A new study out suggests that when we are looking through our friends’ updates, photos, etc. on Facebook, we show greater physiological evidence of pleasantness (as measured through facial muscle EMG responses). Why would we express more pleasantness when looking at specific information regarding one of our “friends” on Facebook?
The researchers divided Facebook behaviors into four different categories, but found that most people on Facebook spent time either social browsing — “browsing through a pool of information that involved more than one person or one type of information (e.g., the newsfeed page)” — or social searching. They suggest that social searching is different …
[It’s] an extractive information-seeking strategy, [and] is more concerned with goal-oriented surveillance, where participants moved from the general content to the pages belonging to a particular person. Each Facebook user has their own profile page where they display and disclose information related to their age, gender, educational background, employment, and romantic-relationship status, in addition to their pictures (either self-posted or ‘tagged’ by others), videos, and blog-like notes.
They studied 36 undergraduates at a midwestern university with physiological responses and screen capture data. Researchers asked the participants to spend 5 minutes at three different websites: CNN.com, Facebook.com and Amazon.com. They then measured their responses with facial EMG, skin conductance, and time spent on each individual page, and paired those with screen captures of what exactly they were doing.
They found that while on Facebook, most users spent little time communicating with others or updating their own profiles. Instead, they spent most of their 5 minutes either social browsing or social searching.
We found that participants showed greater physiological evidence of pleasantness during social searching than they did during social browsing. […]
We suggested that social browsing is a non-specific passive social information-seeking strategy indicative of ritual media use, while social searching is a more goal-directed extractive social information-seeking strategy indicative of instrumental media use.
The researchers found that social searching — looking up a friend’s specific profile information, looking through their photos, reading messages from them — is indicative of greater use of the appetitive system. If you imagine that emotion and motivation consists of two separate systems, the appetitive system is responsible for sniffing out things in the environment that promote species survival (i.e., food, shelter, sexual mates).
Of course, there’s a few limitations to this study. Thirty-six undergraduates in a laboratory setting are unlikely to representative of the Facebook population as a whole (and therefore, it’s unlikely these results are very generalizable). When I’m on a public computer (like those used in this experiment), I may do far less “private” activities (like messaging others) than when I’m in private. This sort of behavior may have biased the researchers’ findings. In addition, huge swaths of activity conducted on Facebook — like social gaming in Farmville or Mafia Wars — weren’t examined in this study. It may be that those activities also promote “pleasantness.”
Reference:
Wise, K., Alhabash, S., & Park, H. (2010). Emotional Responses During Social Information Seeking on Facebook. Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking. doi:10.1089/cyber.2009.0365.
5 comments
Hello Dr. Grohol:
This study could be classified in the area of distraction therapy, I believe.
I have been searching for help for my project for over a year now, with no success this far. Here is my latest idea for distraction therapy.
Rising diagonally from the head of this futuristic hospital bed is a molded metal or fiberglass arm which ends in a three feet high by three feet wide square molded fiberglass LCD or LED flatscreen computer monitor several feet above the bed at mid calf level- tilted towards the patient. The screen of this computer monitor may have to be covered by an unbreakable plexiglass shield.
Inside this arm are the control lines for this computer monitor. The arm would be freely swivable -up and down, left to right.
At the head of the futuristic hospital bed is a computer USB port and the female mono audio adapters for the ear bud extensions or under the pillow speaker wire port.
An internet capable laptop computer at the head of the patient’s bed then controls the music which is downloaded and the idyllic scenery which is seen or even the television and movies which can be watched on this computer monitor suspended above the patient’s bed.
Perhaps the staff of the manufacturers of the existing hospital beds can retrofit them to accept the over the bed computer monitors, monitor arms, computer laptop control ports and ear bud or under the pillow (PILLOWSONIC tm.) speaker ports.
Research has proven that distraction therapy decreases the amount of opiates needed for analgesia in some patients by up to fifty percent.
Since hospital management charges the patients the same fee for opiate use, regardless of dosage, the cost of retrofitting or buying these type of hospital beds would be recovered eventually. Opiates are expensive to supply and use.
But, it seems that hospital management only see the short sided view- that it will cost big dollars to convert or buy new beds.
I know that there are other benefits to this therapy as well, I just have not read about them. I do know that I would like to see this feature available to anyone who wants to use it.
I used to do Facebook, until a group of miserable people used it to cause me stress and anxiety flaunting their “new friendships” in my face…it was very distressing. I no longer subscribe to it. Who needs to look for stress!!!
who can be a friend,a friend is some one who makes you happy and comfortable to talk to, therefore if a friend causes you so much distress is better to do away with him or her.I think you made the right decision.
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