Interview with Dr. Kara Alaimo Transcript
Dr. Kara Alaimo is an Associate Professor of Communications at Fairleigh Dickinson University. She is the author of Over the Influence: Why Social Media is Toxic for Women and Girls — And How We Can Take It Back.
What do you see as the relationship between youth and social media consumption?
Teens are on social media all the time, which can lead to them being exposed to different types of content online which is not always safe. They do not know how to turn off social media due to being online for so many hours a day. Most of their lives are becoming consumed by social media. This is also making the offline world less safe for young women and young girls.
In terms of safety of young people, what are those risks especially for those who may be vulnerable online?
One of the main concerns is children and even adults matching with predators online. When doing research for my book, I found that there would be catfish syndicates where they would traffic young men using social media and use their photos in order to aid in their scams. There is a lot of criminal activity that can take place on social media and it is shockingly common, especially “sextortion” which is usually pressuring the young person to send explicit images online. Younger people often may fall into a trap when it comes to dating apps and connecting with predators or criminals. There is also a lot of toxic content online and one of my main issues is with “fitspiration” as it is a glamorized version of their lifestyles and not realistic. Social media also contains a lot of misinformation as well.
Within this photo editing epidemic, how has this impacted self image?
It creates unrealistic expectations for people’s bodies. I interviewed someone for my book who is a trainer and explained how an “Instagram body” is something that could only be achieved through surgery. However, she still has clients showing her pictures of inspiration from Instagram and wanting these unrealistic figures that are unattainable. This is why in my book I call for social networks to tell people when a photo is edited. Along with this, there are also many deepfakes created using AI and sometimes people cannot tell the difference which can cause many issues. We examined an example of this when a teenage girl had a deep fake posed in explicit nature created of her by two boys she went to school with. Due to the comments and bullying she received from this, she fell into a depression and was suicidal.
Do you see these risks growing as parents begin sharing more and more information about their children online?
Well with “sharenting” it can be very dangerous to teach kids to perform for other people, which oftentimes girls have been taught that they have to perform for others. This is a very dangerous idea especially when a kid has to grow up and look back and see all of this embarrassing content about themselves online.
Are there safe online communities for teens? And how can this combat the negativity teens often consume on online media?
It is possible for a young person to TikTok in healthy ways, and find hobbies or something that could lead to a career. However overall the “platforms it selves are not safe” and that is the current issue we are facing.
There have been talks of certain states (especially New York and Florida) banning social media usage for those under 15/16, what are your thoughts on this?
Personally I would not allow my children to use social media until the age of 16, when I know I will have taught them about the risks of being online. I think that parents should band together in order to prevent their children from going on social media until they are 16 because I know as soon as I give my daughter a phone and her friends are on it, I would be losing that battle. I saw an example of a parent who gave her kid $1600 to not go on social media until they turn 16 and thought that was a great idea for parents who can afford to do that for their kids as a good incentive. While the government can try to regulate these apps, it can turn into kind of murky territory.
How would you advise young women to be cautious in their approach to social media usage?
There is this book by Kate Manne called Unshrinking and talks about things such as size and self image, which would be something important in order to educate young girls on. I would advise them to find a hobby that they can turn into a career and engage in content focused on that, as well as to push them away from consuming toxic content as there is a large quantity of it online. They should only interact with people online that they know in real life and clarify with them that those are indeed their friends’ or family members’ accounts, so they know who they are talking to online. Along with this, when you do get into trouble it is important to turn to your parents. I interviewed a lawyer for my book and one of the main reasons why things got so out of hand were kids being embarrassed or ashamed to turn to their parents about it.
