Millions upon millions of people visit the internet every day, where hundreds of platforms exist for anyone to easily access. High school students have grown up during the evolution of new-age technology, putting them in a position to be affected by social media influencers.

“Social media influences a lot of people in a lot of different ways. Especially when it comes to trends. Whether it is fashion trends, hair trends, etcetera,” said junior Kamden Peterson.

Social media feeds are usually based on content someone has searched for in the past. Feeds can be filtered out with tags as well, picking and choosing what viewers want.

“I primarily use Instagram and I mostly get silly videos, artsy motivational posts, and posts related to my interests,” said senior Josephine Dunmore.

Even with these filters, filter bubbles may blind users from the current news and important information.

“I’ve seen a lot of positive media recently, but I think that it’s because I’ve accidentally made it that way,” said Dunmore.

There are still damaging trending topics that push past the motivational quotes and funny cat videos.

“I think it can many times end up being a negative experience as people might think their life is boring compared to someone else’s or compare other aspects of themselves to other people which can be unhealthy,” said Dunmore.

Sometimes social media trends can lead to unrealistic expectations.

“It’s made kids way more materialistic and wanting really expensive stuff and kids now just spend so much time on social media. We get these idealistic views and they are just unattainable at the moment,” said math teacher Julissa Esquivel.

If social media becomes too overwhelming for teens to keep up with, it is possible to be redirected to more positive aspects of the internet.

“I hope everybody really thinks about what they value and what kind of character they want to be and don’t just follow the trends,” said dean Brooke Twohill.