Is Facebook making us sad?

[William K]

I can't recall... did the study give a age range for their focus?

College students, I'm assuming, at Stanford

 

[Laurie]

I realized this was going on when I posted a picture of my sister, two of her friends and me going to a movie. We dressed up for harry potter (i have no interest in hp, I'm just weird so i thought it would be fun) A teen I know from a virtual world posted something like "Wow, you have so much fun Elaur, we don't have anything like that in Romania" Someone else responded "you don't have movies in Romania?"

Another person told me that before they actually knew me they thought I tried to show off by posting pictures of my cool life on Flickr. I was sharing with friends and I don't have a cool life any more than anyone else.

It's like a book, you get snap shots of only part of people's lives. I had someone tell me that someone they knew had dealt with jealousy of me because I was married, kids, happy blah blah. I was pretty unhappy at that point and my kids were still young enough for me to feel a bit suffocated. Ironically I always thought she had a cool life, was smart and pretty and had so many options open to her.

It's funny what people see.

 

[Rail Tracer]

It's sort of... neutral, people post all sort of random things on their news feed, usually between happy, sad, angry, funny, etc.

When it comes to pictures, it is usually just happy, or random images token (like video chatting with a friend,) but that is about it.

 

[knight]

I remember hearing " if you want people to take an interest in you, you gotta sound like you are always doing somthing exciting" quote from a friend who was posting on facebook, sitting at the key board in sweats, not really heading out or planning to do anything that night. he had some pictures olds ones and moved them into the rotation as "new" photos.

 

[Orangey]

The only thing having to do with Facebook that makes me sad (or at least begins to maybe approach the direction of that emotion) is that I am daily reminded of the stupidity of my classmates. I knew it in highschool, now I know it again. Over and over.

But, that's mostly sadness for myself for reading their crap. The rest is covered by shame and embarrassment.

 

[Ginkgo]

http://www.slate.com/id/2282620/



I can agree that it might seem like it's a 24/7 class reunion where you see all your friends having successful careers/families/facelifts in real-time, and you could feel unworthy in contrast. Maybe that's because envy is supposed to be my main 4w5 weakness.

Moral of the story : Just friend people with negative status updates. It will make you feel relatively happier!

 

[Ginkgo]

It is called 'Facebook' and we don't like to loose face so we put on our best face.

'Face' we were told was oriental and how they loved to save face, but today we are moving East and adopting the oriental 'face'. We have even created Facebook so I can present my face to you.

And the big advantage of Facebook is that it is very hard to lose face. But how we hate it when we do and it can lead to flaming.

I'll show you my face if you show me yours, but I remain a close-wraped soul.

Ah, but how my soul longs for yours.

You forgot the part about dying children in Pakistan. Get with the picture.

 

[Laurie]

I guess it helps that I have a Facebook for online friends/acquaintances so it's people I actually have something in common with. People are adding me from high school and I could see how that could be less than ideal. I'm glad it's segmented into different experiences for me.

I've met some people at game meetups and I'm lost as to what they should be added to. The online crazies I actually interact with or my "real" more boring one.

 

[Such Irony]

I'm kind of ambivalent about Facebook myself. I was a former Facebook user who eventually closed my account. Facebook was good for keeping in touch and seeing what was going on in other peoples' lives. There are some people I've mostly lost touch with because Facebook is their main mode of communication. One of my friends always posted funny pictures of her kids that made me laugh. Another one posted links to cool music videos and website. I miss seeing those posts.

On the other hand, I can relate somewhat to being made sad by others' status updates. I used to be envious that some of my Facebook friends appeared to be living more interesting lives than I was. But you know what? Some of it is probably just an act. Some people only put the good stuff up. Some people have dramatic flair and can make something sound way cooler than it really is. Most people are going to post their best pictures, not their bad ones. Once I got this perspective, I stopped being envious.

On the other hand, I think there is a different kind of sadness one can get from Facebook. It bothers me to have friend requests turned down or when someone abruptly defriends you. I know some people like to clean up their friends lists now and then and trim it to a more manageable size but it still bothers me to be defriended even if I'm not much more than acquaintances with that person in real life. In real life, there are different levels of friendship. In Facebook, you're either friends with someone or not, so if someone defriends you, there's a feeling of it being "final" as if you've been cut off from their life forever.

Another reason for sadness that no one's mentioned but I think is prevalent is Facebook is a major source of addiction for some- to the point that it interferes with the rest of their lives. Work productivity suffers, things like exercise and real life socializing and hobbies become neglected in the favor of Facebook. I had some Facebook friends who probably spent several hours a day on that site judging from their volume of status updates and the massive size of their friends lists. I wonder if some of those people are sad but don't consciously realize that Facebook is to blame. Kind of like spending several hours a day in one place and feeling like the rest of your life is being wasted. Facebook can be a major time sucker.

 

[ThatsWhatHeSaid]

I think it's the way we build our communities. We let big corporations set up shop and run out local competitors. Communities get poorer, and as things get bigger, they become more anonymous. More anonymity means more isolation for community members as well as less accountability for store-owners (since the actual owners are no where to be found and, because ownership is dispersed among shareholders). But even more important, community's collective identity loses its integrity. It's hard to even imagine there's a difference because there's no real community pride and sense of affiliation we feel, and without that, it's hard to imagine a disruption in that. A big factor in this is also urban planning, which has gone to complete shit. Everything is too crowded and there aren't enough spaces designated as meeting places.

Ideal situation: smaller town, people know one another and have a sense of belonging, lots of interaction
Actual situation: big city, no one knows anyone because everything is decentralized, corporations make things impersonal and reduce accountability of businesses, communities get poor and get hooked on cheap products and services and turn on themselves, minimal interaction

Facebook is an online community and I don't think that should be overlooked, but, as people spend time interacting online their physical community starts to fall apart.

 

[Mole]

The Japanese word for 'face' is 'tatemae'. And the Japanese word for soul is 'honne'.

Whereas the American word for 'face' is 'phony'. And the American word for soul is 'sincerity'.

So 'face' in Japan is positive while the soul is to be apologised for.

And 'face' in America is an insult while soul is the epitome of acceptance.

And yet the Americans have invented Facebook. No wonder they feel ambivalent about it.

 

[Patches]

In what world are "face" and "phony" synonyms?

 

[Mole]

In what world are "face" and "phony" synonyms?

Washington DC.

 

[Lotr246]

Facebook doesn't make me sad, but I generally have an issue with the new ways people communicate with each other. I tend to think that people spend way too much time facebooking, texting, IMing etc rather than establishing real connections with people and THAT will make you sad.

This is exactly what makes me sad and very angry at the same time. I don't care if you're eating dinner at the moment! The whole thing engenders superficiality and selfishness. And the majority of the people on FB don't even realize it. A great book on this subject that just came out recently. I think you would be interested in it: http://www.amazon.com/Alone-Togethe...=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1296454170&sr=1-1

 

[ThatsWhatHeSaid]

Washington DC.

OMG PATCHES DUN GOT TOLD OFF!!!!!!!!!


CONSEQUENCES WILL NEVER BE THE SAME