Impacts of Social networks: How do Children Lose Their Traditional Childhood

Authenticity Statement:
I, Shynar Zhakan, declare that this work is my own research and writing and that all original
sources used are credited.
Signature:__________________________
Date: _____________________________

Shynar Zhakan
Aigerim Shakhanova, Augustine Boyle
Global Perspectives & Project Work
Nazarbayev Intellectual School for Math & Physics
Almaty , Kazakhstan
2015
Introduction

Remember, what did you do when you were a child. Did you sit on social networks for the whole
day? Actually, it cant be true, because social networks have been popular since 1995 when the
classmates.com (the first social network) appeared. But today the issue of children using Internet
becomes a big problem. According to investigations Russian children online (European
committee Safely Internet, 2010) 78% of 9-16 aged Russian children have their own page in
social network. According to the statistics given by the child ombudsman Yuriy Pavlenko, 92%
of children attend to social networks. However, about a third of Ukrainian children spend more
than 6 hours a day online and 52% of children met with friends from the Interne. (kianews.com)
This issue has two different perspectives. First perspective is that social networks develop
children thinking of environment and speech. And second perspective is that social networks can
generate quality in children such as aggression, nervousness and insomnia. This paper will show
that social networks arent need to use by children 0-5 ages.

Aims and Methods

The aims of this research are to identify the reasons for the vogue of social networks and
evaluate the possible positive and negative factors. The research will explore two perspectives of
using social networks by students of NIS Almaty and their little brothers/sisters 2-15 aged.
Research question asks what are the mechanisms of action of the social network on the behavior
and emotions of modern children? This research includes primary and secondary research
methods. Some information about children will be taken from the Internet, such as articles,
video. As the primary source it includes a survey of NIS students, about their first start using
internet and also about their younger sisters/brothers and how their behavior changed while using
the Internet.
Context
According to the whatis.techtarget.com, social media is a network of individuals joined with
interpersonal relationships or an online service or site through which people create and maintain

interpersonal relationships and millions of people have become comfortable using smart-phones
to share information about themselves, via mobile apps that access social networks. The number
of Internet users increases every year around the world. Our whole culture is becoming
increasingly dependent on IT. Social networks have become an inalienable part of our modern
life. Most children spend all their free time in this. Here teenagers looking for new friends and
new subcultures, trying to gain a sense of belonging to one group or another. In the process of
finding congenial personality young people engage in a variety of relationships, are able to
communicate with virtually unlimited number of people and interest groups, with various types
of personalities, learn a lot of history, have the opportunity to exchange views and discuss their
questions.

Perspectives
The first perspective is that the use of social networks in the educational process facilitates the
exchange of information, increases the motivation of students in educational activity, stimulates
creativity and cognitive interest. The first reason is that the Internet allows children to entertain
with other children through the use of email, chat rooms, and messaging, growing up the
development of conversation and social skills. The evidence is that many peoples should know
about lingualeo.com, one of the best resources for beginners and advanced in learning English
noticed a significant change in their level to the better side. The counter-argument is that this
kind of sites these sites may be sects, which ultimately leads to dire consequences, which mean
before start using this kind of sites, parents should carefully review this site and read the reviews.
The conclusion is that Internet might have different bad sides, but using it for education is the
good device for learning. The second reason is that with help of social networks children have an
opportunity to freely communicate their thoughts with people and keep anonymity. The fact is
that in all kinds of social network everybody can create his own page with wrong information
and nobody can see the real face and name of them. But this great opportunity might lead to

unexpected bad consequences. For example, one girl chatted in one of the social networks with a
very nice, sociable and cheerful boy, and they decided to meet. When she arrived she saw an old
man instead of a boy, and then no one had seen her after that, and parents could not find her. That
means, anonymity is not always appropriate in all cases, because the anonymity of
communication spawned the number pedophilism on the Internet. The conclusion is that social
networks its place with unlimited opportunities, like keep anonymous, but in not all cases it can
be useful.
The second perspective is frequent using Internet by children leads to Internet dependence. The
reason is that another danger that may trap a child in the network, linked to possible threat to
children thinking, which may increase the quantity of dullness. The evidence is that most
childrens index of the mind decrease after creating their own page on social network, which
make a big problem. For example, lets open any kind of other video and look at the comments.
(Appendix A) This shows that all children use just simple, short words. Our future generation in
under the danger of illiteracy. But, on the other hand its important to note that exactly this fact
awakens in most children intention to study, to learn more and self-develop. Education is also
the single most common motivation parent cite for their children to use the Internet from home
(National School Board Foundation, n.d.,para 6). According to Tapscott (as cited in Affanso,
1999), ...when kids are online, theyre reading, thinking evaluating, criticizing and attesting comprising their thoughts. Kids use computer for movements that go hand-in-hand with our
understanding of what constitutes a traditional childhood. The conclusion is that spending a lot of
time online, children are at risk of problems.

Results
To summarize answers by survey specified to NIS Almaty students, in survey involved 100
students, with 68% of respondents are 12-15 years old, 29% are 16-18 aged and only 3% 8-11
aged . To the question about students first starting Internet use, the most part rather 34%

answered that they were at 9-10 age, 22% were 11-12 aged , 16% were 7-8 aged and 7% were 56 years old. This relevant shows that most students start to use social networks about 3-4 years
ago, what really simplifies the task of this research, because if they started to use social networks
a little earlier, we would not be able to find many reasons and arguments for their actions. The
highest mark is in a 5th question of this survey. According to them, the most two popular social
networks there are Vkontakte and Instagram, which NIS students use every day. 95 out of 100
students use Vkontakte and 65 out of 100 use Instagram. 74 students have little brother/sister
who use Internet in daily life and 68.48% of them didnt see any changes in behavior of their
little brothers/sisters, which justify the usefulness of the Internet without the terrible
consequences. But 31.52% of students saw any changes in behavior. This respondents believe
that the behavior of their young ones deteriorated sharply, to add to it not only behavior but also
their relationship to the family members and relatives. After this, students should to share with
their own opinion about their attitude to childrens' using Internet. 58% of respondents wrote that
they are absolutely negative, 20% were positive opinion and other 22% were in neutral position.

Conclusion
The thesis statement of this research is that children 0-5 aged shouldnt use social networks. The
first perspective, that was discussed in this research before is using social networks for
educational intentions. But not all children use social networks for the personal development,
and thats a little bit offensively. According to results from survey, most part of respondents are
12-15, and they spend about 4-6 hours for looking at the screen of computer monitors or
smartphones, and use social networks, like Vk.com and Instagram. And this data plays a key role
for the research. Its shows that most of the students do not care about self-development
methods, they only care about the number of collected likes. The second perspective, which
was discussed in this research previously, is that Internet makes children more dependent on
social networks. At the second part of the survey, respondents answered to the question about
first start using Internet be their little brothers/sisters, in which 31.52% of students saw any

changes in behavior of their little brothers/sisters. This confirms our fears about the fact that
social networks arouse dependence in children . It is because of this that the respondents said
they had a kind and not permissible aggression against both the senior and junior to. And to talk
about the last question, 22% of students are in the neutral position to relevant of childrens using
Internet. And this is a serious problem for our society. Because, this children are our future
generation, and its important to grow up as intelligent people. So, in this case children should
stop using social networks, because there is nothing more important than health. Students and
their little brothers/sisters should do sport every day and enjoy every moment of his childhood
conducted. If our ancestors could live without social networks and they lived a happy life, we
overlords of the 21st century, will do it without any trouble. Just need to believe to yourself.

References
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Appendix A

Appendix B

Appendix C

Appendix D

Appendix E

Appendix F

Appendix G

Appendix H