PSYCHOLOGICAL SECURITY OF CHILDREN AND ADOLESCENTS IN SOCIAL MEDIA
Keywords:
psychological security, social networks, children and teenagers, well-beingAbstract
The investigation into the issue of psychological well-being for children and adolescents represents a critical domain within the realm of contemporary science and practice. In order to provide children and adolescents with timely psychological, educational, and informational support in situations that pose a threat to their security, it is essential to devise more comprehensive and cohesive strategies and interventions. Nowadays, social media platforms have emerged as a crucial avenue for both subsistence and interpersonal interaction. The younger generation has been brought up in a society where technology is an inextricable part of our existence, and this state of perpetual connectivity is known as “being always on”. Moreover, adolescents are particularly vulnerable to the cultural paradigm of constant online interaction: they establish virtual environments that fulfill their desire for affiliation, security, esteem, admiration, control, and acknowledgement, which manifests itself in the behavioral, emotional, and intellectual dimensions of their communication with others. Social media platforms cater to fundamental human needs by providing opportunities for social interaction and self-expression. This may serve as a plausible explanation for their widespread popularity and the comparatively high level of adolescent engagement with these platforms in contemporary society. Currently, there is a demand for problem-oriented research in the field of digital technologies, with a particular emphasis on analyzing individual interactions with digital devices through the lens of user requirements, psychological state, and security considerations. The study into the impact of social media on various facets of a child’s mental well-being and security, as well as the exploration of the elements of the digital landscape that contribute to fostering a sense of psychological security in online platforms, remains a largely unexplored territory, akin to the shortage of instruments designed to gauge the psychological security of adolescent users. In this respect, research on behaviour and patterns of interaction of children and adolescents in social media exposes novel facets of exploring psychological security as a sociopsychological phenomenon in the lives of contemporary children in the age of digital reality
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