The TikTok Effect

It’s 10:00pm on a Monday night. You lie down in your bed in your dimly lit room. There is school tomorrow. You think, “Oh, I can be on TikTok for a little while before bed,” but you get sucked into the short, fifteen second videos, thinking it hasn't been that long, when it’s actually been multiple hours. All of a sudden it’s 1:00 in the morning and you’re nowhere near sleep. You go to school the next day tired and grumpy because of how little sleep you’ve had. TikTok isn’t good for kids. 

TikTok started as a short video app where people could do lip-sync videos and creative dances. But as TikTok’s popularity grew, it became harder to regulate what went on the app, leading to more inappropriate content being uploaded. Also, more young kids started downloading TikTok as it became more popular, leading to them seeing all the bad things on it.

The effect of TikTok, and social media in general , really, on health and well-being isn’t good. In fact, according to Tobias Dienlen of The National Center of Biotechnology, “Twenty-four percent of (teens) estimate the effects of social media on well-being are mostly negative.” In other words, in a survey of teens who use social media twenty-four percent of those teens think that it negatively affects them. Even the teens, the ones who are supposed to be “addicted” to social media, are admitting to the negative effects. This, to me, is plain and clear evidence.

Now, I realize this is mostly referring to all social media platforms, like Reddit, for example. Once, I used Google to find the solution of a problem I was having, and I found it on Reddit. But, after I had read the answer, I just kept scrolling and scrolling, until five minutes had gone by and I realized what had happened. I know that this happens with TikTok because I’ve had a few personal experiences with the app. The main one being one of my friends who spends hours and hours on TikTok and is pretty much always tired at school.

Social media affects health and emotional well-being in ways some may not really realize. Dienlen states, “Watching entertaining content can make us laugh and raise our spirits, but reading hostile comments can make us angry and put us in a bad mood,” In other words, being on apps like TikTok can make us laugh, but it’s seeing hate on your, and other people’s, posts that can potentially hurt us long-term. Sometimes I think kids have a hard time noticing this because it just becomes part of their daily life at a certain point.

Apps like TikTok affect kids in other ways, too. TikTok has inappropriate content on it that isn’t good for kids to see. Adrienne Dunn from USAtoday.com states, “While TikTok does have community guidelines, sexually suggestive content is still uploaded and shared on the app.” In other words, despite having guidelines, inappropriate content on TikTok can be seen by anyone and everyone. I think people are misled by this. They think that the guidelines will prevent this kind of issue, and they allow their kid to be on TikTok without any real regulations.

Some may argue, “Well, there’s lots of good and wholesome stuff on TikTok, can’t we just pick and choose what we want to watch?” Honestly, I agree that TikTok is full of funny things for many different people, and yes a person can pick and choose what he wants to watch, but as he has an account, his preferences and personal information is being tracked and stored on the app. That, to me, is what ruins TikTok.

TikTok’s security protocols, in general, are very insufficient. According to Dunn, “TikTok’s security vulnerabilities allow hackers to manipulate content, delete videos, and reveal personal information.” In other words, TikTok doesn’t prevent bad people from hacking into your account and threaten your privacy and make it visible to anybody.

More and more people are recognizing these security issues, which has led to

bans in many different, and important, places. Once again, it’s  Adrienne Dunn who states: “Lawmakers and regulators who have become wary of Chinese technologies have targeted the app's vulnerabilities, and branches of the U.S military have prohibited use of the app on government issued devices.” In other words, people in power have already started targeting TikTok. Even branches of the U.S military have started blocking it on government issued devices, so we know the app isn't good.

The final subject I want to bring up is another personal experience with TikTok and it’s addictive nature, and it involves my sister. She and her friends always hung out and got along well with each other, but it seems like ever since TikTok started gaining popularity, her friends’ behavior has changed, and she really can’t do anything about it.

So let me ask you this: When you see your child on TikTok, will you let them see all the inappropriate things on the app? Will you let their privacy be threatened? Or will you help your child by letting them grow up without the addiction to TikTok, and all the bad things on it?