John Boitnott, a journalist and digital consultant writing for Inc. Magazine, compares social media to potentially addictive items such as nicotine or alcohol. However, Boitnott states that unlike smoking and drinking, social media is a fundamental aspect of many people’s workday that often can’t just be ignored. Many businesses utilize social media in some capacity to connect with their clients. If workers have the duties of updating the business’ digital photo albums or managing the comment threads on one of the business’ websites, it is more than likely that the worker will at some point be tempted to switch over to their own social media account. Even without these direct temptations, it has been found that an average American spends almost one quarter of their workday browsing social media for non-work related activities. This can be translated into not only an extreme amount of decreased worker productivity and loss of time, but also into tremendous financial losses for big businesses. While from a marketing standpoint the utilization of social media may have numerous benefits, Morse research reports that British companies lost an average of $2.2 billion a year because of social media’s damaging affects on worker productivity.
Some may believe that they are capable being productive at work while being on social media at the same time. Contrast to popular belief, it has been proven that multitasking is not really possible. Numerous studies have shown that our brains do not have the capacity to fully focus our attention on two things at once, but instead our brain switches quickly back and forth form one task to another. Because we cannot equally divide our attention, multitasking does decrease our productivity and delays information processing. Even if we think we are completely focused on the task at hand, studies show that having our phones out or even other tabs open on our computer can also lead to inefficient multitasking. A current study about media-induced task-switching observed middle school, high school, and college students studying, and found that the participants only stayed focused on studying for an average of less than six minutes before switching to checking their social media or texting. Clearly, this literal switching from task to task takes away from our productivity and adds time to studying or doing work related activities.
Not only can social media take away from the time we spend on schoolwork, but some argue that social media is also taking away from our ability to think critically. A recent study published in the Journal of the Royal Society Interface investigated the affect sharing information has on one’s ability to develop analytical thought. In this study, researchers divided volunteers into different social networks that varied in the amount of electronic connection between members. Some of the artificial networks connected members in a tight net where everyone was in contact with everyone else. Other networks kept the participants more separate and there was little electronic contact between the members. The participants were then asked a series of questions that necessitated analytical reasoning. Each participant was asked each question five separate times. The first time the volunteers had to figure out the answer on their own, but the next four times they were allowed to use their social network to find and copy the answer from another member. The results showed that those in the more socially connected network groups gave the right answer a greater amount of the time because they had the opportunity to copy the answer from their neighbor. The researchers then went to show that this stealing of answers did not actually improve the participants’ ability to figure out the answers independently, because when asked more questions without the ability to ask a neighbor there was no improvement from one question to the next.
Similar to these experimental social groups, social media makes it extremely easy for its users to share and look up answers to more challenging questions. This study shows that while looking up answers may make us feel smarter at first by enabling us to give the correct response, it actually does not facilitate learning and in fact takes away from it. When we are supplied with an answer without having to think critically about it, our analytical abilities decrease. Social media allows us to present an analytical response without actually being analytical and therefore, in the long run, can make us less able to think critically. Although this sharing of answers may not directly take away from productivity, it is one way the social media takes away from our intellectual wellbeing.
Although this blog focuses on the negative impact that social media can have on its user’s professional and intellectual productivity, the rise of social media has had a positive impact on society as well. Social media has drastically enhanced our connectivity with friends and family and has also made it a lot easier to connect and stay connected with people worldwide. Social media has facilitated a rapid spread of information around the world that can lead to more informed political, social, and academic decision-making. However, when left unrestricted, social media can become almost physically addictive to its users and take away from our time spent working and studying. This productivity loss translates into financial losses for businesses and the personal loss of critical thinking. As with most things in life, there are both positive and negative impacts that have come along with the rise of social media. Social media can consume us and allow us to become lazy in our work, or it can be used to share information and aid in our learning. In the end, it is our responsibility as social networkers to determine how this technology is utilized.