Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Limiting Social Media Decreases Loneliness and Depression

guilfordjournals.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

141–150 of 153 posts

Re: Limiting Social Media Decreases Loneliness and Depression

#141

Post by KozmoNau7 »

selimthegrim wrote: post #132
KozmoNau7 wrote: post #7

Luckily I never got into Instagram or Twitter, but I was big into both Reddit and Facebook for a long time. I cut off Reddit completely after a run-in with yet another subreddit wannabe dictator mod. It just wasn't worth the drama, not to mention the crappy usability of the site, especially on mobile. For Facebook, I can't cut it off completely, it is unfortunately indispensable for arranging events and interacting w…

If this is the forum I suspect (goon?), I’m certainly pleasantly surprised it is no longer known as a source of trolls.

Yeah, the days of troll raids are long gone, thankfully.

Re: Limiting Social Media Decreases Loneliness and Depression

#142

Post by Aeolun »

coralreef wrote: post #140
Aeolun wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve had people genuinely get angry at me because I’d just been ignoring all IM’s for a few days. They were worried about whether I was still alive, but the concept of calling to confirm was apparently foreign. I kind of want to stop using social media, but I guess everyone will think I hate them or something.

I wouldn't really classify instant messaging as social media, even though all social media platforms have messengers attached nowadays. Also, if your friends are making an effort to keep in contact with you, why are you faulting them for choosing X medium instead of Y?

I should be allowed not to use medium X?

Why am I forced to have and check (daily, at least) IM?

Re: Limiting Social Media Decreases Loneliness and Depression

#143

Post by village-idiot »

strikelaserclaw wrote: post #138
bambataa wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But don't you find you learn things, get introduced to new concepts and so on? I definitely think that HN has improved me as a software developer, if only to show me how much unknown stuff there is out there. Reddit is a bit more questionable but I've definitely found useful things in some sub-reddits. And sometimes all I want is something that will easily wile away a few minutes.

This is more for reddit than hacker news (although i would say hacker news is the same to a lesser degree). More and more I've been feeling that all that exposure does is make one feel like one is learning a lot but in reality its just a wide shallow understanding not really useful for anything. It's good to gain exposure but its easy to fall into the trap of mistaking exposure for thinking real hard and working to u…

My metric is “how actionable is this information?”

The answer is quite often “not very”.

Re: Limiting Social Media Decreases Loneliness and Depression

#144

Post by coralreef »

Aeolun wrote: post #142
coralreef wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't really classify instant messaging as social media, even though all social media platforms have messengers attached nowadays. Also, if your friends are making an effort to keep in contact with you, why are you faulting them for choosing X medium instead of Y?

I should be allowed not to use medium X? Why am I forced to have and check (daily, at least) IM?

Turn notifications on, don't check it until you get notifications?

Re: Limiting Social Media Decreases Loneliness and Depression

#145

Post by Abutere »

kstenerud wrote: post #68
yyww wrote: post #59

This is probably true, but I don't know what else to do (counting HN as social media) - I don't really have any friends or interesting activities. Basically go to work, do work, go home, repeat. Anyone have any suggestions on how I could live a more interesting life and/or have friends? Sorta pathetic to be posting this here but since every other comment is talking out eliminating social media use, maybe some comment…

Take a job in another country; every day becomes an adventure as you navigate different cultures, different people, different customs, different cities, different bureaucracies, different governments, different foods, different activities, etc. Plus, you become a more well rounded individual. It also gives you valuable soft skills (cultural relations). Many places offer working holiay visas.

That sounds very rough for a lonely person, moving to a different culture. Who considers "navigating bureaucracies" as adventure? Maybe that's why the line at motor vehicles is so long...

Re: Limiting Social Media Decreases Loneliness and Depression

#146

Post by r3vo »

hartator wrote: post #115
prolikewh0a wrote: post #82

I've been off social media for years now, entirely, and I'm back to a point where the rest of my friends and just society itself are so fully entrenched into some sort of social media that I'm getting very lonely and depressed. I've actually thought about making a Facebook or Instagram account again and just placing strict rules on it, but even that really creeps me out. My friends are always telling me about cool ev…

Isn’t HN social media the same way Reddit is?

Strange because throughout this thread a lot of users seem to consider HN/Reddit social media. I don't personally think of these as social media whatsoever. They are content/news aggregators imo.

Social media to me is a site that is mostly not anonymous, and is connected to your real life identity where you are mostly sharing content about your personal life.

Re: Limiting Social Media Decreases Loneliness and Depression

#147

Post by softawre »

prolikewh0a wrote: post #99
davestephens wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can I ask how old you are? I wonder how this affects different age generations. I'm 37, left social media a few years back when my son was born - the thinking being that the time I spent on there would be better spent with him and my wife! I don't feel excluded by my friendship groups or like I'm missing out on anything.

I'm 27, single, no family/brothers/sisters.

Yeah, huge difference here, at least for me. When I was 27 I cared a lot more about friendships, now that I'm 35 I just want to spend time with my family and only care to get together with my friends a couple times a year.

Re: Limiting Social Media Decreases Loneliness and Depression

#148

Post by davestephens »

softawre wrote: post #147
prolikewh0a wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm 27, single, no family/brothers/sisters.

Yeah, huge difference here, at least for me. When I was 27 I cared a lot more about friendships, now that I'm 35 I just want to spend time with my family and only care to get together with my friends a couple times a year.

I wouldn't say I've gone that far to other end of the spectrum and still make time for seeing friends on a weekly basis - I guess I'm just more comfortable in myself than I was when I was younger therefore FOMO is not a thing I care about any more. The well-being of my family and the home we live in, is :-)

Also, not actually having the time to see friends as much as I used to makes a big difference!

Re: Limiting Social Media Decreases Loneliness and Depression

#149

Post by Aeolun »

coralreef wrote: post #144
Aeolun wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I should be allowed not to use medium X? Why am I forced to have and check (daily, at least) IM?

Turn notifications on, don't check it until you get notifications?

I turned notifications off exactly because I got a few hundred of them per day.

Re: Limiting Social Media Decreases Loneliness and Depression

#150

Post by coralreef »

Aeolun wrote: post #149
coralreef wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Turn notifications on, don't check it until you get notifications?

I turned notifications off exactly because I got a few hundred of them per day.

You get hundreds of messages from friends?
Post reply on HN