How do most people work when connected to Facebook and are in bad mood? According to a recent survey, they are looking for friends who are in an even worse situation than them.
“In general, most of us are looking for something positive in websites social networking," says study co-author Dr. Benjamin Johnson, Assistant Professor at the VU University of Amsterdam. "But when you feel vulnerable, you will look for friends on Facebook who have had a bad day or who are not so good at presenting themselves positively, just to make yourself feel better."
For their study, the researchers tested 168 college students, who had to answer questions indicating how they were feeling, to determine whether they were in a good or bad mood. Students could then use a fake webσελίδα social networking site called SocialLink.
Students on this social network could find profiles designed to look attractive or unattractive, successful or unsuccessful. There was no difference in content of each profile's posts.
"So the only real difference between the profiles was the evaluations of career success and attractiveness, defined by various symbols such as the dollar and hearts," says Johnson.
Malware survey participants had to choose which of these profiles they would like to click. Their decision was based in part on their moods.
What did the researchers find? Generally, students spent most of their time on the profiles of people who looked like successful and had attractive profiles. But when the researchers compared the results with those of poor students, they discovered that the cyclothymic students spent more time in the less attractive profiles of the less successful people.
"If you need a boost in self-esteem, you will look for people who are in a worse position than you," says the co-author. Dr. Silvia Knobloch-Westerwick, professor of communication at Ohio State University.
New research published online from the magazine Computers in Human Behavior 28 September.
