Social Networking Sites Pose 'Mental Risk' for Teens

Social Networking sites like Facebook and MySpace may be harmful to teens, according to Dr Himanshu Tyagi, a leading psychiatrist.

Dr. Tyagi explained the "potentially dangerous" effects at the Royal College of Psychiatrists annual meeting. His position is that teens who focus on thier online identities might put less emphasis on their real lives. While social sites offer some positives, he said, there remains the possibility of negative effects: "It's a world where everything moves fast and changes all the time, where relationships are quickly disposed at the click of a mouse, where you can delete your profile if you don't like it, and swap an unacceptable identity in the blink of an eye for one that is more acceptable. People used to the quick pace of online social networking may soon find the real world boring and unstimulating." Dr. Tyagi indicated that additional research and study was needed to assess the full impact of the internet on modern youth. An alternative view was offered by Graham Jones, a psychologist who studies the impact of technology., Dr. Jones agreed that internet networking could pose some problems to teens, but insists the risks associated with them are often overplayed. "For every new generation, the experience they have of the world is a different one. When the printing press was first invented, I am sure there were crowds of people saying it was a bad thing. In my experience, the people who tend to be most active on sites such as Facebook or Bebo are those who are most socially active anyway - it is just an extension of what they are already doing."