TL;DR: people sharing their angst inside filter bubbles causes unrealistic expectations from questionable sources I think, thanks to social media classic socia

TL;DR: people sharing their angst inside filter bubbles causes unrealistic expectations from questionable sources I think, thanks to social media classic socialization among students via social events and clubs has ceased. Person to person interaction isn't a thing anymore, but it's necessary to learn having realistic expectations. Most people crave interaction, comparison, sharing experiences with others, this is normal. With social media it's a two-fold problem: much more people are involved in comparisons (likes, followers), so having little or no followers doesn't help feeling worthy, and the expectation having to have followers at all is unreasonable and unrealistic. The depression is based on doubts that one has any significance in the world, plus, having to keep up with competition. Then there is fear of missing out that drives anxiety like wildfire. There's pressure from everywhere, even internal. Why wasn't it that big a thing back then? Because personal expectations weren't as bloated then as they are now, and today's young people derive their expectations of themselves (what they think they ought to be, to do) and expectations of others (what they think they can expect from others) from the Internet, forums, social networks mostly, not from personal experience. That is it. Personal physical experience once provided the basis for expectations, people had to learn everything themselves. But now people learn expectations from other peoples' experiences, and not their own. So, today the unrealistic expectations of other people are failing on us, naturally, and we are confronted with the reality of things and people. This is what it feels like leaving one's favorite Twitter filter bubble and learning that the actual world is different and much more complicated. And I didn't mention the job market yet, because I think it's just a part in the pool of sources of pressure. Anxiety about one's job isn't as new as people think. The awareness is different now, because people share their angst and amplify it via the social media making it even worse. Social media, job situation, pressure are all parts of the same problem - unrealistic expectations from questionable sources.