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continued from page 22
complex, even when we think we are in touch
we are out of touch.”
THE RIPPLE EFFECT
This reliance on social media in the form of
Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook, Tumblr and
other sites can be “torture,” Zigdon said. “It’s a
very overwhelming situation. It’s very weary-
ing on individuals, but no
teen will say that.”
When she was first
allowed to use her phone
for social media at age
12, Hunter Banooni of
Bloomfield Hills was check-
ing it constantly. “My grand-
mother called me a ‘phone
Hunter Banooni
junkie’ because whenever I
had a free second I was calling this person or
texting that person,” said the Hillel Day School
eighth-grader, now 14.
She continued that pattern for about a year.
Then one morning something changed. “My
mom doesn’t let us on our phones during the
car ride to school because she calls it family
time,” Banooni said. “It was a normal morn-
ing, and then I noticed it was a really nice
day and I started to actually appreciate the
world around me. After a while, my phone just
started to seem like an object, not something I
needed to get through the day, but something
I wanted. It was the whole thing about your
possessions possessing you, and I’m really glad
I could take a step back and realize that this is
not what I want.”
Banooni still checks her phone daily, but on
a much more moderate basis. “You don’t want
to miss the latest Instagram story or Snapchat
update so we feel like we need to check — or
we have to check. Timing blocks really help
keep me organized, so I allow myself 15-20
minutes to catch up on social media. It can be
difficult to stop, and it probably ends up being
more like 45 minutes or an hour,” she said. “I
find myself slowly sinking into the couch and
realize this is not what I want to be doing.”
Dr. Jennifer L. Friedman, Hillel’s dean of stu-
dent learning, said, “Kids feel trapped in a way.
Everything is so public and
taken to a level that never
existed before.”
Squabbles with friends
and romantic partners are
as much a part of teen life
as school dances and study-
ing for exams. But what
may have been a quick snit
Dr. Jennifer
between two individuals can
Friedman
turn into high-level drama
on social media, where everyone feels free to
add her own two cents.
“Before, maybe you would resolve it face-to-
face after school or in a phone call. But now
there is no cooldown period, no time to calm
down or self-reflect,” Zigdon said. “Social media
is the platform to continue it, and then other
people get involved, screenshotting comments
and sending them to other friends. It gets
obsessive, and teens can feel like they need to
find out what everyone is saying about them.
24
April 5 • 2018
jn
“So, they are on the phone till all hours of
the night trying to figure out what is going on.
It continues all through the night and picks
up the next day right where it left off. So even
if the friends repair whatever happened, now
everyone else knows your business and may
start treating you differently. The ripple effect
is so much greater.”
MAGNIFIED MISTAKES
That ripple effect in which everything can
become exponentially magnified is a major
culprit of teen anxiety, Blumstein said. A tact-
less remark or foolish comment blurted out in
person may be quickly forgiven and forgotten,
but it lives forever on the internet where more
and more people can see the faux pas and feel
free to comment on it and pass it along for
others to ridicule.
“Teens are continually watching themselves
mess up again and again. It’s like skiing down-
hill and now you’re somersaulting out of con-
trol,” Blumstein said.
Friedman agreed. “Now all your friends
from school and camp, and their parents and
your parents, know about it. You can’t make
an easy or light mistake anymore.”
And messing up can be an important big
part of growing up. “Poor judgment and
mistakes are part of becoming experienced
and learning — it’s inevitable. But with social
media, it’s a perfect storm,” Friedman said.
Zigdon worries about the future. “Think
about these kids developing their skills to be
successful once they leave school. Are they
able to express themselves to a colleague?
They have no experience in conflict reso-
lution because it’s all being done via text.
Confronting someone is a challenge and a skill
they need to develop, and high school is that
social minefield where they can be practicing
these things.”
Blumstein said, “I wonder if teens are
struggling with individualized self-expression
because they are so part of a group processing
experience. The whole dating relationship is
this whole public soap opera.”
Zigdon added, “I have definitely noticed
the breakdown in communication and social
interaction between peers. Friends don’t talk
face to face anymore; it’s just a text or an
emoji and some important parts of commu-
nication like tone of voice and body language
are being lost.”
But Celia Levy, a seventh-grader at Hillel,
takes the opposite view. “It’s easier to incorpo-
rate what you want to say when you’re texting
and with photos,” she said. “I
feel like you can see the emo-
tion more than just listening
to their voice.”
Levy, who is 12, relies on
her phone to keep in touch
with friends both locally
and those from Israel she
has met at camp. She thinks
Celia Levy
adults who worry about the
ramifications of cell phone use are overreact-
ing.
“Adults say, ‘Oh, it’s so harmful’ and stuff,