TikTok is massively used by teenagers and the younger generation and the application is known to be the breeding ground of some challenges which in many instances have proven to be quite harmful. TikTok was called out on a lot of challenges over the course of this year, where challenges like students hitting their teachers or destroying the school property just for the sake of a video and few likes was observed.
However, while these may seem extreme, these challenges were among the basic ones. This year, a black out challenge started circulating around TikTok and this was picked up by a lot of youngsters on the app. The blackout challenge included the participant choking themselves to the point they pass out and then wake up a few minutes later. While choking was dangerous in itself, the death of a 12-year-old trying to imitate this challenge was brought this to actual focus.
When TikTok was called for a Senate hearing it denied any associations with such challenges, until the Senate members brought in video proofs of actual ‘pass out videos’ and other harmful content on the app.
TikTok then dove into a research on the psychology younger users hold and what drives these risky and harmful challenges to be implemented.
In the research that TikTok started, ten thousand teens, parents and teachers from various countries were included to surveyed. An independent safeguard agency named ‘Praesidio Safeguarding’ was picked up to write a detailed report on the survey and a 12-member team of ‘teen safety experts’ was made to review it as well. Apart from this, ‘Dr. Gretchen Brion-Meisels’, ‘a behavioral scientist’, who specializes in risk prevention management was asked for further guidance.
According to him, the internet and social media over the years have become a more youngsters fort. You find more young people on apps like TikTok etc. who’s are still in their puberty phase.
During this time, the minds of the children s transitioning towards an adult phase. They are going through more complex mental and emotional states and are trying to figure out themselves in general. All this makes them wanting to learn more about the world, and participate in everything to get exposure and test their limits increases.
Sometimes the thirst for such risks can also be derived by peer pressure or to feel validated by your friend circle. The report suggests that while sometimes these risks are minor or harmless, other times they can be big enough to leave a traumatizing effect.
These viral challenges are also a result of peer pressure, and the hunger for likes and reviews.
However, the research concluded that not all the teens and young adults were participating in such challenges and only 21 percent of the world-ly population was participating in challenges, out of which only 2 percent took part in risky stuff with 0.3 participating in what can be termed as ‘dangerous.’
While the report conducted that the risk stuff was more of a social media issue as a whole than specific to TikTok. However, TikTok has announced to play its part.
The short video making application has stated to be more conscious towards their moderation and check up on hashtags when one specific hashtag starts trending a lot.
It will take a lot of time to remove or limit such content from the internet. However, if proper efforts are given it is possible to do so.
Read next: TikTok Might Have 1.5 Billion Active Users by 2022 According to App Annie's Prediction
However, while these may seem extreme, these challenges were among the basic ones. This year, a black out challenge started circulating around TikTok and this was picked up by a lot of youngsters on the app. The blackout challenge included the participant choking themselves to the point they pass out and then wake up a few minutes later. While choking was dangerous in itself, the death of a 12-year-old trying to imitate this challenge was brought this to actual focus.
When TikTok was called for a Senate hearing it denied any associations with such challenges, until the Senate members brought in video proofs of actual ‘pass out videos’ and other harmful content on the app.
TikTok then dove into a research on the psychology younger users hold and what drives these risky and harmful challenges to be implemented.
In the research that TikTok started, ten thousand teens, parents and teachers from various countries were included to surveyed. An independent safeguard agency named ‘Praesidio Safeguarding’ was picked up to write a detailed report on the survey and a 12-member team of ‘teen safety experts’ was made to review it as well. Apart from this, ‘Dr. Gretchen Brion-Meisels’, ‘a behavioral scientist’, who specializes in risk prevention management was asked for further guidance.
According to him, the internet and social media over the years have become a more youngsters fort. You find more young people on apps like TikTok etc. who’s are still in their puberty phase.
During this time, the minds of the children s transitioning towards an adult phase. They are going through more complex mental and emotional states and are trying to figure out themselves in general. All this makes them wanting to learn more about the world, and participate in everything to get exposure and test their limits increases.
Sometimes the thirst for such risks can also be derived by peer pressure or to feel validated by your friend circle. The report suggests that while sometimes these risks are minor or harmless, other times they can be big enough to leave a traumatizing effect.
These viral challenges are also a result of peer pressure, and the hunger for likes and reviews.
However, the research concluded that not all the teens and young adults were participating in such challenges and only 21 percent of the world-ly population was participating in challenges, out of which only 2 percent took part in risky stuff with 0.3 participating in what can be termed as ‘dangerous.’
While the report conducted that the risk stuff was more of a social media issue as a whole than specific to TikTok. However, TikTok has announced to play its part.
The short video making application has stated to be more conscious towards their moderation and check up on hashtags when one specific hashtag starts trending a lot.
It will take a lot of time to remove or limit such content from the internet. However, if proper efforts are given it is possible to do so.
Read next: TikTok Might Have 1.5 Billion Active Users by 2022 According to App Annie's Prediction