This is the first pandemic that has impacted the world while this smart and technological generation, the first pandemic was registered in 2009 the flu or influenza pandemic. Certainly this did not impact as big as the Covid 19 but in its time that pandemic impacted the world by taking many lives. In this time the social media was just starting to become accessible for everyone but now with covid-19 society is documenting everything in the social media and this will be passed to history, people will be able to see how in real time we went through this. The Harris Poll conducted between late March and early May, found that between 46% and 51% of US adults were using social media more since the outbreak began. In the most recent May 1–3 survey, 51% of total respondents — 60% of those ages 18 to 34, 64% of those ages 35 to 49, and 34% of those ages 65 and up – reported increased usage on certain social media platforms. 

Facebook has had a great impact on promoting information while in this pandemic, with more than 2.500 millions of users worldwide just by a click or a hashtag of anything related to the coronavirus we could have access to all the information that is on this social media in relation to this topic. A great initiative that facebook took was the removal of many fake pages which spread made up information about the topic and many post with face information in relationship to this which allow many people to get information like test locations, to know the red areas in where the cases where worse and as well places where people could stay quarentening if they could not stay at their house and as well for those that were traveling. All of this information is placed on facebook from agencies and for ambassadors that try to maintain the people informed.

Social media platforms have been of great use while in this pandemic to maintain communication with family and friends and to reduce isolation and boredom which connect with anxiety and long term distress. As we all could have seen by this point that social media has become a place in where every celebration is being stream, graduations, weddings, gender reveal and birthdays all of this are being share in social media in an attempt to feel close to those that are in distance and in a way to share the same feeling with all of our loved ones even through screens. Childrens that were not able to go in presents to their graduations could still share the same moment with their friends over social media by a zoom call or in a facebook live, they could see each other faces and their professor that even though we feel this as minimum for them this is exciting because their routine was cut drastically and this affect them in a big way, this little moments of seen the people that they spend 5 or 8 hrs with is well needed for them.  Events like weddings now are being stream or people share the especial moment by the help of this social media, grandparents are meeting their grandchildrens by a facetime call or by a google meet or zoom meeting and even though this is not the normal for us is the only way that we have to still see those familiar faces and it is thanks to this social media and the whole society is depending totally to this to cut this distance that is not only 6 feets away but as well kilometers away for those that are not able to travel and meet with their families in this time. 

The social media have been of a lot of help to the people of the entertainment area, a lot of artists are making virtual concerts in order to keep their fans entertained and in order to keep their business and make money. A lot of artists have used places like facebook or instagrams to go live and perform for their public and others have used youtube to have a wider reach of people that will stream their music and videos without the need of infecting more people or gathering big groups together. With the amount of time in the house that people are spending, families are bonding more, video games and movies are being used more. The amount of games requested and play have increased in comparison to last year, not only people play with those that are in the house with them but as well they place with those that are far away which are not able to share their time together. This time of entertainment allows people to have a sense of normal and allows them to release stress and continuum the interaction between

This data shows the increase on the use of this social media within one year and how the post and the actions like live stream have increase or decrease in this year. The travel my have decrease but the publishing, government and health have increase. showing how much interaction this topics have gain over the year.

Resources:

https://www.jmir.org/2020/5/e19556/

https://iaap-journals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/aphw.12226

Just like we have seen with other crises, people all over the world reach out to each other through social media to make sense of what is happening. Since March Social media has been one of our best friends, while in this quarantine many of us only have the single social interaction of our families and others that were not able to be with their families had to spend this time alone. We have increased our forecast on mobile messaging and  time spent by US adults to grow by 4 minutes in 2020, to 24 minutes per day, not only due to the pandemic but also data showing strong engagement on messaging services like Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, and Apple iMessage. The social media have been the only way to stay connected with the outside world, with our families and our friends, for some this has been the only way to connect with their work, their co-workers and it has been the greatest form of entertainment as well as the biggest platform of information. Social media has been a way to coope the reality of what was going on at that time and a way to maintain our self informed on how the world was doing and where people could find help. We could  think of the many funny videos about how people creatively deal with the lockdown, of the neighborhood Facebook groups that organize entertainment and practical support to help neighbors who need assistance with grocery shopping or childcare, and the quick rise of apps and functionalities that allow for live chat and video sessions with multiple people. A lot of people found psychology, teachers, and a lot of information about places where food could be delivered to home at times when some people were not able to look for their own food.

The role of social media during socially challenging times like today also adds a new angle to the long-standing debate about reinforcing vs. displacing effects of online communication on in-person connections. Whereas it has been established that social media use can reinforce and does not reduce in-person contact,  the COVID-19 outbreak underscores a different social compensatory role of social media. When in-person connections are displaced, not by social media, but by outside forces and disruptions such as the virus outbreak, online communication can provide a much-needed remedy for staying in touch and connected.While social media can undoubtedly help us maintain a sense of normalcy and social touch, this is not to say that its effects are unequivocally positive, and we can be on social media 24/7.Being mindful of this dualism, we should remember to take breaks from our digital devices and screens and engage in other meaningful activities in our lives, such as doing fun activities with our partners and families as challenging as it can be when families are cooped up together for weeks and spending time outdoors, to maintain a balance in our lives.

These positive outcomes could be related to the population following the Darley and Latane’s five steps, The first step is identifying and recognizing that there’s a problem in this case we as a society identify that the virus was a big problem that was affecting us.

Secondly, is the ability to interpret the conflict as an emergency, as a society we identify that this virus is an emergency and we start to share this information. Social media became a way to let everyone know how dangerous this virus is.

The third step is taking responsibility for helping, in this case we as a community can take responsibility for following the lock down that has been implemented and avoiding spreading the virus or getting it. As well finding ways in which we could assist those who are in a worse place than us. In this apps like Zoom, Facetime, instagram, whatsapp and Facebook among others apps help us to maintain distance and make the lock down 

In this instance, step four, deciding how to help in this case we as a society have been informed that in order to help we need to keep our distance from each other and use protection like gloves, mask and hand sanitizer in order to prevent getting sick. As well for elderly people a way to help 

Step 5 goes hand in hand with step four and is simply providing the assistance after you have decided the method in which you will help in this case it would be following the methods state in the step 4 and preventing going out unless needed in order to stop the spread which social media helped on this case by being the one providing the easy access for the society in order to allow the communication among distance, allowing people to buy in places like facebook and in order social medias by teaching people how to do things on their own restricting the need of other people to do this things.

Resource.

https://www.emarketer.com/content/how-coronavirus-changing-us-social-media-usage

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2018/06/19/621136346/a-look-at-social-media-finds-some-possible-benefits-for-kids