Children Safety and Social Media (Essay Sample)

Children Safety and Social Media
Name
Institution
Literature Review
Existing literature point to a wide spectrum of impacts the social media has on children. On a number of studies, it is elaborated that children who are exposed to social media often tend to start smoking or the consumption of alcoholic beverages at a tender age (O'Keeffe & Clarke-Pearson, 2011). It is also related that social media promotes the raving culture with a lot of social consequences. The literature also reveal that social media is associated with lower grades of students in school (Villani, 2001). The dwindling of school grades amount to poor career orientation in future and poor characteristics of socialization and adaptation in society or at places of work. Moreover, the best approaches to handing the challenges are best attained through exhaustive case studies of practical experiences (Livingstone & Bovill, 2013).
Review of the Original Article
Tony Loftis give a very detailed and brief outlook of the research about privacy and the dangers children are exposed to through the various social media platforms. He evaluates how parents are prepared to deal with the issues, analyses the extent of the danger and how various organizations may help to get a solution. The paper gives a lot of statistical detail about American respondents and the experience of children on the social media.
Blog Article
A child growing up today is less secure than if they perhaps grew up in the previous generation before the advent of social media. A research done by McAfee suggests that children share a bit too much about themselves online. Many parents are oblivious of the activities of their children due to the fact that technology differentials exist between the young generations and the old generations today. It is suggested that the impact of social media on an average child today has a huge influence on the development of their personality, their future career prospects, their relationships and adaptation in society, their problem solving abilities and general maturation trends into adulthood. Apart from the obvious risk of giving personal contacts to the wrong people, the kids are themselves exposed to an unfettered and uncontrolled content from diverse contributors.
The fact that other sophisticated agencies use social media data for a varied extent of uses makes the online participants a bit vulnerable because they lose ground every time they make a post because their very information is tapped for free and could be used for the scheming of programs directed at them in adversarial ways. The fact that data handling techniques and storage facilities exist around the globe with enormous capacity for interpretation should be a wakeup call particularly for the children who may not be very discerning. Children need care and guidance from their parents and the general public but on the social media platform, they take advice and counsel from a wide variety of players who may never be genuine as a result of their being presumably disguised.
Young people tend to shield their contents online from prying eyes and as such parents should be alarmed about the fact that their kids are getting spoilt online through the cumulative engagement with a wide variety of uncontrollable players and agents. Unfortunately, once one makes a comment or share online, it is very hard to retract or shield without an immediate loss of control of the wishes one had before making the post. Young people post about their addresses, phone numbers and private content that should not be shared indiscriminately. In addition, young people spend about six hours online per day and that is a huge loss of time. It is suggested that the teens of today have taken to the social media in a manner only comparable to the baby boomers indulgences with the telephone. The consequences are diverse parents or schools must take caution about their security shields around their young children.
According to the McAfee report, only about 25% of the parents reported they knew how exactly how to deal with the behaviours of the children online. About 75% throw up their hands and on average, even if the parents seem confident that they control the behaviour of their children, in actuality only a few are able to handle the challenges with their children (Loftis, 2013). Today’s standards of practice and policy in the social services directed at children are yet to effectively determine how they might effectively address the online challenges to children. In particular, teens have a challenge managing their quest to understand aspects of their sexuality and in their quest to gain better knowledge through online, often land on the wrong places and get exposed to the wrong contents like pornography and other orientations of sexuality like the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transsexual orientations.
In conclusion, a concerted effort needs to be ejected into the regulation of social media access for children. Only the participation of one party may never really make headway. Parents’ organizations need to collaborate with the government agencies, the police, the schools and the churches and student organizations to address the challenges as they emerge. It is only upon such a concerted effort and multiple players that the problem may be nipped in the bud. The challenge is to learn more about the behaviour of children online and to interpret what it might really mean and then address the challenges from a platform of strength and knowledge.
Annotated Bibliography
O'Keeffe, G. S., & Clarke-Pearson, K. (2011). The impact of social media on children, adolescents, and families. Pediatrics, 127(4), 800-804.
This source has a paediatric orientation but gives an exhaustive research survey on how the social media influences children in various ways. The article claims that parents should take an initiative to always monitor what their children do online. The various effects of social media are explained and suggestions given on how they could be handled.
Villani, S. (2001). Impact of media on children and adolescents: a 10-year review of the research. Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 40(4), 392-401.
The authors of this article make an extensive review of existing authoritative research on the impact of social medi...