Social networking has taken the younger (and older) generations by storm. The introduction of Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram has allowed for a massive transference of information from one person from the next. It’s also allowed for a more diverse set of ideas to help young people explore and develop their own, authentic identities. As someone who uses Facebook a lot, I have to say that I really enjoy engaging with people who have different views than me, I think this is very important when it comes to diversity of thought and a strong development of one’s identity.

The reason why social networking sites are so influential on one’s identity is that you can now converse with someone across the world. This has caused a more multicultural attitude in younger people than what we have previously witnessed in past generations. This is good because multiculturalism encourages people to be open to new things and allow people to develop an open-minded understanding of the entire world and not just one’s own country. It’s important to become global citizens, and this is what Facebook and other platforms have been able to do. When you log onto Twitter, there is a trending page that shows you everything going on throughout the entire world. If someone happens in Germany and it ends up trending on Twitter, that means people across the entire world are talking about this event.

However, social media has also increased the “deva personality” in younger generations. By deva personality I mean narcissistic personality disorder, which can be found in people who are simply too obsessed with themselves. Some experts even believe that those people who constantly spend time on these platforms and read through every single post during every second of the day have grown too addicted to social media and is hurting their cognition.