Brown 1

Annotated Bibliography

Likes over Life: How Social Media Affects Mental Health

Lauren Brown

Professor Malcom Campbell

UWRT 1101

23 October 2018
 Brown 2

“Mental Health.” Youth Topics | Youth.gov, Interagency Working Group on Youth Programs, 7

Feb. 2008, youth.gov/youth-topics. Accessed 23 Oct. 2018.

On the reliable website, mental health is clearly defined and it also gives other definitions

for words such as positive mental health, behavioral health, mental disorder, and serious

emotional disorder. Importantly, the site list different risk factors associated with

different domains such as individual, family, school, neighborhood, and community. The

article provides warning signs and behaviors to be on the lookout for around people. It

also tells how mental health can be promoted through early childhood interventions,

programs targeted at vulnerable groups, and community development programs.

Implementing school-based mental health services is heavily focused on the website.

Ideally, the agency wants schools to partner with the community to develop evidence-

based programs to provide positive school climate and promote student skills in dealing

with bullying and conflict. They also would like to see a school culture in which teachers

and other students are trained to recognize the early warning signs of mental health issues

with their students.

The website’s mission statement is to help create, maintain, and strengthen effective

youth programs. They were created by the Interagency Working Group of Youth

Programs, which is composed of representatives from 20 federal agencies that support

programs and services focusing on youth. The information is reliable because the

website’s related resources include sites such as National Community and Service, U.S.

Department of Education, and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services plus
 Brown 3

many more. The website is a government based website and this is evident in the federal

funding sources. The purpose of this communication is to give the general public an idea

of what mental health is, warning signs, and risk factors, and prevention methods. The

audience is intended for people who are seeking mental health help and for those who are

trying to help a friend/family member. Compared to the first source, this article is strictly

based on facts and definitions of mental health.

The reliable website fits into my project because I need to have a base line of what

mental health is. Without the base line, I have nothing to compare my statistics with.

Having the basic information on mental health will also provide me with information to

give the audience on how to seek help, what the warning signs are, and what the risk

factors seen in individuals suffering from mental health are. The source was very helpful

because I did not know that there were so many risk factors and warning signs for mental

health issues. It does not necessarily shape my argument but rather gives me more of an

understanding of the topic. The purpose of this article was to give me all of the

background information that I would need to properly form my case for this project. The

source will definitely appear in my paper because it holds the basic information that I

need to complete my piece of the conversation.

Pantic, Igor. “Online Social Networking and Mental Health.” Cyberpsychology, Behavior and

Social Networking, Mary Ann Liebert, Inc., 1 Oct. 2014,

 Brown 4

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4183915/. Accessed. 23 Oct. 2018.

In the scholarly journal article, the author, Igor Pantic, speaks on how several studies

have shown that prolonged use of social networking sites may be related to signs and

symptoms of depression, and low self-esteem in young children and adolescents. One of

the reasons why time spent on social networking sites may be associated with depressive

symptoms is because computer communication may lead to a wrong impression of the

physical and personality traits of other users. In a study of 425 undergraduate students at

a University in Utah, they reported that Facebook usage was linked to the feeling that life

is not fair. In the scholarly journal article, they define low self-esteem as the development

of numerous mental illness. It is suggested that the relationship between social media and

self-esteem is that social networking platforms promote narcissistic behavior. This then

results in individuals with lower self-esteems to be more active online to promote more

self-content. The object self-awareness theory suggests that looking at oneself in a mirror,

hearing one’s own voice, or hearing one’s own voice shifts the subject’s attention on

themselves. Finally, the overall impact of social media on self-esteem is negative when

users incorrectly perceive physical/emotional/social characteristics of others, feeling of

jealousy and narcissistic behavior.

Igor Pantic is a Professor at the Department of Medical Physiology at the Medical

Faculty, University of Belgrade. He is a psychiatrist with experience in the field of

depression, anxiety disorders and addiction. Pantic has also written a number of scientific

papers is psychophysiology. The information is reliable because the author has years of

experience in working with depression, anxiety disorders and addiction. The academic
 Brown 5

journal is also reliable because it has been cited 12 times throughout other academic

articles. Finally, the author has MD and PhD behind his name which gives him

creditability for his work. I know that the source is an academic journal because it

includes an abstract and 39 references at the bottom of the article. The purpose of this

communication is to relay information about studies conducted on social media usage and

their results to the general public. The intended audience is for people who are interested

in learning about the scientific reasoning behind social media usage and mental health

issues. While the second source and this source are both strictly factual, the third source

focuses on the scientific side of evidence. The source gives factual information about

mental health based on scientific research and studying while the second course gives a

baseline of what mental health is.

The academic journal perfectly fits my research because it is important to have scientific

research conducted to prove any argument or to further any conversation. The research is

an important component for the being able to gather data, background information, and

for opposing viewpoints that support my opinions. The source was helpful because it

gave scientific reasoning for why individuals may post more on social media, and what

can cause a negative impact in self-esteem due to social media usage. This can be used to

further my case for why individuals may feel the need to make themselves stand out on

social media platforms and for why other individuals may feel the need to target

vulnerable people. More importantly, the source will help further my case for

physiological effects that social media has. The source has positively shaped my

argument because the scientific research proved that there are negative conations from
 Brown 6

displaying and interacting in certain ways on all social media platforms. The research

questions how society can change self-presentation in order to prevent narcissist

characteristics and ultimately avoiding the down-fall of negative self-esteem. I will be

using the source in my project because it gives excellent information on how self-

presentation leads to feelings of unfairness and narcissisms which ultimately lead to

negative impacts in self-esteem.

“Plight of the 'Screenager': Is Social Media Taking a Deadly Toll on Teens?” NBCNews.com,

NBCUniversal News Group, 22 Oct. 2017, 6:01 am , www.nbcnews.com/news/us-

news/social-media-contributing-rising-teen-suicide-rate-n812426. Accessed 23 Oct. 2018

In the developed news story, the author questions if social media is contributing to the

rise in teen suicide rates. Elizabeth Chuck starts the story out with giving a background to

Sadie Riggs’ life and the things she dreamed of accomplishing one day. Riggs’ life was

cut short when her peers started making fun of her and from the lack of responsiveness

from higher authority. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that suicide

rates hit a 40-year high in the year 2015. Between the years 2007 and 2015, the rates

doubled among girls and there was more than a 30 percent increase in teenage boys.

Psychologist Jean Twenge from The Atlantic, states iGen has the worst mental health in

decades and much of it can be traced to their phones. Chuck reaches out to two outside

sources who have experiences in the field of teens suicide. Dr. Delaney Ruston focuses

on her study for why holding out on giving a child a smartphone is not the answer.

Ruston says that phones are the dominant source of interaction and a child can feel very
 Brown 7

isolated by not being a part of the online world. Dr. Victor Schwartz talks about how

shows, such as 13 Reasons Why, provides suicide promotion instead of prevention.

Elizabeth Chuck is a staff writer for NBC and the homepage producer. She has been

working for the news station since 2006 and is responsible for reporting on U.S. news as

it breaks across the country. The information is reliable because Chuck has over 15 years’

experience in writing on breaking stories across the nation. The outside sources that she

uses help build her creditability due to their experience as a physician and a psychologist.

The audience is intended for people who read the daily newspaper and individuals

looking for true stories on how social media has ended lives. This source goes hand-in-

hand with the other two sources, however, it differs. Whereas this article is focused on

telling a real young girl’s story, itt also dives into what physicians and psychologist think

about the subject matter and what can be done. Compared to the other two, this article

appeals more to the emotional side of the audience versus the factual side.

This article fits into my research because I am focusing my writing on how social media

affects teenager’s mental health and the correlation it has on the rising suicide rates. Also,

I wanted to appeal to my audience’s emotions and using a story of a young girl whose life

ended due to activities on social media will help make the crisis seem like a legit issue

that needs to be tackled. The source was also helpful in ways that I was not expecting it

to. I found more information that helps me further analyze and question my topic. Now I

can also use my research to focus on how TV shows glorify suicide instead of teaching

prevention and how it has impacted the increasing suicide rates. The developed news
 Brown 8

story will appear in my project because it gave me great insight to statistics about suicide,

and what psychologist and physicians have to say about the topic.