Essay on the Teenagers Addiction to Social Media

It is a natural desire of human to know and discover new things, account for the present occurrence or predict what will happen. I, for instance, noted that majority of the teens around me are always on social media, even when attending classes and meetings. The adults tend to be on social media with moderation. I would like to find out why the teenagers are more addicted to Facebook as compared to the senior adults (40 years and above). In so doing, one may opt to rely on scientific research, or just rely on common sense or some belief-based system. However, lessons from phrenology,  a concept that cranial morphology is correlated with personality and intellectual ability, shows why empirical research beats belief-based system and common sense in obtaining the truth.

Phrenology is mainly attributed to Franz Joseph Gall, a German physician who in the late 18th century claimed that cranial morphology would predict how people behaved, including their propensity to commit a crime (DeLisi, 2013). The basis for this notion was that some location of certain brain parts influenced intelligence and traits. Since such locations would be affected by cranial morphology, it would follow that morphology would impact on character, emotions and intellectual ability. Though persuasive because the inference came as a common sense, there was no credible empirical research for this belief. Unfortunately, Gall's views were believed and got overwhelmingly received, particularly in western Europe and the US. Some scholars like Cesare Lombroso's in his work, L'Uomo Delinquente, claimed that there were born criminal, and this could be inferred from the shape of their forehead (DeLisi, 2013). The subsequent empirical research found no statistical association between body morphology and crime, like that by Charles Goring, leading to falling of phrenology.

I may want to use common sense and conclude that teens find social media more entertaining. But this may be erroneous as was the case with phrenology. I need an empirical research, where I survey youths and senior adults, so as to test my hypothesis that entertainment is a factor. Scientific research is objective, replicable and falsifiable, unlike belief-based system or common sense that may not be falsifiable (Bunge, 2012). Falsification means the study can be examined and the hypothesis or theories developed to be tested and proved. Replication means another researcher may follow the same methodology under similar setting and find the same answers to the theory. These attributes lack in unlike belief-based system or common sense.

References

Bunge, M. (2012). Scientific research II: The search for truth. New York: Springer Science & Business Media.

DeLisi, M. (2013). Revisiting Lombroso. The Oxford handbook of criminological theory, 5-21. Oxford: OUP