Catholic schools make big impact at Young Scientist Exhibition

A balanced use of social media is important in developing positive mental health and good grades, a group of young student scientists discovered.

Several projects in this year’s BT Young Scientist and Technology Exhibition focused on the growing prevalence of social media in peoples’ lives and the effect it’s having from day to day.

Participants Kaleigh Brady, Marina Lago and Natasha McGlynn from St Bricin’s Vocational school in Cavan found that although 75% of young people believed social media had a positive impact on their lives, those who spent longer periods online had low moods.

“People who spend a lot of hours on social media are always looking at others’ lives and thinking ‘they have a perfect life and I don’t’,” said Ms Lago.

“It starts making them feel bad, and it can lead to depression and other mental health issues.”

Two students – Rosie Murphy (16) and Ciara Maguire (16) – from St Mary’s Secondary School in Cork found that certain personalities on social media had a big impact on what people buy.

The influencers are described as “a user on social media who has established credibility in a specific industry/social media platform”.

After a survey of 577 people they said they found that it was mainly females who were influenced to buy a product, which they put down to make-up and fashion influencers online.