One day I had an extensive conversation with my friends about nutrition. We are all kind of gym rats so we often talk about exercise and nutrition. One of my friends had a totally different diet plan than me, she took inspiration from Googling, I did my ‘research’ on Instagram. When I came home I scrolled on Facebook to find a few shared articles of self-proclaimed researchers about some opinions about the Covid vaccine. In my mind I – with little knowledge about medicine or biochemistry – started battling the claims made in the articles. “Whatever” I thought while opening YouTube, quickly I ran into true crime video’s, pedophile hunter video’s and other amateur criminology stuff. Being a criminology student, I sighed and opened TikTok. “If you can not sit still while listeling to this sound, you have ADHD!” popped up on my screen. That is when it hit me, how come everyone, including myself, has become an ‘expert’ on everything?
In our modern day society the creation, distribution and application of information is easier and quicker than ever before. With TikTok having about 1 billion active users, Instagram having 1,4 billion users, and YouTube even having more than 2 billion active users, an insane amount of people create and consume content (information) every day. Our information society gives everyone a chance to share their ideas and information. With information being more accessible and more quickly distributed than ever, people who would have never known anything about certain topics suddenly have access to limitless amounts of knowledge. And with that, amateurs have turned into the new ‘experts’.
Because of this development, experts have found more and more people challenging their expertise, a prime example is the idea that vaccines cause childhood autism because one study (which has been revoked for years) claimed this was the case, despite overwhelming medical evidence showing no link. Some individuals take it upon themselves to spread misinformation. An example is the self-diagnose trend on TikTok. In these videos, creators claim to be able to diagnose others or themselves – while having no relevant academic background – by using sounds or images in to determine whether you might have a certain disorder. Sure, some people do not have the time nor the funds for a therapist, but to say “You have ADHD/autism/DID if you cringe at this sound.” Is simply not right. Note that the video below has 2.6 millions like at the time of writing this, and how many people might believe they have ADHD because of these kind of videos.
An easy fix fort his problem would be for people to fall back a little bit more and let the experts with academic backgrounds lead the conversation. However, with the current speed and accessibility of information it might not be right or desirable for individuals become sole amateurs again. I would love to hear your opnion on this, should the amateurs stay amateurs and let the experts be the experts, or is it good thing everyone can be an expert on everything because of the internet?
Disclaimer: I am not saying trying to say people are not allowed to have opinions, beliefs or question what they think is right/real. Any topic that you are interested in or you feel like you know a lot about will logically dominate your conversations and I encourage everyone to think for themselves.
Sources
Ellinor. (2019, december 16). How come everyone’s an expert according to their writings on social media? http://www.thenurslingthing.se/babywearing/experts-social-media/
Hsu, J. (2009, march 4). Modern Problem: Everyone’s an Expert. https://www.livescience.com/9616-modern-problem-expert.html
Morford, M. (2020, september 25). Everyone’s an expert. https://www.tacomadailyindex.com/blog/everyones-an-expert/2448035/
Williams, B. (2019). When everyone is an expert on everything… https://www.fluxtrends.com/when-everyone-is-an-expert-on-everything/
Indeed I stumble upon more and more of such videos and sometimes find myself indoctrinated or influenced by them. The current speed of life through the internet does too, perhaps, increase people’s impatience and desire to seek information fast. But then again, there are some benefits to this fast spreading of opinions you described, that aren’t necessarily science-based. Some grassroot organisations also use social media platforms to share ‘truths’ or their opinions about certain causes, which does not necessarily be misinformation. Indeed a very intriguing blog!
Thank you for writing about this common and increasingly frustrating phenomenon! It seems like even sources are biased (there are “experts” arguing vaccines are good and there are “experts” claiming vaccines are bad) and people’s perception of the academic world is changing, especially in the time of COVID-19. Self-diagnosing is definitely a very interesting phenomenon, with the fast spread of information in newer media forms (short videos and picture posts) combined with the “if it’s on the internet it’s true” mindset.
I think you bring up a very relevant topic for our modern day society! This reminded me of the Dunning-Kruger effect, which talks about how when people are just introduced to a topic, they believe that they know much more than they actually do, which I think is exactly what is happening nowadays. All of us are exposed to so much information that we just have started to believe that we know so much just from knowing about the existance of certain issues/problems, even though just knowing that, for example, ADHD exists and what its general definition is does not qualify us to be diagnosing anybody.
This is so true! Many individuals these days receive most of their information and “news” from TikTok and other social media platforms like Instagram. While it may be convenient to receive a summery of the news in a 60 second TikTok or Instagram reel, we have to analyse the reliability of the creators behind these videos. The danger of getting your information from these news sources is understandable when it comes to medical health whether it be physical or mental. As active users of these platforms we should acknowledge that not everything you read, hear, or see on the internet is true. As you mentioned in your blog, we should listen more to experts in these types of conversations. Perhaps those educated on certain topics can have a different form of account verification so that viewers know the information is true when viewing their videos. I wonder how we can collectively change the false spread of information online. Interesting post!
I have similar feelings as you! It is very easy to voice your opinion on the internet today, but the cost behind a well-reasoned opinion is very costly. People need to organize their posts and find arguments, which is a lot of work. I think this is one of the reasons why pundits are so prevalent on the internet. But on the other hand, that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Because of the ease of communication, news can be spread quickly, whether good or bad. So the best approach for netizens is to find a way to find a balance between the two.
I believe that the responsibility for believing the vast amounts of misinformation online can not be put with the consumers, simply because this will be undoable. If we were to restrict the accounts spreading this fake news, have fact checkers go over posts and constructing a strong narrative backed by a for many people invisible group of experts, a side-effect will be the emergence of conspiracy theories. I think that the problem of these rabbit holes which produce self-acclaimed experts, lies first and foremost in the algorithms that Google, Facebook, YouTube and other media platforms use. When these were structured more in a way to let people open online nuanced conversation, bring people together in real life and offer a heterogenous feed, these problems would be way less present.
Great post! This is something that has been making me frustrated recently. On my Instagram explore page, there is an endless amount of mental health content. While such mental health tips and reminders can be of much comfort sometimes, a lot of their content gets repeated a lot and doesn’t really go beyond telling people to take care of themselves by drinking water and taking naps. A lot of psychology-related content is very much pop psychology too, and as a psychology student, I am particularly annoyed by this type of half-hearted mental health and psychology content.