PsychBook Research

What your Facebook ‘friends’ say about you

What are you actually doing, adding all those randoms?

It seems that Facebook friendships are related to something called ‘social capital’ – you might say you’re stocking up on party dollars! But they’re probably not going to be much use…

This research, from Nicole Ellison, Charles Steinfield and Cliff Lampe (2007, honestly didn’t make that last name up), entitled ‘The benefits of Facebook “friends:” Social capital and college students’ use of online social network sites’, is, even at barely two years old, somewhat dated by Facebook research standards, but still very interesting. What the team is interested in is what people are using it for, and how it benefits them.

At the outset, it has to be said that this is a seriously limited study, though only in the way that most psychological research is limited – in that it was carried out entirely on American college students. Plus, as we know, Facebook began life there, but has now spread all across the world, beyond such a small focus. Hence, it shouldn’t be surprising that they found that first year students at Michigan State University used Facebook to keep in touch with friends from their former high school. Not exactly Noble Prize material.

However, they did find some interesting things around the idea of ‘social capital’, which is split into on the one hand ‘bridging social capital’, and ‘bonding social capital’. In general, Facebook use seems to be positively related to the former, which is essentially collection of weak ties – people you know but wouldn’t rely on for emotional support. So Facebook allows you to collect contacts and acquaintances, which isn’t such a bad thing, though not unexpected.

Also, in relation to self-esteem and satisfaction with life, it seems that their relationship to bridging social capital is moderated by intensity of Facebook use. Or in other words, people with low self-esteem and low satisfaction with life will experience greater bridging social if they use Facebook, than if they didn’t. This is a pretty significant and powerful finding for Facebook – it means it is helping the less psychologically healthy improve their quality of social life. In their own words:

Facebook use may be helping to overcome barriers faced by students who have low satisfaction and low self esteem. Because bridging social capital provides benefits such as increased information and opportunities, we suspect that participants who use Facebook in this way are able to get more out of their college experience. (Ellison, Steinfield, & Lampe, 2007, n.p.)

But only to an extent. In terms of ‘bonding social capital’, relationships were not seen quite so strongly. While it was predicted by high self esteem, satisfaction with university life, and Facebook use, it only accounted for 22% of the variance (as opposed to 46% for the bridging). As the authors put it themselves Facebook “… can lower barriers to participation and therefore may encourage the formation of weak ties but not necessarily create the close kinds of relationships that are associated with bonding social capital.” (Ellison, Steinfield, & Lampe, 2007, n.p.).

So, there you have it – the research which finally says what you’ve been suspicious of all along: using Facebook isn’t going to help you develop deep and meaningful relationships that you don’t already have.

Again, this is a good, but not a great paper. No real origin of ‘social capital’ is provided. An non-chronological explanation of Granovetter (1982) of Putnam’s (2000) distinction between ‘bridging’ and ‘bonding social capital’ is given. Some of the items on the scales are a bit odd – like ‘About how many total Facebook friends do you have at MSU or elsewhere?’ – why not ‘how many Facebook friends do you have?’.  The authors were also very proud of the fact that they found that Facebook was only being used between people who already knew each other, which they inferred from the results achieved by the following item ‘I use Facebook to meet new people’. Perhaps not so current in 2007, but I reckon if something like  ‘I sometimes add people I have never met’ would produced very different results today.

But that’s another days’ work. Next article – how many Facebook friends should you have?

You don’t want to know how Facebook affects your relationships …

Facebook stalking? Dangerous? No!

This was the first Facebook-related psychological article I came across when I started teaching on the Cyberpsychology M.Sc. – ‘More information than you ever wanted: Does Facebook bring out the green-eyed monster of jealousy?’ (Muise, Christofides and Desmaris, 2009). Obviously, even with as ham-fisted a title as that (the authors steadfastly refuse to explain the empirical status of the afore-mentioned ogre), it’s still catchy enough to spark the interest of even such a celibate as myself.

And what did Amy, Emily and Serge find? Well, building on ‘anecdotal evidence’ and previous research (Lee & Boyer, 2007; Ellison, Steinfeld & Lampe, 2007) which makes the startling revelation that some of our Facebook friendships may be ‘superficial’ (perish the thought!), our intrepid cyberpsychologists found that time spent on Facebook predicted jealousy in Facebook relationships. Thus, the more time you spend on Facebook, the more likely you are to experience jealousy – which, I hear, does not make for a ‘psychologically healthy’ relationship.

What’s that you say? ‘I’m just checking out his profile, just to see what he’s up to …’ No! You’re stalking him! And thereby putting your relationship at risk! Psycho!

Really? Could this be true? Surely, in this sense, Facebook is only another tool used by, oh I don’t know nutters, psychopaths and Peeping Toms? Surely, normal, well-adjusted, people in mature relationships aren’t affected by this type of thing?

Well, no – not by Muise, Christofides and Desmaris’s (2009) data. By using a multiple regression across several factors – including gender, trait jealousy, personality and other relationship factors – time spent on Facebook was the most predictive of jealousy. What this should mean is that ‘naturally occurring’ jealousy has been taken care of, as well as the other factors. Plus, with their qualitative data seems to back up that finding – essentially, Facebook makes it really easy to stalk your partner with tons of ambiguous and regularly updated information. You know what it’s like when you see some random dude commenting on a picture of your girlfriend. As they put it themselves:

…Facebook may expose an individual to potentially jealousy-provoking information about their partner, which creates a feedback loop whereby heightened jealousy leads to increased surveillance of a partner’s Facebook page. Persistent surveillance results in further exposure to jealousy-provoking information. For many, the need for knowledge about their partner’s intent becomes indispensable … (Muise, Christofides and Desmaris, 2009, p. 443, emphasis added)

Ring any bells? Of course not, I didn’t think so …

However, while on the one hand, I don’t doubt the veracity of this finding – I’m pretty sure that Facebook does increase jealousy in relationships, to some degree – I have certain queries about this study. For one thing, I don’t wholly buy this multiple regression lark, and can’t understand why a simpler method wasn’t’ used. For another, only two items from the questionnaire are provided, and with a previously unpublished test, the whole thing should be provided – and the two that are given: ”How likely are you to become jealous after your partner has added an unknown member of the opposite sex?” and ”How likely are you to monitor your partner’s activities on Facebook?” could use re-wording, to say the least. Finally, given that it was carried out on the world’s psychological lab. rats (also known as undergraduate American college students), I’d be curious to see this study replicated in a different context. Because there’s no way that Facebook use increases jealousy in Irish relationships, no way at all!

A good study, not a great study. An interesting finding, but a pertinent one? For you? Maybe. Not me though!

Oh the possibilities!

I am not sure if I will get the time to keep this up, but I am going to give it a shot. Basically, I hope this to become a repository for all of the psychological research that I am coming across about Facebook – it seems to be growing at an exponential rate.

I’ll begin properly, tomorrow …

hello world