Loneliness in College

Written by Alexis Puthussery | Designed by Emily Snisarenko | Photographed by Samantha Grobman

How Social Media Feeds Our F.O.M.O.

On a bustling college campus in 2022, the air we live and breathe is made of social media. It’s the first thing most people look at in the morning, what we scroll through when we wait for the bus, what distracts us from doing our homework after a long day, and what lulls us to sleep at night as our eyelids grow heavy in front of our bright screens in bed. What does this mean for the mental health of everyone who lives in this semi-digital world?

It didn’t quite seem possible in an already social media entrenched 2019, but our use of social media drastically increased once the pandemic hit. People were separated from those they already knew, and for students just starting college, meeting new people became an online affair. Following people on different platforms became one of the primary ways to reach out with awkward Zoom classes and rigid social restrictions. It was a lonely time for many, and social media may have eased that loneliness a bit. But, now that COVID protocols are loosening and we’re seeing more people in person once more, what happens to our social media use? I think that, for many people, it’s stayed the same.

“We’re not meant to know or see this many people,” Grace O’Brien (COM ‘24) said. And she’s right. We’re meant to know 150 people at the maximum. This is Dunbar’s number, which was arrived at in a sociological study done in the late 1990s. Grace hadn’t known that there was a particular name or number, but she could tell from her own social media experience that something was off. She used the word “overwhelming” a lot when describing platforms like Instagram, where content is constantly thrown at us. Once we exceed that 150 person limit, we start to stretch ourselves thin.

So, what does viewing hundreds and thousands of people’s lives do to us? Many students I’ve talked to described FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out) as one of the primary negative effects. When you need or even want to stay in on a Friday night, it is so easy to feel like you’re missing out when you open up social media and see everything that everyone is doing. This can incur feelings of loneliness in you when you didn’t even feel lonely to begin with.

This FOMO extends well beyond seeing people at the club or at a party on their Instagram story. Seeing how other people live, no matter how contrived it may be on their social media can have drastic deleterious effects on how we view our own lives. Even when we are aware of how factitious everyone is on social media, it still affects us on an unconscious level.

Arin Siriamonthep (COM’24) described this sort of double-consciousness. He thinks, on the first level, people post and partake in social media to keep up with friends and be in a community. But, on another deeper and more unconscious level, many use social media because they crave attention. And this craving for attention that Arin mentions was absolutely caused by social media in the first place.

Studies have shown that validation from social media gives us dopamine rushes in our brains, the same thing that would happen with other addictive substances. Everyone wants to be seen and recognized, and social media is able to provide that in a cheap, fast way. It’s a vicious cycle in which the need for it grows the more you use it.

But it can’t be all bad, right? Grace mentioned how it was through social media that she found the Bunion and the Pinky Toe, two BU satire publications which have been very fulfilling for her, and in which she’s met some of her closest friends. Arin, while conscious of the negative aspects, still subscribes to the idea that media is the future, and he’s trying to embrace this in a healthy, productive way. He’s used Instagram to trial and error ideas of his like magazines and student groups.

Evan Akinyemi (SAR ‘24) has used social media to find the Brothers United BU, a group on campus that has helped Evan connect with other black men. And, sometimes, social media can just be entertaining. We’ve all seen a post that’s made us and our friends laugh, and that can’t be a bad or evil thing, right? So, clearly, there are aspects of social media that have been fruitful for many people. But, is it worth it?

The idea that social media is harmful is not new. Its competitive nature, negative effects on body image, and erosion of our attention spans are all topics that have stayed fixed in conversations for years.

It feels like I’m beating a dead horse by writing an article on this topic, because what left is there to say? How many times can our generation and society have the “social media is bad” conversation, nod our heads solemnly, and go back to whatever app we were on? All of the students I talked to strongly believed that one doesn’t need to have social media in college to have a social life. But, knowing you don’t have to have it and not having it are very different things.

As long as you're being yourself and enjoying yourself, whether or not you have social media is unimportant. This was Arin’s basic philosophy when he spoke with me. “Positive attraction-- if you stick to your own morals and your own views, then you’ll automatically attract people who share those views,” he said. He says that’s how he met most of his friends in college, and to him, it didn’t matter whether or not he met them online or in person.

Noah Magaziner (CGS ‘22) had similar thoughts. He wants to reach a point where he has “nothing left to say about social media”. Whether he has social media or not at this point is not important.

This “social media neutral” outlook can be hard to maintain successfully in a very social media present world, but I think it’s something worth pursuing. The biggest problem I’ve seen with the usage of social media stems from how much people care. People have cared how others view them for ages-- this is nothing new. Careers and fashion and social circles have always been things people cared about, but they are things in the real world that also give fulfillment and have value in themselves. Posting these things (social media) is only about perception. Because of this, when one has social media it is not a problem. It is only when one puts value in it that things get murky. If you try to find substantial value in social media, you will be disappointed. Going to college is hard enough. There are so many things that college students juggle, between class, clubs, jobs, and friends. Social media is something accessible and easy, so it’s not hard to get hooked. And most of us are hooked. Advocating for the complete riddance of social media is ridiculous. It simply will never happen because social media is here to stay. And to pretend that there isn’t a pressure to be on these apps when it is the currency of our conversations is equally naive.

Instead of starting with reevaluating whether you should engage with social media, start with reevaluating how you engage with it. If it’s something that you can’t not care about, question its role in your life. There are very few things worth feeling burdened by, least of all social media.

There are plenty of ways to stay connected with others. For Grace, her plethora of extracurriculars has led her to some of her closest friends. Noah said that playing basketball at FitRec is where he’s met a lot of people. Evan thinks just being outside and being open will lead you to others. And for Arin, it was all about positive attraction. It’s so easy to fall into the wide, meretricious trap of social media. And when you do fall, you can fall far. Think about how social media makes you feel and whether it’s worth keeping in your life, because there is nothing worse than an app telling you you have a thousand friends and feeling like you have none.