Layden 1

Luke Layden

Professor Toy

ENC 1102

31st October 2020

What is the Rhetorical Conversation Around the Use of Technology and Social Media and

How Does it Affect the Way We Read, Write, Learn and Process?

Introduction

Rhetorical analysis is the study of how writers and speakers use language to influence

their audience. When using the genre theory to do a rhetorical analysis, you are looking for

pieces of the research that stand out or contribute to the conversation on your topic, which in my

case is social media and technology. It is widely believed that technology and social media play

a role and have an impact on our everyday lives. Researchers believe they have both negative

and positive effects that can change the way that we go about our daily routines.

Technological advancements and growing social media platforms in recent years have led

to an increase in the number of ways people can connect. Online platforms, such as Facebook,

Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, Pinterest and Snapchat, have gained popularity over the past decade.

These apps have expanded the number of ways that people can share information online. New

technology advancements by Apple, Microsoft and Amazon have expanded upon the ways that

many tasks can be done. Laptops and computers have allowed students and adults to connect

remotely to learn and work. On one hand, technology and social media are good because they

allow people from anywhere around the world to connect and socialize. The use of social media
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and technology could positively affect the way people read, write and process information. But

on the other hand, they could cause people to lose focus, become bored, and rely on technology

too much.

Many scholars have studied how social media and technology have impacted learning

and they’ve focused on how it’s good or bad, but they haven’t looked at it rhetorically to see the

larger conversation around it. In the article, “A Latent Class Analysis of Adolescents’

Technology and Interactive Social Media Use: Associations with Academics and Substance

Use,” by Tang and Patrick, the authors used graphs and surveys with demographics to show how

the increase of social media and technology had negative effects. In the article, “The Social

Media See-Saw: Positive and Negative Influences on Adolescents’ Affective Well-Being,” by

Weinstein, the author talked about the positive and negative impacts of technology, appealing to

readers’ logic and allowing them to see how she drew her conclusions.

When doing an analysis of these sources, you could see the connections between the

research that you were reading and previous research that had been done. Some of the chosen

sources said that social media and technology negatively and positively affected adolescents and

young adults, while other sources claimed there were only negative or positive effects. Many of

the sources did surveys or interviews to support their research on the impact of technology on

adolescents, teenagers, and college students. In the surveys they would ask basic questions so the

audience would understand what the researchers wanted. Some sources weighed the odds,

showing both the positive and negative effects, but allowing the readers to come to their own

conclusion. The researchers looked into how long people used technology and how it affected

their learning abilities and health. They studied children and young adults from different

demographics, which allowed them to show how a certain group could be affected differently
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than another. Tang and Patrick’s research related to the research done by the Media and Young

Minds group as they both talked about the negative effects that the use of technology had on

children. Tang and Patrick showed the correlation between the grades and technology for

teenagers, while the Media and Young Minds research demonstrated the effects that it could

have on a toddler based on their findings.

While earlier research said how the use of technology and social media impacted our

everyday lives, I looked into the ways social media and technology changed the way we read,

write, learn, and process. I believed that research that had been done could be built upon and that

some of the important information had not yet been explored, such as how certain apps affect

learning in our everyday lives. I explored the different aspects of social media and technology,

and I believed there was a gap in the research that I could expand upon. I thought this research

would help improve upon and fill the gap other researchers had not filled, and I decided to

explore and draw my own conclusions. I researched the rhetorical conversation around the use of

technology and social media and how it affected the way we read, write, learn and process.

Methods

For my research paper, I decided to do a rhetorical analysis to see if the use of technology

and social media had an effect on the way that we read, write, communicate and process

information. My goal for the research study was to find the negative and positive impacts in our

lives. It was interesting to see how social and technology use could impact people differently and

how different applications could affect people differently and how so many people relied on

technology every day to get through their work week or school day.
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For the research, I did a rhetorical analysis on four articles, which all presented

information on the different ways that social media and technology affected the way we learn

and communicate. I also analyzed six secondary sources of research in my field of research to

get a better idea of what research was out there and to get a better understanding of the

conversation around social media and technology. Then I created an ethnography in order to

share my experiences with social media and the impact that it’s had on my life. This allowed me

to find patterns and relationships between the articles to establish an argument on why social

media and technology positively affected our lives. These articles also included data and

information from surveys that had been conducted to show how social media and technology had

affected people’s lives around the world.

After reading these articles I decided to create my own survey, where I could look into

how technology affects different age groups and what apps they use. The survey was sent to

people of different age groups and there were 27 responses from different age groups. The

survey included 10 questions and the questions were either multiple choice or short answer. I

looked for quantitative data when making this survey and I wanted to make it easy and

understandable for all ages. This survey allowed me to get more insight on the ways that

technology and social media affected different age groups. In my survey, I asked about screen

time, learning, popularity of apps, and spellcheck. This allowed me to see the age groups that

used technology the most and the most popular apps in those age groups.
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Results

To find the different ways that the sources connected and to weigh the pros and cons a

coding table was created in order to show the different ideas in the scholarly articles I read for

my research. The figure below shows the rhetorical appeals of each article and the effects that

these articles had. I started by coding the articles. I found it interesting how articles used

different rhetorical appeals to back up their statements to make their argument more convincing.

Many of the sources also were professionals in their fields with background knowledge, which

made them credible sources. Most of the authors also came to a neutral conclusion that social

media and technology had both positive and negative effects. The impacts that social media and

technology had were also similar in the articles, but they addressed different ways that people

could be affected.

“How the U.S. Social Media's “Exploring the "The Impact of Social
Changed Over the Past Growing Impact on Invisible Impact of Media: Is it
Codes Decade” by Bonilla Our Lives” by Technology” by Irreplaceable?" By
Gaby. Summer Allen. Sarah Bures. the University of
Pennsylvania.
Appeals to Shows graphs of the Shows surveys that Backs her opinion up Uses other sources to
Logic increase in the use of demonstrate the with other writers back up their
technology and how impact that social and colleagues. statements and quote
different apps have media had on teens reputable sources.
grown over time. being cyberbullied.
Appeals to Backs up her research References studies Talks about her Talks about
Credibility with other statistics, and other experiences and her background
which help explain professionals. peers’ experiences knowledge and
their ideas. while working makes educated
remotely. claims.

Appeals to Talks about the By talking about Appeals to the Talks about the
Emotion different apps that are children getting audience’s emotions effects that social
being used and how bullied, she appeals by talking about how media has on
they have changed, to the audience’s the coronavirus has people’s emotions,
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which could give the emotions, making impacted us all and which could make
reader a sense of them empathize with how it has changed them happy or sad.
nostalgia. the victim. the way people do
things.
Social Shows how social Talks about the Writes about how Shows how social
Media’s media is now used by negative and positive people are using media is addicting
impact more people, which effects of social social media to and shows how social
has caused more media and how they connect with one media can greatly
people to rely on affect people another more due to impact your career.
social media. differently. the virus.
Technology’s More people use Shows how Talks about how Writes about how
impact technology every day, technology can have technology has technology is a tool
which causes an both negative and allowed her to work that is being used in
increase in how positive impacts remotely and how many places to
communication over and the increase of technology allows improve systems and
the phone and through technology has led to people to talks about the
emails. online personalities. communicate better. dangers of
technology.
Changes in Talks about how new Shows how Talks about how Shows how social
our daily programs make it technology has led to technology has media has changed
lives easier to share photos a change in behavior changed the way we the way that people
and videos online and and moods and how do things and how it do things and how it
how we have moved this can positively or has allowed people to has made people’s
from Facebook posts negatively impact work from home to attention spans
to YouTube videos. our lives. stop the spread of a shorter.
pandemic.
In the article, “How the U.S. Changed Over the Past Decade,” by Bonilla Gaby, the

author showed how the amount of social media and technological advancements had increased in

the past decade. Two graphs in particular demonstrated the increase in the use of technology and

the different apps that were being used. Below Fig. 1 and Fig. 2 both show the increase in the
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number of people that own technology and what apps are used most predominantly.

Figure 1 to the left “Use of Mobile Devices.” Figure 2 to the right “Social media sites as

pathways to news.”

I conducted my own survey in order to get a better understanding of how much people

use technology and what social media apps people used. I ended up getting 17 responses to my

survey, which was not as much as I originally hoped. I received 7 responses from people who

were of the ages 16-21, 5 responses from people who were of the age of 22-35, and 5 responses

from people who were ages 35+. It was interesting to see how many people used technology for

three to four hours a day. In the 16-21 age group, apps such as Snapchat, Instagram, and TikTok

were popular and most of the respondents said they preferred these apps over other ones. In the
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22-35 age group, apps such as Instagram and Facebook were popular. In the 35+ age group,

Facebook and Twitter were both popular apps. Some people said that they used Twitter and

Facebook for work, which was interesting. They said that outside of work they used technology

for one to two hours a day.

Discussion

After researching and analyzing five primary sources and six secondary sources, to

answer the question “What is the Rhetorical Conversation Around the Use of Technology and

Social Media and How Does it Affect the Way We Read, Write, Learn and Process?,” I found

that social media and technology have a positive effect on education and communication. Some

of the positive effects included better education, communication, improved efficiency, and

research. While on the other hand, the cons were cyberbullying, dependability, and less face-to-

face interaction. After reading all the articles and doing some of my own research I believe that

the positive effects of social media and technology outweigh the negative effects on education

and communication.

Primary Sources

The first piece of primary data is a textual analysis on an article called “How the U.S.

Changed Over the Past Decade,” by Bonilla Gaby. In this article, the author talked about how

technological advancements have changed in the past decade. The author appealed to the

reader’s logic by showing graphs on the increase in the number of people that use technology

and by showing how different apps have grown in the past decade. The author also used ethos by

backing up the research with other statistics, which helped explain the increase in the use of

technology and social media. This source allowed me to bolster my claims and show the ways
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that social media and technology had changed over time. It allowed me to demonstrate that these

advancements have allowed people to connect and communicate across the globe.

The next piece of primary data was a textual analysis of an article called “Social Media's

Growing Impact on Our Lives,” by Summer Allen. In the article, the psychologist talked about

how time spent on social media impacted our mood and attention spans. She shared how some

people are affected by social media, while others are not. She appealed to the reader by

referencing studies and other professionals to show the impact that social media could have on

people’s lives, making her conclusions credible. Dr. Allen also appealed to people’s logic by

citing other professionals in order to demonstrate the impact that social media had on teens. In

the text, Allen says, “restrictive parenting could drive social media use and social media use

could reduce the time teens spend together in person”. (Allen 2019) This means that social media

use is sometimes driven by restrictive parents and may limit face-to-face interaction. Allen also

appealed to the audience’s emotion, making them empathize with the victims of cyberbullying.

In the text she states that “The Commonsense Media” survey found that 13 percent of teens

reported being cyberbullied at least once.” (Allen 2019). Based on the article, I felt that the

positive effects outweighed the negative effects because the loss of connections outweighs the

negative effects that social media and technology might bring.

In the third piece of primary data, a textual analysis of “Exploring the Invisible Impact of

Technology,” by Sarah Bures, was conducted in order to get a better understanding of the unseen

impacts of social media and technology. In the article, the author talked about the impact that

technology had in the past years and how the coronavirus is changing the way people work and

go about their everyday lives. She reviewed how working remotely had affected her and

discussed how technology had evolved to allow it. In the article, the author stated that “I am
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working remotely from my one-bedroom apartment in New York ... My laptop is right now

parked on top of a shoe box because it positions the video camera in my line of sight for video

meetings..” (Bures 2020) This explained the challenges that working remotely brings, but it is

interesting how technology has allowed people to work remotely from the comfort of their

homes.

The author appealed to the reader’s sense of credibility by talking about her experiences

that her and her peers had while working remotely. She also appealed to the reader’s logic by

talking about the effects that technology had and backed up her ideas with opinions from other

writers and by sharing how the coronavirus had impacted her in particular. She said: “I’m sitting

on a crappy desk chair that hurts my back. So, I have a pillow. It’s all not ideal.” (Bures 2020)

By talking about her situation, she allowed the reader to imagine what it would be like to be in

her shoes, reporting news during a global pandemic. The author showed the upside and downside

of technology and showed how working remotely had changed her usual routine. This source

showed both the positive and negative sides of technology, demonstrating how on one-hand it

sucks to work at home, but it’s better than not being able to work at all.

In the next piece of primary data, I conducted a textual analysis of "The Impact of Social

Media: Is it Irreplaceable?," by the University of Pennsylvania. It was analyzed in order to get a

better understanding of the impacts of social media. The authors talked about the importance of

social media and technology by showing how many people relied on it every day to get

important information. In the text, they stated: “Social media is like a drug, but what makes it

particularly addictive is that it is adaptive. It adjusts based on your preferences and behaviors.”

(Pennsylvania, 2020) This means that the addictive properties that social media and technology

have make users want to come back for more. The group of authors appealed to the reader’s
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logic by using sources that backed up their statements and by quoting reputable sources. They

also established credibility by sharing background knowledge and making educated claims. They

appealed to the reader’s emotions when they talked about the effects of social media and how it

has caused some people to have breakdowns or be unhappy with the life they have when they see

the posts of others. This source showed how all the different tools that technology offered was an

integral part of our society and how the positive effects outweighed the negative effects on

society.

Secondary Sources

In the article, “A Latent Class Analysis of Adolescents’ Technology and Interactive

Social Media Use: Associations with Academics and Substance Use,” by Sandra Tang and

Megan E Patrick, the authors did research on the effects that social media and technology had on

adolescents. The researchers claimed that the increase of the use of technology and social media

had led to an increase of drug and alcohol use. The researchers took surveys from different

participants where they asked how often they used technology and social media and then looked

at the participants’ academics and if the student had used substances, such as alcohol or drugs, in

the last year. This secondary source showed the negatives of technology and social media and

how it could lead to worse grades and drug use. I think that there are definitely some issues that

arise out of technology and social media, but feel that the positive effects outweigh these effects

because there is no way of knowing what the results would be without technology and social

media.

In the article, “The Social Media See-Saw: Positive and Negative Influences on

Adolescents’ Affective Well-Being,” by Weinstein, the author addressed the positive and
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negative influences that social media had on an adolescent’s well-being. Weinstein’s research

showed the positive and negative influences that social media had on an adolescent’s everyday

life through in-depth interviews and analysis. Weinstein collected data about the link between

online and offline behavior and found that in most cases adolescents mirrored their online

behavior when doing something else. (Weinstein, 2018) Weinstein went into further detail as she

reflected on positive and negative effects, showing that technology could affect people in

different ways.

The author talked about how online behaviors could mirror offline activities, which could

lead to positive or negative behavior. She found that teens experienced both positive and

negative influences when using social media and by cutting them off from social media you

could block them from having better friendship interactions. (Weinstein, 2018) The author said

that there were limitations and that as technology develops and changes over time there could be

a need for more research to fully understand the see-saw. I felt as though this proved why the

positive effects outweighed the negative effects and showed how social media and technology

allow people to communicate and express themselves.

Ethnography

Social media and technology have played a role in my life and have shaped and changed

the way that I do things. I grew up in a Christian household with two parents and a younger sister

who always supported me. I got my first phone in 7th grade, which was a flip phone so the only

thing I could do was call my parents or text occasionally. I used technology throughout middle

school to write assignments and used Google classroom to submit assignments virtually.
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Technology also helped me get better grades because I was able to do practice problems and

create flashcards online for my vocab quizzes that I had each week. In 7th grade, I also got an

iPod, which I used to play a few games and to listen to music.

In 9th grade, I got my first smartphone and started to get more involved in social media. I

began to use apps such as Snapchat and Instagram because other people I knew used them to talk

and communicate within my friend group. Throughout high school, I used these apps and used a

Chromebook, which was cool because the personal computer allowed me to do assignments from

home and started up quickly and lasted all day, which was nice. Now that I am in college, I use

YouTube, TikTok, Snapchat, and Instagram to communicate with my friends and to see what

other people are doing. Technology also allows me to check my grades and check due dates all

from a touch of a button and has made life convenient.

Survey

The survey that I conducted showed how people used technology anywhere from one to

two hours to four to five hours a day. It also showed the trends in the apps people used when

they changed how much they used technology. Teens and young adults tend to use technology

and social media more than people who are older. Teens used apps such as Snapchat, Instagram,

and Facebook, while adults 30+ used Instagram and Facebook. This showed how teens are

impacted by technology and social media more than other people and that technology affects

people differently based on the way they use it. This also helped me reach the conclusion that

social media and technology had a more positive impact on learning and attention spans.

Conclusion
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Increasing social media and technology use has led to an increase in the ways that people use

technology every day and has changed the way that people receive information and

communicate. This has made technology and social media an integral part of society that allows

people to converse, work, learn, and educate. Growing platforms and technology companies such

as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Apple, Amazon, and Microsoft have paved the way for better

communication and technology.

The research showed that social media and technology had a positive effect on the way

people read, write, learn and process information. The positive effects of social media and

technology outweighed the negative effects on education and communication. The pros include

increased productivity, better education and communication and the cons can be dependency,

social disconnect, and addictive behaviors. These key points brought me to the conclusion that

even though sometimes people use technology too much or rely on technology too much, it is

important to socialize and communicate with one another because it allows people to build better

friendships. The increase in technology has also led to a better education system, which has

allowed students and educators to teach and learn more easily. This is why social media and

technology have more positive effects on the way people read, write, learn and process

information.
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Works Cited

Amirault, RJ., et al. Computer-Based Technology and Student Engagement: A Critical Review of

the Literature. 1 Jan. 1970,

https://educationaltechnologyjournal.springeropen.com/articles/10.1186/s41239-017-0063-

Egan, Timothy. “The Eight-Second Attention Span.” The New York Times, Jan. 22, 2016,

www.nytimes.com/2016/01/22/opinion/the-eight-second-attention-span.html.

Horvath, Andi. “How Does Technology Affect Our Brains?” Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and

Health Sciences, Aug. 3, 2015, https://mdhs.unimelb.edu.au/news-and-events/news-

archive/how-does-technology-affect-our-brains.

Firth, Joseph, et al. “The ‘Online Brain’: How the Internet May Be Changing Our Cognition.”

World Psychiatry: Official Journal of the World Psychiatric Association (WPA), John

Wiley & Sons, Inc., June 2019, www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6502424/.

Bonilla Gaby. “How the U.S. Changed Over the Past Decade,” The Pew Charitable Trusts

Magazine, May 2020. Pages 62-63.

Allen, Summer. “Social Media's Growing Impact on Our Lives.” American Psychological

Association, Sept. 20, 2019, www.apa.org/members/content/social-media-research

Bures, S. (2020, May 06). Exploring the Invisible Impact of Technology. Retrieved November

04, 2020, from https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/06/reader-center/ontech-newsletter-

writer.html
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Tang, Sandra, and Megan E. Patrick. “A Latent Class Analysis of Adolescents’ Technology and

Interactive Social Media Use: Associations with Academics and Substance Use.” Human

Behavior & Emerging Technologies, 1, Jan. 2020,

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/hbe2.154

Khan, Tehmina, et al. “Use of Social Media by University Accounting Students and Its Impact

on Learning Outcomes.” 6, Nov. 2016,

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09639284.2016.1230880

Media, Council on Communications. Media and Young Minds. 1 Nov. 2016,

https://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/138/5/e20162591?hwoasp=authn

%3A1601505792%3A71616989%3A1226303603%3A0%3A0%3AmZafTwm

%2B0pG20NvrVTgcGg%3D%3D

Weinstein, Emily. “The Social Media See-Saw: Positive and Negative Influences on

Adolescents’ Affective Well-Being.” New Media & Society, Oct. 2018

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1461444818755634

Wilmer, Henry H., et al. Smartphones and Cognition: A Review of Research Exploring the Links

between Mobile Technology Habits and Cognitive Functioning. 3 Apr. 2017,

www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2017.00605/full.

Donnelly-Hermosillo, Dermot Francis, et al. “Impact of Graph Technologies in K-12 Science

and Mathematics Education.” Mar.2020.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S036013151930301X
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Appendix A

Research Questions Asked in The Survey:

1. How old are you?

A. 16-21
B. 22-35
C. 35+

2. How many hours do you use social media on a daily basis?

A 1-2 Hours
B 2-3 Hours
C 3-4 Hours
D 5+ Hours

3. How many hours do you use technology per day?

A 1-2 Hours
B 2-3 Hours
C 3-4 Hours
D 5+ Hours

4. Do you think that social media affect your attention span?

[Short Answer]
5. What social media app do you use most often?
[Short Answer]
6. Why do you find yourself using this app more than others?
[Short Answer]
7. Do you think that the use of technology has positively or negatively affected your learning?
[Short Answer]
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8. Do you think spellcheck makes you rely less on spelling words by yourself?
[Short Answer]
“How the U.S. Social Media's “Exploring the "The Impact of Social
Changed Over the Past Growing Impact on Invisible Impact of Media: Is it
Codes Decade” by Bonilla Our Lives” by Technology” by Irreplaceable?" by the
Gaby. Summer Allen. Sarah Bures. University of
Pennsylvania.
Appeals to Shows graphs of the Shows surveys that Backs her opinion up Use other sources to
Logic increase in the use of demonstrate the with other writers back up their
technology and how impact that social and colleagues. statements and quote
different apps have media has on teens reputable sources.
grown over time. being cyberbullied.
Appeals to Backs up her research References studies Talks about her Talks about
Credibility with other statistics, and other experiences and her background
which help explain professionals. peers’ experiences knowledge and
their ideas. while working makes educated
remotely. claims.
Appeals to Talks about the By talking about Appeals to the Talks about the
Emotion different apps that are children getting audience’s emotions effects that social
being used and how bullied, she appeals by talking about how media has on
they have changed, to the audience’s the coronavirus has people’s emotions,
which could give the emotions, making impacted us all and which could make
reader a sense of them empathize with how it has changed them happy or sad.
nostalgia. the victim. the way people do
things.
Social Shows how social Talks about the Writes about how Shows how social
Media’s media is now used by negative and positive people are using media is addicting
impact more people, which effects of social social media to and shows how social
has caused more media and how they connect with one media can greatly
people to rely on affect people another more due to impact your career.
social media. differently. the virus.
Technology’s More people use Shows how Talks about how Writes about how
impact technology every day, technology can have technology has technology is a tool
which causes an both negative and allowed her to work that is being used in
increase in how positive impacts remotely and how many places to
communication over and the increase of technology allows improve systems and
the phone and through technology has led to people to talks about the
emails. online personalities. communicate better. dangers of
technology.
Changes in Talks about how new Shows how Talks about how Shows how social
our daily programs make it technology has led to technology has media has changed
lives easier to share photos a change in behavior changed the way we the way the people do
and videos online and and moods and how do things and how it things and how it has
how we have moved this can positively or has allowed people to made people’s
 Layden 19

from Facebook posts negatively impact work from home to attention spans
to YouTube videos. our lives. stop the spread of a shorter.
pandemic.