The influence of social networks on the formation of the linguistic personality of a Russian teenager

Mazirka Irina Olegovna Doctor of Philology Associate Professor, Professor of the Department of Language Theory, English and Applied Linguistics, State Educational Institution of Higher Education of the Moscow Region Moscow State Regional University 141014, Russia, Moskovskaya oblast', g. Mytishchi, ul. Very Voloshinoi, 24 mazirka_den@mail.ru

Nekrasova Ol'ga English teacher, Municipal budgetary educational institution Zakharovskaya secondary School 143022, Russia, Moskovskaya oblast', pos. Letnii Otdykh, ul. Zelenaya, 1 B olynchik_86@mail.ru

The World Wide Web in the modern globalized space is not only a convenient and multi-encompassing means for the exchange of any kind of information, but also a platform for communication of various contents, an active resource that influences the formation of personality (including language) of young people, including adolescents (see also ^{[16, 17]}).

The relevance of the study is due to the fact that daily and even hourly on the Internet reflects the turbulent life of society in many senses with specific national, religious and age characteristics of its participants, which, of course, cannot but influence and eventually change (sometimes radically and not for the better) language consciousness, language picture of the world and the language personality of a teenager.

The purpose of the study is to identify and describe the ways in which social networks influence the reformatting of the linguistic consciousness and linguistic personality of a Russian teenager at certain levels of perception of the information of the global network.

Subject of research: the influence of social networks on the process of formation of the linguistic consciousness of an individual, his formation as a linguistic personality in the complex process of his socialization.

Object of research: publications (videos, hashtags) in TikTok social networks (since 02/24/2022, content recognized as extremist in the Russian Federation in accordance with Articles 207.1 and 207.2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation) and Instagram (since 03/14/2022, content recognized as extremist in the Russian Federation in accordance with Articles 207.1 and 207.2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation), used by manipulators (including A. Navalny) in order to reformat the language consciousness of Russian teenagers and themselves as a linguistic personality.

Tasks:

to study the stages of the emergence and development of the Internet;

to consider the features of communication in social networks as a modern social phenomenon;

to consider the concept of linguistic personality, using the relevant scientific literature;

to determine the aspects of socialization of a person who is under the influence of information from the Internet.

The theoretical significance of the study is based on the provision of extensive and conveniently systematized material on the topic of studying the modern linguistic personality of a Russian teenager and the impact on its formation through communication of a teenager in social networks.

The practical significance of the study lies in the fact that its results can be used by an instructor of any direction to exercise control over the consciousness of teenagers who are in constant and close interaction with participants of a single virtual space.

A social network is a social structure consisting of a group of nodes, which are social objects (people or organizations), and connections between them (social relationships) ^[25].

Social networks are a system of channels for the dissemination of information and communication in modern society. Unlike traditional media, through communication in social networks, the flow of information can flow to the recipient personally.

Virtual communication is a type of computer communication that is carried out using a communication system. Compared to direct or "live" communication, this type of communication has several characteristics. These include:

1) communication without borders (interlocutors can be thousands of kilometers away from each other);

2) communication in a familiar and, in principle, any environment convenient for communicants;

3) communication (as a rule) through correspondence;

4) the possibility of mastering various language skills (not only native, but also a foreign language) ^[27].

Speaking of young people, it should be mentioned that they make up the main audience of social networks. Thus, approximately 58% of users, according to experts, are people aged 15 to 25 years ^{[26, p. 152]}.

Statistics show that one out of five minutes of the total amount of time allocated for spending time on the Internet is spent on social networks ^{[18, pp. 125-129]}

However, naturally, like any other phenomenon, social networks in no case can be considered solely from the standpoint of their merits. If an adult is able to filter information and divide it into necessary, unnecessary and harmful, then teenagers, due to the peculiarities of their age and lack of experience, cannot do this.

Communication in social networks today is practically a way of life for a teenager, which entails a huge number of different kinds of problems even for him.

A.B. Sorokina draws attention to the problem of education, upbringing, as well as the personal development of adolescents using the Internet, and also discusses the peculiarities of the development of children's communication skills ^[28].

Due to the fact that, unlike in real life, when communicating on the Internet, a user can claim some anonymity, there is such a phenomenon as "illiterate and thoughtless writing". Users gain some freedom on the web, they can say whatever they want and how they want, they can profanely express themselves and insult other users without fear that this will entail any negative consequences for them.

The transfer of communication from reality to virtuality leads to a number of quite obvious problems for the individual: a decrease in her communication skills, deterioration of interpersonal relationships, the emergence of a sense of loneliness and, as a result, leads to the appearance of various pathological conditions of her psyche.

Special emoticons, emojis, stickers bring online communication closer to real life and make it less "dry", while there is an increasing mixing of written and oral speech, which once, for example, was the impetus for the appearance of Internet slang in linguistic knowledge.

In the early 2000s, during the rapid development of the Internet and social networks, several so-called languages emerged, which were actively used by teenagers to communicate in the Internet space.

The most popular language was "padonkaff", and based on phonetic writing, although with a number of mandatory rules, for example, replacing –t with –tsa (nraitsa), replacing vowels in a weak position with other vowels ("padonak").; zhi, shi were written with "y" ("zhyvotnaye"). A characteristic feature of this language is the use of a large number of modified obscene words and expressions, as well as slang.

Another language of this kind was the so-called "Alban" language, based on phonetic writing. Its difference from "padonkaff" consists in the reduction of the basis of the resulting word in it ("hello" – "priv").

Later, computer games provoked the emergence of the language of gamers (the use of short constructions), which allows not to be distracted from the game for a long time (replacing long and complex phrases with abbreviations – LOL (from the English laughing out loud) – "laughing out loud").

As you know, any language is a living organism that is in constant and continuous development, so today many words and expressions from the languages given in the example have become a thing of the past and are considered obsolete. Today's teenagers use a different vocabulary in Internet communication, but formed according to the same rules. English, of course, is a universal means of international communication on the Internet. Very often, new Internet buzzwords arise on the basis of borrowings from the English language ("kringy" – vile, from cringy, "creepy" – creepy from creepy).

Summing up the above, we can say that today a significant arsenal of media and communication channels is available for a modern person, including communication via the Internet and social networks.

Every mentally healthy person needs communication, searches for it and requests society to provide him with faster and more effective ways to exchange information.

Analysis of the degree of influence of such social networks as TikTok (since 02/24/2022, content recognized as extremist in the Russian Federation in accordance with Articles 207.1 and 207.2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation) and Instagram (since 03/14/2022, content recognized as extremist in the Russian Federation in accordance with Articles 207.1 and 207.2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation) the formation of a teenager's personality, including language, is impossible without considering the definition of the essence of the term mentioned.

The concept of "linguistic personality" arose through the transfer to the field of linguistics of this interdisciplinary concept, which reflects various (sociological, psychological and philosophical) principles that determine the physical and spiritual development of the individual, such extremely important for society qualities ^[21].

As a rule, a "language personality" means a native speaker with the ability to speak, express his thoughts, conduct speech activity in general ^[19], (see also the works of G.I. Bogin ^[5], V.I. Karasik ^[12], Yu.N. Karaulov ^[14], L.P. Rat ^[15]).

Thus, the concept of "linguistic personality" includes the following definitions:

- speech personality (capable of perceiving and producing speech);

- communicative personality (its verbal behavior in the process of communication,)

- an ethnosemantic, dictionary personality (a typical prototype of a native speaker of a particular language, fixed mainly in the lexical system of the latter, and depending on the national and cultural identity of the individual) (Quoted by Sedykh ^{[23, p.205]}, (see also the works of S.G. Vorkachev ^[7], S.S. Galstyan ^[8], V.I. Karasika ^[9], Y.N. Karaulova ^[14]).

The term "linguistic personality" means an individual whose individual consciousness is "fixed" by a certain language (or several), as well as a certain outlook on life (worldview) ^{[13, C. 671]}. A person is able to manifest himself not only through objective activity. Communication plays an important role in this process, which cannot take place without connecting the means of language and speech to it. Analyzing the speech of any individual, you can get a sufficient amount of comprehensive information about his personality, better understand his inner world. There is no doubt that it is not possible to fully and comprehensively study an individual's speech without studying it.

In linguistics, the term "linguistic personality" is understood as a set of characteristics and abilities of an individual that determine the perception and creation of speech works by him. The linguistic personality is that deep idea that penetrates through all the problems of language learning and at the same time eliminates the boundaries between disciplines that study an individual outside of his language. A linguistic personality is a way of fully understanding a personality that contains social, ethical, mental and many other components, refracted through its discourse and language ^[22].

I.N. Borisova describes the phenomenon of "linguistic personality" as a mandatory belonging of an individual to a certain culture. The scientist believes that stable forms of communication, speech stereotypes are formed in it during the development of each individual language. This is how an important function of language is realized – social, in which the "servicing nature of speech activity is clearly manifested: speech is always subordinated to an extra-verbal goal and is aimed at organizing people's joint activities" ^{[4, p.54]}.

K.A. Burnaeva gives the following definition of this term – "a linguistic personality, as a rule, is aware of only a small part of his linguistic behavior" ^{[6, p. 57]}. A linguistic personality (YAL) cannot fully control his speech behavior, because it is mainly caused by his linguistic consciousness.

According to A.A. Zalevskaya, a linguistic personality "is a mechanism for controlling speech activity and forms, stores and transforms language signs, the rules of their combination and use, as well as views and attitudes on language and its elements" ^{[11, p. 62]}. In the research of the scientist, the emphasis is mainly on how a person uses language signs, observing common syntactic and semantic features ^{[11, p. 62]}.

V.I. Karasik characterizes a linguistic personality in this way: "a generalized image of a carrier of cultural-linguistic and communicative-activity values, knowledge, attitudes and behavioral reactions" ^{[12, p. 46]}.

But nevertheless, the representation of the term "linguistic personality" is undoubtedly connected with the name of Y.N. Karaulov: "a personality expressed in language (texts) and through language, a personality reconstructed in its main features on the basis of linguistic means" ^{[14, p. 38]}.

It is obvious that the implementation of speech-thinking activity in the process of communication in the conditions of social interaction of individuals with each other in the world around them mainly defines the concept of "linguistic personality".

The influence of social networks on the linguistic personality is described in the works of a number of scientists, such as E.G. Azimov ^{[1, pp. 7-16]}, N.G. Asmus ^[2], M.B. Bergelson ^[3], T.M. Germasheva ^[9], G.N. Trofimova ^{[24, p. 8-14]} and others.

Such representative and mass, from the point of view of their permanent audience, social networks as TikTok (from 02/24/2022, content recognized as extremist in the Russian Federation in accordance with Articles 207.1 and 207.2 of the Criminal Code) and Instagram (from 03/14/2022, content recognized as extremist in the Russian Federation in accordance with Articles 207.1 and 207.2 of the Criminal Code), representing themselves in this regard by right as global communication channels, form a different, virtual YAL, which, however, undoubtedly interacts closely with the actual (real) person, and that, in turn, has its own, exclusively characterizing her ideas about the real world around her. At the same time, the YAL of the virtual world begins to acquire other characteristics, finding its reflection in a virtual social space that is new to it. Having "settled" in it, YAL's behavior also begins to change, because in a new "place of residence" for her, she is forced to reconsider her basic communication strategies and tactics.

Also note that social networks are increasingly acquiring a pronounced manipulative character. On the one hand, the social network acts as an interpreter of media texts, and not as an aggressive manipulator, since it is assumed that the audience already has certain skills of working with information and can interpret media texts, carry out their semantic content and evaluation. On the other hand, in social networks there is a desire of "interested persons" in multi-layered encoding of information in media texts, which simultaneously creates difficulties in their perception, uncritical evaluation of hidden messages in them and some passivity in their perception.

So, in January 2021, active calls for the participation of the younger generation of Russians in unauthorized rallies in support of oppositionist Alexei Navalny took place throughout the Russian Federation, aimed more at the audience of underage members of society, because such calls were carried out through TikTok social networks (since 02/24/2022, content recognized as extremist in the Russian Federation in accordance with Article 207.1 and Article 207.2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation) and Instagram (since 03/14/2022, content recognized as extremist in the Russian Federation in accordance with Articles 207.1 and 207.2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation). Manipulators of teenagers' consciousness not only encouraged teenagers in social networks to come to rallies, but also to arrange real flash mobs with all the consequences arising from the genre of this event, while all the same "interested parties" skillfully camouflaged the true goals of these actions under "noble" goals and objectives.

Judging by the language (speech) content, support for these provocations was expected from teenagers, whose consciousness is easier to manipulate, having gained access to their consciousness with the help of a certain algorithm (through language, phrases and "buzzwords" popular in their environment).

So, in the TikTok social network (since 02/24/2022, content recognized as extremist in the Russian Federation in accordance with Articles 207.1 and 207.2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation) videos were posted with hashtags clearly calling for disorder in a number of Russian cities, which gave the following statistics on the number of views:

#rally #navalny #putin #rally 23yanvarya – 23.7 million

#navalny #23yanvarya – 6.9 million

#putin #rally #navalny – 3.4 million

#rally #2021 #navalny #moscow #vrek – 236.4 thousand

#walk #navalny #moscow #31yanvarya – 23.1 thousand ^[29].

Also, more than 1,000 publications were posted on the Instagram network (since 03/14/2022, content recognized as extremist in the Russian Federation in accordance with Articles 207.1 and 207.2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation), viewing statistics also became a very alarming signal for everyone who deals with teenagers in one way or another:

#rally 23yanvarya – 84.7 thousand

#rally 23yanvarya #23yanvarya2021 – 49.9 thousand

#navalny#rally#protest – 12.7 thousand

#23yanvarya#meeting 23yanvarya#navalny2021#svobodunavalny – 12.1 thousand ^[30].

With such appeals, social networks constantly and most effectively influence the formation, or rather reformatting, of the linguistic consciousness of the personality of a teenager, introducing new patterns into his consciousness, which can later become the basis for constructing him as a different linguistic personality, which will become easier to manipulate by speaking to her in a "different" language, forming she has different ideals and values. Social networks have the ability to influence the formation of teenagers' consciousness so quickly, intensively and powerfully that, according to A.K. Mikhalskaya, the manipulative influence of social networks is "one of the most important functions, along with informational, educational, articulatory, critical and control functions" ^{[20, p. 24]}.

"Manipulation of consciousness can be carried out by verbal, visual and acoustic methods at three levels: individual, group and mass" <...> "acoustic and visual methods accompany and enhance the linguistic impact, but in some cases they can carry an independent influencing load" ^{[10, p. 12]}. Manipulating a teenager's YAL is no exception in this sense.

Returning to our example, we note that if in the text of the video in TikTok (from 02/24/2022, the content recognized as extremist in the Russian Federation in accordance with Article 207.1 and Article 207.2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation) or Instagram (since 03/14/2022, content recognized as extremist in the Russian Federation in accordance with Article 207.1 and Article 207.2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation) Alexei Navalny says that "thieves and scoundrels have seized our country and deprive its citizens of the present, and also steal their future," and "his information" is supported by a video sequence with pictures luxury mansions and cars of officials (visual impact), then, undoubtedly, this type of impact will strengthen the verbal and will have a stronger effect on the "reformatting" of the linguistic consciousness of adolescents and their as YAL, which is necessary for the manipulator. At the same time, we note that if we were talking about increasing the pace of improving the living conditions of citizens of the country, but at the same time the video sequence would show people standing with their hand outstretched, grandmothers who count pennies before buying a loaf of bread and the like – the impact of the video sequence in this case would be dominant.

The influence on the formation of the language consciousness and the language personality of a Russian teenager through social networks can partially "correct" and sometimes radically change the perception of reality already familiar to a teenager, provoke him to reconsider his attitude to a number of concepts and ethical norms already partially formed in his personal and public consciousness, thus noticeably change he has a picture of the world around him (including language). All this can happen for him imperceptibly, gradually, through the introduction of ideas, images, associations, stereotypes necessary for the manipulator into his consciousness.

Hidden or more often "covered up" any kind of influence on the recipient, specially compiled for him by the manipulator of content (including language), aims to mislead the recipient, for example, in relation to some event, phenomenon or fact. The presence of a manipulator of a certain design or intent, specifically in the content of his statements, is understood by A.A. Danilova as "language manipulation" ^{[10, p. 12]}.

To determine the degree or "success" of the linguistic influence of manipulators on the formation of the linguistic personality of adolescents and their linguistic consciousness, by analyzing speech texts that are widely presented in the videos of TikTok channels (since 02/24/2022, content recognized as extremist in the Russian Federation in accordance with Articles 207.1 and 207.2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation) and Instagram (since 03/14/2022, content recognized as extremist in the Russian Federation in accordance with Articles 207.1 and 207.2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation), A.A. Danilova suggests taking into account the following important criteria:

The reference "how the statement corresponds to reality, while with individual and each time new objects and situations" ^{[10, p. 13]} "Distortion of reality, bias and bias can manifest themselves both in providing false information and misinformation to the reader/viewer, and in influencing the associative thinking of a person in creating an emotionally loaded context" ^{[10, p. 13]} (in our case, a teenager).

? the presence of linguistic anomalies, the use of grammatically incorrect constructions ^{[10, p. 13]}.

? frequency of use. In a situation where we are talking only about a single case of influence used by only one journalist, it cannot serve as convincing evidence of intentional and purposeful verbal influence on the addressee. ^{[10, p. 13]}. However, when the same turn of speech is constantly used, backed up by a hashtag, quoted in various accounts and social networks, then it may be about the established method of influencing a certain segment of the audience.

In conclusion, we note that currently a large volume of scientific literature is devoted to the study of the characteristics of the process of Internet communication and the means by which this communication becomes possible - a language that, thanks to various types of structural, semantic and functional transformations, acquires a slightly different status and is known in many scientific studies as the "Internet Language".

The influence of social networks on the formation, or rather, on the "reformatting" of the linguistic consciousness and linguistic personality of a teenager is a process that implies a powerful, at the same time artfully veiled, often aggressive informational and psychological impact on a teenager, both the text addressed to him (verbal) and the accompanying video and audio row. At the same time, it should be taken into account that such an impact with the help of a whole group of specially selected lexemes and a number of other language means often occurs at three levels at once (individual, group, mass). The main purpose of such a directed "language onslaught" is to deliberately provoke an incomplete socially and ideologically formed category of society (teenagers) to action, while not entering either their interests or the value system of the society surrounding them as a whole. To identify this kind of linguistic and psychological influence, to "expose" its harmfulness and danger to a teenager, as an inexperienced and therefore the most vulnerable participant of communication in society (real and virtual), can be based, according to A.A. Danilova, on three criteria in the analysis of the text produced by a possible manipulator of a teenager's consciousness: reference, linguistic anomalies, the frequency of the use of linguistic forms ^{[10, 13]}.