The Antisocial Aspect Of Social Networking

Thursday, April 2, 2009

It's estimated that more than one-third (35 percent) of U.S. adults have a profile on a social networking site, according to the Pew Internet & American Life Project's daily tracking survey of 2,251 adults. A more practical survey can be done just by thinking of the number of people you know who use these sites - starting with yourself.

While many will legitimately use social networking sites for broadcasting, distribution, and communication purposes, more people are attempting to instigate and manage friendships online.

Therein lies the problem. I contend that if social networking sites contribute to the decline or decay of social skills, they inadvertently create an antisocial mindset for people as they navigate in the real world because they become more adept and comfortable at socializing in an online world.

If you were walking down the street, or sitting on a bus and someone tapped you on the shoulder and said, "I'd like to add you as a friend," you would look at them as though they were insane, or at the very least, with skepticism. Online, most people are not nearly as discriminate about their friend selections as they are in real life, but they should be.

Friends are afforded special privileges both online and offline. Offline you have to earn them. Online they are instantly granted. One such privilege is knowing who your other friends are and what you are up to. This comes in the form of "updates" which a surprising number of people use to post personal information and comments.

The shouting nature of MySpace (which is saturated with people who are eager to draw attention to themselves or their songs) makes it a favorite among a younger demographic of social network users.

Dr. Himanshu Tyagi, a psychiatrist at West London Mental Health Trust, stated in a recent report that people born after 1990, who were just five-years-old or younger when the use of Internet became mainstream in 1995, have grown up in a world dominated by online social networks such as MySpace and Facebook. He states:

"This is the age group involved with the Bridgend suicides and what many of these young people had in common was their use of Internet to communicate. 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," said Dr. Tyagi. "People used to the quick pace of online social networking may soon find the real world boring and unstimulating, potentially leading to more extreme behavior to get that sense."

It's been my observation that most people don't know who they have among their "friends" on MySpace. More commonly, people amass hoards of friends strictly for the sake of appearance - the appearance of being popular. So friends can get used both offline and online in that regard.

The 80/20 rule teaches us a lot about friends and time invested in friendships (which is what really defines them). 80% of correspondence that you send to anyone on any given social networking site will be sent to only 20% of the people you have in your "friends list." Just as 80% of your time spent nurturing friendships will be with 20% of your friends. You are most likely to communicate with that 20% without the aid of a social network.

Facebook, for lack of a better if not more accurate description, has become the adult version of MySpace. As the real estate mantra goes: build it and they will come. But social networks have a saying all their own: build it and they will use it for illegitimate purposes.

B.J. Fogg, director of the Persuasive Tech Lab at Stanford University and editor of a book called The Psychology of Facebook has been studying the social networking phenomenon for years. He argues that what we are doing on Facebook and other social networking sites is a lot like "primate" grooming. We are building "social solidarity" by publicly flirting and socializing online.

Yes, your suspicions are correct: the most illegitimate use of social networks takes place among people who are married or in committed relationships who use them to locate old flames. Actually, that's not the illegitimate part. The illegitimacy stems from the resulting clandestine relationships that occur. There's a lot of rekindling taking place on social networks...probably right now as you read this article.

According to Nancy Kalish, a professor of psychology at Cal State Sacramento and author of the book Lost & Found Lovers: Facts and Fantasies of Rekindled Romance, many people try to reunite online because it's so easy," Kalish says. "Most people go looking for lost loves, initially, out of curiosity. First loves in particular are most often sought out online, she says, and they pose the most danger to real-world relationships for two reasons: biological and emotional.

First, she says, when two people meet in the adolescent years (between 16 and 22), they start to form their identity together and break away from family. In those formative years, "you define what love is and what you want from a partner, and when you lose that, you lose that piece of yourself." This combines with the hormones that are encoding in your brain at that age as "emotive memory" and creates a biological imprint of that person.

On top of all this chemistry, the adolescent years are typically the years when humans start to reach their reproductive maturity and look for biologically compatible mates. Kalish argues that this in turn causes problems because people are delaying marriage. She says, "we are so far away from marrying our first love because people are waiting until later in life to settle down. When they do settle down, oftentimes, the chemistry just isn't the same."

Perhaps this is the reason why in the Pew survey, of the adults who had removed their profile from a social networking site, 3 percent said they did it because their spouse or partner wanted it removed.

My favorite social networking site is LinkedIn. It's essentially an online portal for resumes. Like the others, it operates on a membership/sign-up basis, but is geared toward professionals and building professional networks. Unlike MySpace and Facebook, people lead with their credentials on LinkedIn and the site regulates, discourages, and prevents abuse of the system by blocking those who get repeated rejections for linking requests.

It's most distinctive feature are the recommendations that others make on your behalf to help you complete and promote your profile. The LinkedIn business premise is simple: you should know at least 5 people with whom you have real relationships who can endorse you to make you a more valuable connection to others.

LinkedIn is not a cozy, give-a-shot-out, tell you about my weekend, post a stupid comment about what I just saw on TV social network. It is for serious professionals who want to network with credentialed people without the levity and frivolity that is so commonplace on social networks. It's not designed for conviviality and making friends.

Another social network that's growing in popularity is Twitter. Twitter allows users to "follow" each other (i.e. keep up with each other's activities) and is predicated on the exchange of short updates that can be seen online via their website or sent to you via your cell phone. I suspect that many music artists and professionals who regularly calendar events that the public, their fans, or constituents need to be made aware of will utilize it more in the future.

Personally, I have yet to make a friend through any social networking site. Nor do I know of anyone who has. I'm sure it happens. I've even been contacted by "friends" from my past. I'm hesitant to call them "friends" because I believe it's extremely rare when you lose contact with a real friend.

Most of the time when we lose contact with each other it's because we lacked the motivation or commitment to maintain the friendship in the first place; therefore, I tend to keep past "friends" in my past because that's usually where they belong. Those who don't subscribe to this philosophy usually end up briefly re-uniting with their past friends and drifting apart once more.

For me, the social networks offer their greatest value from a professional capacity. They serve as a divide between my associates and my friends, while allowing me to communicate with both simultaneously. But in the end, they offer us a reminder of just how valuable real friends and friendships are, if we can take our faces away from the computers screens long enough to realize it.

Source: Gian Fiero

File Under Psychology Journal

Relationship Psychology

Have you ever been transferred from your work place or schooled far away from home? Such experiences break your social and family ties, and you may feel isolated or become a loner. You face dynamic changes and sometimes it takes long for you to adapt. Relationship psychology explains how our relationships affect our psychological well-being. When you are separated from your family and social friends, the ties tend to weaken hence you invest in other relationships.

You will agree with me that when your relationships are not working, you are unstable health wise because your psychology needs are not fulfilled. This is because your health is determined by the quality of your relationships. There are themes studied in relationship psychology that explain how relationships orient you in other fields. Most of the time you cannot judge the outcome of a relationship but the basic information you get gives you a rough idea about the other person.

We all like different music. When you meet someone you can guess his personality if he tells you the kind of music he listens to. Studies show that our cholesterol levels are different. To save your relationship from effects of cholesterol you should write down affectionate thoughts about close friends and family members. If your partner is unfaithful how do view him? The conclusions you make can break or re-build your relationships.

Relationship Psychology explains parental relationships after divorce. Children are likely to suffer psychologically in cases of divorce therefore they are the major concern. The parents should devise ways of ensuring that the children have basic necessities and are psychologically stable. Communication and understanding is very vital in a relationship as bring it determines compatibility.

Your Emotions Determine your Health

Saturday, March 28, 2009

Every thought and emotion you have constantly contributes to the state of your overall health. Scientists have now proven that being kind boosts your immune system. Can you believe it, isn’t that amazing? But of course we already knew that didn’t we? The body mirrors the mind perfectly; so what takes place in the mind, takes place in the body, thus the mind- body connection.

When we experience an emotion, a chemical reaction takes place within our body. An emotion is felt and a corresponding hormone is released. For example when we feel stressed our body releases adrenaline into our system to help cope with it. Alternatively when we feel joyous our body releases endorphins which provide a sense of satisfaction and well being. It is this chemical release that connects the mind to the body and impacts our health.

The chemicals released into our system attach to our cells by way of receptors. All cells have receptors and are therefore capable of connecting with the hormones from every emotion we feel. When the chemical attaches to the cell, it sends a signal into the cell that in turn creates a biochemical event inside the cell. Enough of the heavy stuff though, basically what that means is it changes the state of the cell and therefore changes you internally.

We as human beings have an enormous array of emotions we feel continuously, whether we are aware of it on a conscious level or not. All emotions have a charge that we feel as positive or negative. Moment by moment we are releasing emotional charges into our bodies and most often unaware that we are feeling anything at all. In society as a whole, we have become so totally disconnected from our emotions.

When we experience any of the positive emotions such as happiness, joy, passion, inspiration, harmony, trust, optimism, freedom, appreciation, empowerment, peace, enthusiasm, jubilation or love, our bodies are in a state of homeostasis which is physiological equilibrium within our bodies involving a balance of functions and chemical composition. Basically our whole body is in balance and we feel amazing.

However reoccurrence of negative emotions such as boredom, anger, frustration, grief, disappointment, blame, worry, stress, loneliness, abandonment, sadness, fear, hate, rage, disillusionment, depression, anguish, resentment or guilt leave our body in a state of ill-health because of the way the cell is altered. From negative emotions comes a decline in our health.

Negative emotions are toxic to our cells and therefore our whole body. For example when we suffer from too much stress in our body, we experience an enormous amount of cortisol which has a detrimental consequence on how we feel physically. We may encounter such symptoms as muscle tightness, back/head aches, liver dysfunction, sluggish bowels, fatigue, inadequate kidney performance and eventually may be a casualty of heart attack or stroke. Then we feel miserable physically, and consequently we feel negative emotionally and so you can see how the cycle can escalate. This is how dis-ease originates in the body.

In a nutshell, the more you feel positive emotions, the healthier you will be! Your emotions determine your health and that is the bottom line. Think of a time you felt a negative emotion, how did your body react? Slumped shoulders, head down, tears, a sense of heaviness, shaking, tension, heart palpitations. This is how your body reflects your mind. What happens in the mind, happens in the body. I love what Louise Hay says in regard to skeptics of the mind-body connection; “Anyone who does not believe in the mind-body connection has never had a sexual fantasy.” Oh how she has the ability to get her point across.

Think of how your body reacts to positive emotions; a sense of lightness, smiles all round, shoulders back, posture straight, glowing face, a full state of relaxation. Positive emotions allow us to feel good physically, mentally and emotionally. The more we feel good, the more we feel good. So here is a perfect reason why we would endeavour to live our life from a place of happiness.

Yes, I know what you are thinking; we all encounter events and situations that provoke us to feel bad and I acknowledge it is all part of our human evolution. But this is where the desire for positive emotions is derived; us experiencing the polarity of the negative. To have the desire to be happy comes from knowing what it feels like to be unhappy. Having the desire for safety is from the feeling of being unsafe and scared. I am not saying you never have a negative emotion ever again, I am saying that we have the ability to take control and not fall victim to our emotions.

When you feel a negative emotion there are a couple of ways to change how you feel. Firstly, acknowledging how you feel and being in acceptance of it will take the power away from it; and you will begin to feel it dissipate. Don’t ignore it or try to make it go away, this gives more power to it. So when you are feeling angry, acknowledge it and allow yourself to be angry rather than trying to push the anger away. Don’t punish yourself by thinking you shouldn’t feel a certain way, that will lead to repression of emotions.

Acceptance of what emotion you are experiencing, frees you from feeling that way anymore and allows the emotion to move through you instead of being stuck in you; therefore allowing room for more positive emotions to enter. The acceptance of the emotion is already exchanging a positive emotion instead of the anger. Now your anger is gone, you can put your attention into a more positive effect. You can choose to feel positive about the same situation because you are seeing it through the eyes of a different emotion.

Secondly, if you are still feeling powerless to negative emotions, it is vital that you release them by expressing yourself. Expression can be in the form of talking to someone about it or writing it down in a journal, either way, the emotion is leaving your body and that is what is needed here. Rid your body of the harmful emotion by expressing it fully by words or pen. Unexpressed negative emotions cause sickness in the body. They block the flow of energy and cause a buildup of toxic cells creating incessant fatigue problems, illness and disease.

Long term emotional trauma stored in the body can cause serious disease such as cancer and the like. We repress our uncomfortable emotions in many ways including masking them by taking drugs (legal and illegal) or alcohol, overeating, excessive working, spending money (commonly known as retail therapy), obsessive sexual habits or even extreme exercising. These habits can turn into addictions and only serve to disguise the emotions within. These addictions enable you to numb the pain of the emotion so you don’t feel anymore.

So many times we see an obese person lose weight only to regain it again because the core issue of why the weight was there in the first place has not been resolved. In some instances they may lose weight, keep it off, but will fall prey to a new addiction to seek the same numbness until they are willing to look within for the cause. This process is known as being detached from your emotions, although just because you are ignoring their presence, doesn’t mean they do not exist. They are still causing major toxicity from within. The sooner you attend to hurt in the past, the healthier you will be.

If you are unsure of how to resolve past issues, seek advice from the experts. You may decide to leave bygones be bygones or sweep past hurt under the carpet so you don’t feel the pain of it again, but for the sake of your long term health and freedom of mind, resolution of emotional trauma is absolutely essential. Releasing past hurts is such a feeling of freedom and as I said before, it allows much more room to fill yourself up with the ‘feel good’ stuff.

In my practice I have found that those who choose resolution of deep- rooted emotional pain are able to move forward with a new passion and vigor for life. They have the ability to paint their future with the brush of freedom because they have released what it is that has been holding them back. They are able to step forward with newly recreated dreams on a bigger and more abundant scale.

Removing these self-sabotaging blocks allows processing on a physical, mental and emotional level all at once. It can also transpire at a subconscious level so you may not even be aware of what is being accomplished behind the scenes. So much can be achieved in a small amount of time. Years of cycling through the same patterns can be modified in a moment. Emotional potentiality is not a new concept for humanity to embrace; however being disconnected from it is the cause of the decline in our health.

So how do we strengthen our immune system by being kind? When I heard Dr. Wayne Dyer state this, I was absolutely blown away because scientists have now proven what I have always felt in my heart. Whenever you give an act of kindness to another, the recipient encounters a strong emotion within. This emotion, as stated earlier, causes a chemical reaction inside the body by way of serotonin. Serotonin is the hormone that makes us feel phenomenal. So when someone gives you a gift, that welling up of emotion you feel inside is from the serotonin. It is this hormone that strengthens our immune system and therefore our state of health.

But not only does the recipient increase their levels of serotonin, so does the giver because when you give in kindness, you also feel the emotional connection between the two of you and therefore release your serotonin accordingly. So you are both boosting your immune system at the same time. In this moment of kindness, the connection you feel is on a heart level, it is a connection of love between two souls. This is grace!

But if that isn’t amazing enough, when an individual simply observes this act of kindness, they also feel the act of love and it boosts their immune system as well. So if you don’t want to be kind yourself, you can always just watch someone else do it and get the same result. So you can see where this is all going. Just by being kind, everyone around you benefits and gets a stronger, healthier mind and body. Wow, how awesome is that? So being kind and feeling good makes you healthy!

So what you can do on a daily basis from a conscious perspective is to declare that you are the controlling factor in your health by seeing the positive instead of the negative; seeing the good instead of the bad. It is possible, but it is a choice, you can perceive things in a ‘feel good’ way. Tar you brush with the paint of love. Every single thing you encounter has an emotional reading to it. As the powerful human being that you are, you can override and change the way you think and feel about everything.

Choose to see the endless beauty in situations, rather than the ugliness; face each day with passion instead of dreading what is in store. Embrace the opportunity to spend time alone and be out in nature rather than dwelling on the fact you have to mow the lawn, notice the beauty in the snake rather than feel the fear. See the love in everyone and know we are all connected by the Divine, infinite intelligence that we all embody within. ‘When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.’ – Dr Wayne Dyer.

Permanent change means we need to abandon an old way of doing something and recreate a new and more effective way. Our common misconception is in believing all things happen automatically within our body. Now we have the understanding, knowledge and therefore the power to realise we are all in total control of creating our health. We now know how to give birth to optimal health. It originates from our state of mind and our wondrous emotions are the key. It doesn’t matter how well you eat, exercise and look after your body physically, if your cells can’t receive the nutrients and benefits because of emotional blockages, you will not become healthy for long.

As you think, so shall you be. Mind becomes matter. So when you change your thought, you change the way you feel about any given situation. Thinking a positive thought enables a corresponding ‘feel good’ emotion. Raising your consciousness allows you to think and feel positively more of the time, naturally creating a healthy mind, body and soul. When your health is in an optimum state, the possibilities you create for yourself are endless. Change your thought, change your emotion and create the life you desire. Change your emotion, change your cells and be the complete and utter picture of health. Source; http://www.articlesbase.com/self-help-articles/

Emotional Intelligence: a Tool for Success

Friday, March 27, 2009

Do you know what emotional intelligence (EI or EQ) is and how it can benefit your life? Do you know how to manage your emotion so you can propel yourself to the next level?

In short, do you have the EQ edge for success?

There’s so much talk about emotional intelligence and how it can promote personal and business success. Many corporations that prioritize productivity and profit spend thousands to make EQ seminars available to their employees.

Why is this so? What is emotional intelligence?

Technically, emotional intelligence is the capacity to recognize, understand, and manage one’s emotions and those of others. But in practical terms, EQ simply refers to emotional and social skills.

Regardless of how you define it, this concept focuses on the role of emotion in our daily lives, how it affects our reasoning and behavior, and how we can manage it to our advantage.

As you know, emotion is pervasive in our daily existence. Whatever we do or wherever we are, we experience it. A typical day consists of situations that evoke varying degrees of happiness, anger, anxiety, or excitement. We always feel something when we — have a date with a loved one, share our thoughts with a friend, receive greeting cards on our birthdays, smile to a shy neighbor, shower our homes with laughter, or drive around a scenic national park.

Even in our sleep, our dreams trigger various emotions — from anger and fear to excitement and joy.

Like the setting of the sun, emotion exists in our natural midst and without it, life can be boring. So we should get to know it. We should use it to advance our cause. If we don’t, it will simply overpower our resolve.

Anger for instance is normal and everyone feels angry for different reasons. When your child goes home with a poor mark, you get upset because you realize he spends more time playing video games than reading his school text. When a speeding car cuts you off in a highway, you will not only feel angry, you’ll get “MAD”!

However, uncontrolled anger can be destructive. If you grab your son and hit him with a right hook because of his poor grade; or if you chase and bump another car for cutting you off, then you allow anger to schedule your vacation in jail. Also, you let your emotion dictate the outcome of your life.

How many families have broken up simply because couples can’t control their emotions? They exchange blows more often than they go to church. Some bicker more often than they eat meals together. How many kids grow up with low self-esteem just because parents can’t stop their untamed tongue from unwarranted ridicule — putting their kids down, calling them unprintable names?

When you let unrestrained emotion guide your destiny and life decisions, then you may be in a big trouble along the way. However, when you recognize and manage your emotions and those of others appropriately, then you guarantee your personal and professional growth.

Developing emotional intelligence should be prioritized at home and at work. Through its four basic principles of self-awareness (knowing one’s emotions), self-management (controlling one’s emotions), social awareness (recognizing the emotions of others), and relationship management (honing social skills), people can make use of their emotion to enhance relationships and to pursue success.

Emotion not only serves a special purpose in our lives, it also sets us apart from other creatures and makes us human with unlimited possibilities. So tame it, befriend it, lead it, and love it. Very soon, emotion will be your ally.

Source; http://www.articlesbase.com/mental-health-articles/