next aspect of social connectedness lies in more of a grey area. Social media can have various effects on our sense of community. 

A sense of community is the feeling of belonging to a certain group. Social media can heighten this feeling by connecting users to members of their group. It is especially beneficial for keeping a sense of community alive between members separated by geographical distance. 

Adversely, social media can cause division within communities. If a group member was excluded from an event plastered all over social media, it can hurt that member. Social media has made FOMO (fear of missing out) a very real thing. 

Social media improves our social capital, it has both positive and negative effects on our sense of community, but what does it do for the final aspect of social connectedness? 

The School of Positive Psychology defined loneliness as “a complex emotional and psychological experience characterised by a perceived isolation and a deep sense of emptiness or social disconnection.” Social media breeds and heightens this experience through comparison and superficial interactions.

On social media it is easy to compare the number of followers we have with someone else. The number of likes we get versus the number they get. Then our mind in this culture of comparison starts to spin and wonder why. Are they more popular than we are? More well-liked? Oftentimes we need to take a step back and remember how shallow those interactions are and how little they reflect our true worth.

Social media can foster true and meaningful interactions, but those are few and far between. The majority of the time, that comment was sent in the midst of their doom scroll. That “like” was given, then forgotten. The School of Positive Psychology adds that “the absence of physical presence and non-verbal cues can exacerbate feelings of isolation.”

So is social media making us less social?

My answer is yes.

Take a look around you. Take a good, sharp look at the state of our world. 

Children are on their tablets at dinner. Partners are on their phones during dates. Teenagers have headphones on as they walk down the hall. Can we not be alone with our thoughts for one moment? 

Think back to the example I gave at the beginning with the student giving the presentation. Not one of us was paying her any attention. She likely worked hard on that presentation. I know I paid good money to sit in that lecture. Yet my focus was somewhere else, along with every other student in the room. 

Social media affects our social connectedness through three different aspects: social capital, sense of community, and loneliness. 

It improves social capital by helping us network our relationships digitally and effectively.

It improves our sense of community through connecting us with those we do not have the opportunity to see in person, but it hurts us when we feel left out or leave out others. 

It amplifies our loneliness by creating a culture of comparison and glorifying meaningless interactions. 

The solutions are clear: we need to put down our phones, prioritize face-to-face interactions, and not compare ourselves to others. 

Social media is making us less social, and we are the only ones who can fix that—the question is: will we?