Social media has shaped our lives in the digital era and has a big impact on how we view and comprehend different ideas. It's important to investigate the psychological processes through which social media platforms affect our views, even if many research studies have focused on the sociological effects of these platforms. With an emphasis on cognitive processes, selective exposure, cognitive dissonance, and the function of emotional contagion, this article investigates how social media shapes our perception of concepts.
Concept perception is profoundly influenced by cognitive functions like interpretation, memory, and attention. With its continual stream of information, social media influences these processes by focusing our attention on certain topics. Cognitive confirmation bias results from the platform's algorithmic architecture, which frequently confirms our preexisting opinions and preferences. Because we frequently interact more with knowledge that supports our previous views, our understanding of a subject becomes distorted as a result.
Users are more likely to come across material that aligns with their preexisting opinions because of social media platforms' selective exposure. Due to this phenomenon, people are exposed only to views that support their worldview in online echo chambers. This limited exposure to different viewpoints results in a limited understanding of concepts as a result of this selective exposure. These echo chambers can eventually strengthen people's opinions and possibly exacerbate the polarised character of debates.
According to the cognitive dissonance theory, people get psychologically uncomfortable when their beliefs conflict with fresh facts. Social media contributes to this process by exposing users to a wide range of viewpoints and data. Cognitive dissonance can happen when people are exposed to opposing perspectives. They could seek out information, interpret it just partially, or even ignore opposing viewpoints all away to try to ease this pain. Due to our propensity to seek consistency and coherence within our online identities, this phenomena has an impact on how we construct impressions about concepts.
Emotions are extremely important in determining how concepts are perceived. Social media platforms are skilled at evoking strong emotions through spectacular tales, viral content, and striking visuals. Conceptual framing is affected by emotional contagion, the mechanism through which emotions spread among people. A notion could, for instance, arouse fear or rage when given in a negative emotional frame, leading to a skewed impression. Similar to negative emotional framing, positive emotional framing can inspire sympathy and backing for a certain idea.
Social media platforms allow people to curate their online personas and act as venues for self-presentation. When users display themselves in ways that are consistent with particular ideas, this might result in impression management. To give the impression that they are concerned about the environment, someone who is engaged in sustainability could post material. This self-presentation affects how we see ourselves in connection to particular ideas as well as how others see us.
Social media has a complicated interplay with cognitive processes, selective exposure, cognitive dissonance, emotional contagion, and self-presentation that affects how people perceive concepts. Recognising how the digital environment is influencing our perceptions requires an understanding of these psychological processes. It's important to be aware of the biases and cognitive processes that impact our perception of the world around us as we traverse the social media landscape. We may lessen the negative effects of social media's influence on our perceptions by encouraging critical thinking and actively seeking out different points of view.