The claim chosen is about how media apps that are accessible to younger generations, and have slowly matured children or young adults. If you open any social media app, you will most likely come across a twelve year old dancing to a tiktok trend. The way they present themselves, they look a couple years older than their actual age because they were influenced by others on social media. Many factors come to blame, including parents for allowing their children to have these apps that are directed towards older teens. Also getting their kids phones at such a young age, when they have too much to learn before the responsibility of a phone. People also argue that kids are getting the “correct” childhood experience because it's vastly different from what other generations had. “It appears that TikTok is now seen as a platform for tweens, partly because parents are becoming less concerned about their children using it,” (Medium). Considering all of this, the concern is tweens are growing up too fast, ignoring what it means to be a kid.
“Each time a post receives positive reactions such as shares and likes, a bit of dopamine is released. Dopamine is like chocolate, having just a little feels unsatisfactory, making the brain yearn for more, which can result in addiction,”(Los Angeles Times). “Tweens” are slowly getting addicted to the internet, resulting in them following trends that are directed towards older teens, or adults. For example, there is this tween named Evelyn who is a fourteen year old girl currently making content on Tiktok, but started posting in 2023, when she was twelve. In these videos, she is wearing cropped clothing, using expensive products, and acting in an inappropriate way for her age. Comments on these videos include young adults putting “hate comments,” about how she is ruining her childhood experience. Not just her, but almost every twelve year old using the app has this attitude, mindset, and overall acting more mature for their age. “Social media can indeed disrupt and expedite the maturation process of tweens by exposing them to self-presentation online,”(Medium). The media is almost an escape pocket for children to feel as if they are the same age as everyone around them. Kids are constantly looking up to older people, craving being just like them, and social media apps are allowing them to act like the “older people.” Overall, the social media apps today are slowly maturing younger generations.
