One of the key areas that I believe kids need a greater understanding of is social media:
- How the biggest platforms differ
- What they have in common
- Why they’re so effective
One night not so long ago, when I should’ve been going to bed but was mindlessly flicking through the few TV channels that I find slightly less annoying than the rest, and Sky Sports News had run out of irrelevant stats, I ended up on BBC2 and watching Newsnight.
It was pure gold. They were doing a piece on social media and why it’s so effective.
Two things stood out, and I’ve been sharing them with as many people as possible, given that 99 per cent of 16-24-year-olds in the UK use social media at least weekly (source).
Social media platforms, it suggested, have been designed to exploit our psychological vulnerabilities. Our brains are hard-wired to work in particular ways and Facebook, YouTube, Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn are brilliant at exploiting them.
One of these vulnerabilities is our innate desire to finish things. Researchers gave people a bowl of soup and asked them to eat it (or is it drink it?). Those people tried, but couldn’t, because what they didn’t know was that the researchers had fed a pipe into the bowl so that it was always filling up. But because they really felt the urge to finish the soup, they ended up with pints of it inside them.
This is why we can scroll through our social media feeds endlessly. Try to get to the bottom and they will of course populate with more posts. For ever.
Another tactic the social media networks use is based on how we’re hooked on the prospect of a new, potentially positive outcome. Just like fruit machines: when you put your money in and press the button, your brain can’t wait to see what combination turns up. Will it be a winner for you?
And this is at least partly why notifications exist on social media platforms: what will be waiting for you following your latest post or comment? Who’s liked your picture? Pull down to refresh. See anything new?
You can watch the Newsnight edition here:
