The Facebook mania has spared no one with even younger
children, as young as seven or eight, signing p with or without the consent of
the parents to be “in”.
There could be several implications of the wide exposure
that the internet and specifically social networking can have on impressionable
minds. It could vary from simple distraction from daily routine studies to more
serious ones like addiction to the net and falling prey to online stalking.
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Children in the teens and pre-teens are vulnerable to peer
pressure and having a personal email and being on a social networking site
features high among the other things that are products of the current age which
is a combination of upwardly mobile people class and rampant invasion of
technology in our lives.
Therefore, the constant need to be present online and
sharing updates about the other’s life is not restricted to adults alone. With
young minds, it is difficult to also reason out with why one cannot and should
not be competing with friends who are always visiting exotic places or whose
social life does not resemble ours.
Kaveri Subrahmanyam, a professor of psychology at California
State University-Los Angeles as a different view point here.
She feels that for all the bad press that these online activities gather, they
are something that the kids anyway do.
*Many parents also worry that younger users of social sites
could be targets for online predators. While there are some concerns that kids
aren't mature enough to make good decisions about their privacy, Subrahmaynam
and Lenhart said most are savvy enough by their early teens to know what, and
who, to avoid. Younger children, they say, need more parental supervision.
*source: the
linked article.
Whatever the compulsions and reasons behind minors using the
internet/Facebook, the hours they spent must be controlled (even during
holidays) and monitored by guardians/parents. Since there is no way we can
reverse the effects of technology, we need to, as much as possible, at least
keep off the dangers of “having too much too soon” from the children.
Lawrence High School, located at HSR layout, Bangalore,
focuses on educating children with traditional values to adapt and excel in the
world. To know more about Lawrence school, please visit the website http://lawrenceschool.in/ and join us at
our Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/pages/Lawrence-School/
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