Social Media Technologies: An Important Factor of the Loss of Critical Thinking Ability

Abstract

Nowadays, information leakage and disinformation have become a hot research topic. Behind this, the influence of online technologies such as algorithms and data push can not be ignored. This article argues that technologies used on social media platforms help to create an invisible and dangerous system, in which digital surveillance and digital manipulation take place, and gradually numb individuals and deprive them of their critical ability. Many related theorists, including Foucault and Frankfurt School scholars, have studied how people are controlled and disciplined in spaces of public interactions, thus lose their critical ability. This paper uses theories provided by Foucault and Frankfurt School scholars to study the technologies uses on social media platforms that needs further examination.