
Facebook use 'makes people feel worse about themselves' - tareqak
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-23709009
======
karpathy
82 participants. 3 participants did not complete. 1 person excluded as
inconsistent > 4SD.

Study comes down to: Participants were text-messaged 5 times per day between
10am and midnight over 14-days.

""" Each text-message contained a link to an online survey, which asked
participants to answer five questions using a slider scale: (1) How do you
feel right now? (very positive [0] to very negative [100]; M = 37.47, SD =
25.88); (2) How worried are you right now? (not at all [0] to a lot [100]; M =
44.04, SD = 30.42); (3) How lonely do you feel right now? (not at all [0] to a
lot [100]; M = 27.61, SD = 26.13); (4) How much have you used Facebook since
the last time we asked? (not at all [0] to a lot [100]; M = 33.90, SD =
30.48); (5) How much have you interacted with other people “directly” since
the last time we asked? (not at all [0]to a lot [100]; M = 64.26, SD = 31.11)
"""

So we have a shaky self-reported study with low (and relatively homogeneous)
sample size where it is fairly clear what the researchers are after, spun into
an article with link bait title about how Facebook makes you sad. This is news
now.

~~~
devindotcom
Also, every participant was an undergrad at a single university - not that
that's an uncommon thing for psych studies!

~~~
beachstartup
in almost every lower division psychology class i took, i remember they forced
us to participate in experiments as part of our grade. and not just one or
two, either. i remember it was a huge pain in the ass.

one of the many reasons i graduated university with a C average.

------
manishsharan
I can relate to this study --- even though I am not a young adult like the
subjects of this study.

I stopped using Facebook a few months ago because I couldn't handle how it
made me feel. I am bootstrapping a start-up ,working insane hours and
depriving my family of the comforts/luxuries that I could have afforded when I
had a corporate job. I am really happy that my friends are spending their
summer vacation at resorts/beaches etc.; I feel horrible that my kids as stuck
at home and they can't have the kind of stuff my friends' buy their kids and
it is all my fault. I am not jealous -- I feel guilty and facebook updates
from my dearest friends exacerbates my guilt.

So I stopped using Facebook temporarily -- I will be back on it when I can buy
stuff. m

~~~
stephengillie
Going on Facebook, I see how everyone's social life is better than mine.

Going on Hacker News, I see how everyone's startup is doing better than my
failed attempt.

Going on Hackaday, I see how everyone's working on cooler projects than mine.

The only place I feel good about myself is at work.

~~~
rfnslyr
Everyone publishes the awesome shit they do. Nobody publishes constantly
things they suck at, things they failed at, things they won't attain.

~~~
droidist2
Exactly. Don't compare your insides to other people's outsides.

~~~
prezjordan
Wow, love that line. Source?

~~~
droidist2
I think I first heard it in the movie 28 Days with Sandra Bullock, but I
believe it was already a popular saying in AA and other types of self help and
therapy.

------
T-hawk
The underlying cause of Facebook feeling depressing is that the corpus of
Facebook posts you see are not drawn from a random population of moments of
your friends' lives. There's an enormous sampling bias created by the sources
self-selecting for interesting bits of activity. For every post you see from
someone at a hot concert, there's ten other friends who didn't post about
their mundane day at work or lazy weekend.

If you have 52 friends who each go on vacation for one week out of the year,
then every week Facebook will be showing you _somebody 's_ awesome vacation
updates. This does not mean that you're missing out or living less life for
not being on vacation that particular week.

It's natural to compare our moods and experiences with others. But the self-
selected nature of Facebook posts means you'll always be losing that
comparison, since you see the highlights and outlying data points in relation
to your own average. Once you consciously understand this and correct your
mood for it, Facebook becomes a lot less of a downer.

------
ljd
I just read the Method section of this study and it seems really slanted to
produce a correlation.

It asks 5 questions daily, 4 were about how well the participant felt and the
last one was a direct question asking how long the user was on Facebook. It
was also advertised as a "Facebook study" which is completely ridiculous.

A more condemning study would ask those first 4 questions then ask a handful
of questions like "how long were you on twitter?" Or "how long did you watch
TV" or "how long did you exercise today?".

And it shouldn't be advertised as a Facebook study.

------
danso
Facebook can be a source of happiness if you are proactively managing how
you're using it. In my case, it's the way that friends who I've stayed out of
touch with can contact me out of the blue and ask me out to drinks because
they're in the city. I post occasionally to my feed, but don't really spend
much time reading what others are posting except to trade jokes/insults...thus
limiting the time in which it seems my life is less fun than others'.

But by default, Facebook's algorithm can only make you unhappy if you're a
passive user. The edge algorithm means you see the posts most liked by other
people...virtually guaranteeing that you'll be subjected to a stream of
awesome-than-life posts. And if you're a young adult, you also find yourself
in the situation in which you're pining after someone and constantly viewing
their profiles and liking their posts.

Well, in that case, FB is really going to hit you hard as it will assume you
want to see _lots_ of stories of your secret crush. And viewing what that
person is doing in the time that you're not present around him/her creates
nothing but anxiety.

Hell, you don't even have to be young to experience that.

------
enraged_camel
I'm currently in-between girlfriends, and even though it is silly, I admit
that I feel a pang of jealousy when my friends post pictures on Facebook
showing how happy they are with their significant others. So even though this
article talks about a shaky self-reported study with a low sample size, I
think they are _absolutely_ on to something. I can relate to the findings
almost perfectly.

Facebook is one big game of "keeping up with the Jonases." Everyone's
Facebook-facing life is fantastic. They buy houses, they have kids, they go on
trips, they have fun adventures with their girlfriends, and so on.

What you don't see is the cockroach infestation at the new house they bought,
or the sickness their kid is going through, or the fact that they had to max
out their credit card for their trip, or that they got in a huge fight with
their s/o right after posting pictures of hugs and kisses.

What this means is that browsing through Facebook is a great way to make
yourself feel awful, because at any point in time you are not going to have
one of the things you see on your news feed. At least I feel that way. The
only reason I'm still on there is because my mom (who lives back home, in
Turkey) _freaks out_ when she doesn't see regular updates from me. She thinks
something must have happened.

~~~
Zimahl
_or that they got in a huge fight with their s /o right after posting pictures
of hugs and kisses._

My wife's friend talks to her all the time about how her and her husband are
constantly fighting and their marriage is falling apart. I hear this second
hand but I'd never know that from all the lovey Facebook posts and pictures.

Another couple we are friends with is just 'perfect' and 'cute' on Facebook
but the husband is just an ass to his wife sometimes (borderline verbal abuse)
and has turned outings with them from fun to weird, awkward, and embarrassing.
Meanwhile, the wife has become a secret stripper (husband knows and supports
it) yet no one else knows.

I just assume that if someone is broadcasting that their husband or wife 'is
the best ever' is covering for something.

~~~
woodchuck64
The human species has evolved over eons to use complex social face-to-face
interaction to see through the lies we naturally put on about our prowess as
mates or allies. But Facebook is a whole 'nother thing; the world's worst
sociopaths can look and sound perfectly normal on Facebook and no one has any
way to tell the difference.

------
squozzer
Facebook in some ways is the ultimate HS or college party. Everyone has a
front to present. So it's not surprising that it might make a lot of people
feel bad because the reader is seeing everyone's outside and comparing it to
their inside.

~~~
eksith
Very true. In HS or college, how much you'll enjoy it depends on your
perspective and what you expect from the crowd as well. I never mingled with
the shallow crowd (boy, that really sounds pompous; but it's true) because I
knew I wouldn't get much out of that experience.

But like HS and college, Facebook has its own variety of groups you mingle
with and those you avoid with a 10 foot pole.

That said, I avoid all of Facebook with a 10 foot pole except for the
occasional cross post with my blog.

~~~
solistice
You totally missed out on toying with the shallow crowd. Shallow people are
just that, shallow, so they're rather easy to calculate. Since they usually
annoy me to no end, I'll sooner or later resort to the people equivalent of
cow tipping. I act perfectly well adjusted, and for a moment, a glint of
madness, just enough that they question things. Best case scenario is that
they question their facilities of judgement and become less shallow, worst
case is that they don't like me anymore because I bewilder them, but then my
goal wasn't for them to like me.

It's like playing with cats and a laser pointer.

~~~
jff
Wow, you're the fucking puppet master, I tip my fedora.

~~~
solistice
Could have gotten a little over the top. I was tired as hell when I wrote
that.

Judge it as a mix of petty revenge and mindgames if you want, but it helps me
to deal with incredibly superficial people just fine. In fact, after making
them question their modus operandi, they tend to become a lot more agreeable.
Of course I could go the regular route of either ignoring them, putting up
with them or agressively lashing out at them, but at the end, that doesn't
improve the situation for anyone. They'll go their merry ways, irritating
everyone.

And before that transition happens, they'll strain very hard to put you in a
box, and that's kinda cute.

Anyways, you're good at quips, I tip my propeller hat.

------
eddieroger
I've thought about this before. Facebook, especially on Sunday or Monday
morning (read: post weekend) is like a highlight reel of your friends' life.
So if you had a particularly boring weekend and see nothing but pictures of
people having a great time (in your absence, mind you), of course you'll feel
bad.

------
D9u
I quit using Facebook (deleted account) nearly two years ago, and I don't miss
it at all...

Back when it was less commercial, and when you were expected to actually know
the people on your "Friends List" in real life, it was a fun way to reconnect
with old classmates, workmates, and Army buddies.

Now it's just another data mining advertising machine, and I can do quite well
without it.

------
regis
I feel like most people don't consider that the content people post on
Facebook is posted because the person wants everyone to see it... They
wouldn't post about the absolutely mundane stuff that we all go though every
day unless it's significant in someway. This is why it can be depressing,
because you're looking at the best moments of hundreds of your friends' lives
and you're just sitting there at the computer.

But when you post something interesting others feel the exact same way you did
when they posted something interesting. Sort of a weird situation.

------
iamwil
I've found that oddly enough, reddit has a kind of honesty that facebook
doesn't, which you wouldn't think, since the former is full of people you
don't know, and the latter full of people you do.

~~~
floydenstein
The people you know have something to prove

~~~
iamwil
It comes from the failed assumption that those you know are those you can be
more honest with, since they want to see you succeed. Otherwise, why are you
friends?

That ends up not being the case, since most people aren't very discerning with
whom they accept friend requests from, and facebook encourages making as many
connections as possible as well.

As a result, the only current way to be honest online is through anonymity.
I'm not sure if Path App has made any headway in this regard.

------
cafard
Articles about Facebook use 'make people feel better about feeling worse about
Facebook users.' I have done a carefully controlled survey of 2 participants
(self and wife). Method: dinner-table conversations. Peer review real soon
now. (Will discuss it with neighbors and maybe sibling.)

------
toxik
Seeing people on Facebook is a little bit like seeing everybody you know pass
you by on the street, but because it happens so often you stopped saying hi.

------
cheald
This doesn't particularly surprise me. Facebook is a self-advertising
platform; people present a whitewashed and happier-than-reality version of
themselves, and when you compare that to your own life (with its problems and
warts and whatnot), you might conclude that your life is deficient.

It's the "keeping up with the Joneses" problem, except massively amplified.

------
visakanv
I was a heavy power user of Facebook for a couple of years, spending lots of
time crafting witty status updates, getting into extensive arguments and
discussions. It became like a game- I lived for the Likes and Shares and the
red notification at the top of the screen.

I didn't realize how bad it was until I finally disengaged, deactivated my
account. I've been off for about 2 months now and I feel like a different
person. It feels vaguely like quitting smoking- you don't realize what
"normal" is until you're away from it all.

The greatest thing is witnessing my thoughts enter a "longer wavelength" where
I'm not so obsessed with being witty and clever all the time. I have more time
and space to work on actual problems. It's great.

Hope this was useful or relevant to someone.

~~~
aldous
This resonates with me. Twitter was my compulsion, until I realised what an
absolute time sink it had become, whilst equally becoming an increasingly
inane and frustrating experience. I logged out and never went back (almost 2
years has passed I think) without the slightest inclination to return.

------
bmohlenhoff
Facebook is like comparing everyone else's highlight reel against your behind
the scenes footage.

------
j45
While I don't fault Facebook directly with this, when any gathering evolves to
enabling gossiping, spying and showing off for those who are most affected by
it, I'm not sure if on one hand we move ahead as a society, or if by using up
such social attention, perhaps, as a civilization, we use up our energy and
attention to care about such things and have the opportunity to spend as much
energy on ourselves instead of spending it on others and putting ourselves in
front of others for so much validation.

We're all human and need support and love, but we need to be able to give it
to ourselves, and maybe a 'social' network will always be superficial to the
point that it drives and feeds loneliness.

------
bobsy
> The more time they browsed the worse they felt.

Despite the shakey study wouldn't this result be expected? The more time you
spend on Facebook the less time you spend actually socialising with real
people? Facebook doesn't have voice chat. Text messaging is unforfilling.

Facebook has a great number of uses but one thing it doesn't do is allow you
to see your friends, or actually speak to them. Using their chat box, if
anything, emphasises the distance between you and the person you are speaking
to.

Facebook doesn't have the tools to help with loneliness. Then it makes it
worse by showing how awesome everyone else has it. My friends timeline is like
a highlight reel of their best bits.

------
moondowner
This: "Why Facebook Makes Me Feel Like A Loser"
[http://shkspr.mobi/blog/2012/12/why-facebook-makes-me-
feel-l...](http://shkspr.mobi/blog/2012/12/why-facebook-makes-me-feel-like-a-
loser/)

------
diminoten
They should have written a browser plugin.

They might not have gotten the results they were looking for, though.

~~~
disgruntledphd2
Apart from the ethical (i.e. review boards) objections that would arise from
that idea, that's actually a really good way to run a study.

When I still worked in academia, that was something I wanted to do. Amusingly
enough, that research is probably easier to do as an independent researcher,
especially if you don't plan on publishing in the peer-reviewed literature.

------
Sessions
A worthwhile read in the same vein

[http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2012/05/is-
faceb...](http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2012/05/is-facebook-
making-us-lonely/308930/)

------
alan_cx
Well, I left facebook because I say it made me feel worse about other people.
But perhaps the truth is that indeed it made me feel worse about myself. Or
are they really the same thing?

Either way, I left facebook.

------
jgalt212
I have a similar, but largely converse problem:

Facebook makes me feel worse about my friends. i.e. their posts make them seem
more lame than they are in real life.

I am currently much older than average person in the sample set.

------
perlpimp
On lunch break I usually peruse vine and no longer login to facebook. I do use
facebook as a login shortcut to some service.

------
KevinEldon
I found that Facebook use made me think worse things about other people.

------
KevinEldon
I found that Facebook use made me feel worse things about other people.

------
plg
makes me feel worse about them too

------
benched
As a lonely, single, childless, unpropertied, mediocre 35-year-old, any
exposure to anybody else's life, excepting the homeless, makes me feel worse
about myself.

~~~
cwarrior
You don't know what demons those people are fighting on their daily lives.

~~~
skeletonjelly
Ain't that the truth. Goes for anybody you see in public too. It's easy when
you're down to think that everyone else has it rough. I find it's only when
you ask questions or read bios of people that you get a sense of how connected
we are in are daily struggle as humans.

