The Role of Designers in Social Media Toxicity

Since then the tweet has accumulated over 100,000 likes and almost 40,000 retweets. Yes, you should also be deeply appalled that over 100,000 people have read and agreed with that statement. Below the tweet commenced a heavy debate between Twitter users pushing the responsibility of the toxicity of social media on the users themselves or social media apps. However, there was no mention in any of the 97 comments in the thread of designers: the people who essentially design social media. Where are the designers in this equation? Are we really going to allow ourselves to believe that we have full control over how we use social media platforms owned by powerful corporations like Facebook?

It is evident that any effects from a user’s relationship with a social media platform that ultimately harms them is considered toxic. However, addiction with social media, or strictly speaking as the Twitter user criticized, “let[ing] [an] app fuck up your priorities” (Texas, 2018), is one way social media has become toxic for its users. The user’s interactions with social media itself are not inherently toxic, but instead, the frequency of interactions are. This is not to say that users don’t have any control over how often they use social media apps, but it is more important to look at the amount of control we have left from how social media is designed for us. Yes, it really is quite easy to “let a app fuck up your priorities” (Texas, 2018), if we are unaware of the nuances of design that affect our interactions with social media.

Let’s look at the Facebook like button. As we visit Facebook and give likes to its content, it shows us more of the things it thinks we agree with and like to see. Thus, the like button creates a vicious cycle of being trapped in echo chambers and being fed external validation. Who wouldn’t be addicted (even in the mildest sense) to such a ceaseless digital utopia? Even the co-founder of Facebook, Sean Parker, admits that the social media platform “exploit[s] vulnerability in human psychology” (Coen, 2018). The company actively works to make its users revisit the app and breed addictive behaviors. Not only does the design of the like feature create mini pseudo-pleasures for our brains, but the visual design of notifications also play a part in “fuck[ing] up [our] priorities” (Texas, 2018) as well. Former Facebook boss Leah Pearlman says that the red colour of notifications is used as a “trigger colour” to “stimulate the brain” (Coen, 2018). It should be absolutely horrifying to know that Facebook designers are aware of the harm created to users and still harness it to use for their company model.

This is just one example of how tech companies like Facebook vigorously design to manipulate our attention spans and attention seeking tendencies to gain capital for their platforms, which should be a red flag to all of us who use social media apps daily. Interaction designers and tech companies should be the ones held accountable for the ethical responsibility of what happens to users past their interactions within the app and cultivate humane technology: technology that reinforces healthy human and tech relationships. Users should not be left to believe that “social media is only toxic if [we] allow it to be” (Texas, 2018), and blame ourselves of the harm we experience from interactions designed for us.

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