by Mallory Mattingly

Mental health is an extremely intricate topic because there are so many different components to it, yet all of them are equally as important as the other. Mental health issues are really common in youth, ranging anywhere from 10 years old to 20 years old, and more; however, these are the most common. An age range that mental health is an extremely big issue for is the mid teens, like 13-17 years old. 

With teenagers, mental health has only become a bigger issue throughout the past few years, stemming especially from 2020 in the COVID-19 pandemic. Mental health is greatly associated with the overuse of social media with teenagers and being stuck in the house in 2020, significantly affecting people’s mental health in a negative manner because one of the main things we all resorted to for entertainment was social media. 

Social media can negatively affect anyone because it has come such a long way, and in some cases, that isn’t a good thing. For example, cyberbullying. 

Cyberbullying is the use of electronic communication to bully an individual, or multiple individuals. Social media is one of the main ways people communicate in today’s society, and specific platforms and apps are rapidly becoming more and more popular, like the application TikTok. TikTok was essentially a dancing and lip-syncing app and it was meant for ages 13 and up, but several children would get ahold of the app and somehow make their own account and enter a false birth date. 

As the popularity of this app continued to rise, the original meaning for the app changed. It went from being a dancing and singing app to an app where graphic news stories would be uploaded or negative posts would appear. These posts were so unlike the other fun posts, that they blew up and went viral, creating more people to want to create that same content. In addition, since almost the entire world has access to this app and the age restriction is able to be bypassed, there are subjects being revealed to young minds that shouldn’t be revealed to them and all kinds of people use this app and many other apps for cyberbullying.

There are accounts on TikTok whose main goal in posting is to degrade certain individuals and then on top of that, people in the comments that are also belittling these people and agreeing with the creator of the account. When someone is being insulted by thousands of people, that is going to take a toll on their mental health without a doubt. Some people will even get bullied by their own friends and peers, which can be worse because these are people you see everyday and have to be around. 

A specific story that I always tend to bring up when speaking about mental health is about a girl named Aubreigh Wyatt. Aubreigh Wyatt was a 13-year-old girl that committed suicide due to bullying. Her mother, Heather Wyatt, has used a TikTok platform used to bring awareness to mental health and prevent bullying, whether it’s cyberbullying or in-person. Her mother using her platform for a positive impact on people is what we should be doing with our social media. 

If you or anyone you know struggles with mental health or suicidal inclinations, the national suicide prevention hotline is 988.

You matter!