Facebook and its Psychological and Social Effects

Title: Facebook and its Psychological and Social Effects

Topic: Cultural Artifacts (Text)  

Source:  Psychology Today, “Facebook and Your Brain” by Eva Ritvo

Relation: In Anthro, on page 20, it talks about cultural text being a way of thinking about culture as a text of significant symbols-words, gestures, drawings, natural objects- that carry meaning. I decided to look at Facebook because 163, 071, 460 Americans use it which is roughly 52% of the nation’s population.

Description: Facebook is a website that’s purpose is be a social network where people can connect with their friends, family and people they don’t know.  Facebook users “friend” people they know as well as mutual acquaintances, total strangers, celebrities, and people they find interesting.   Users post “statues,” which are messages that their Facebook friends can view. These messages can be about anything, whereabouts, their days, exotic locales, their thoughts, actions or even the food they are about to consume. Their friends in turn can click a thumb up icon, which signals they “like” the status, or comment on the status. A person’s Facebook popularity is based on number of friends they have, how many likes their statuses have, how many likes their profile picture has and to an extreme how many different locations the person has been to, which shows they are a social and popular person.

            A Facebook user’s day usually consists of logging into Facebook once they wake up and consistently throughout the day to keep up with their friends’ lives, see how many likes or comments their posts have received or maybe just laugh at silly posts.

             Facebook didn’t begin until after my teenage years.  When I was a teenager, we kept up with our friends by calling them, seeing them at school or just hanging out with them outside of school.  It was hard to keep up with friends that moved out of state because you could only call and spend time with so many people. There was a natural limit and that kept your close friend circle relatively small by today’s standards.

            Now you can keep pace with an absurdly large group of people on Facebook by viewing pictures of their life, reading their public thoughts, and looking at the life they present online.  It helps you feel connected to loved ones you don’t see very often.

            Besides the perceived social benefits of Facebook, there is now evidence that there is a psychological effect on your brain when you view Facebook.

In “Facebook and Your Brain,” Eva Ritvo who is a M.D. in Psychology says that a chemical in your brain is released when you view Facebook. That chemical is dopamine, which is associated with feel good feelings.  In her words, “When we view an attractive face, dopamine is released in the same reward pathway that is stimulated when we eat delicious food, make money, have sex, or use cocaine."   We can carefully select our photos and statues to show the best representation of ourselves and give our friends that dopamine rush anytime they look at our personal page. 

On the other hand, you can post a status about a difficulty you are facing or if you feel down. This in turn, can draw out support from your Facebook friends reacting to the rush of oxytocin (“love hormone” as she called it) when they read your status.   This virtual comfort can help you battle the stress hormone cortisol.

            One last positive mental effect of Facebook is that Eva found was mirror neurons in the brain that are activated when a person sees a Facebook friend “expressing emotion” or  “engaging in an activity.”  The mirror neurons give off feelings of empathy and “imitative learning.” For example when you see a picture of your smiling friend, you will smile in return without realizing why.  Or reading a happy post, you will feel good inside because emotions are infectious.

Commentary/ Analysis: For all the positive affects that Facebook can have on a person, there can be negative affects. Since everyone is concerned with showing the best representation of their lives, it can lead to a person feeling like everyone is living a better life then them.  It can also make one feel like they can never quite measure up to the invisible, impossible standard. Facebook offers a sense of connection with others but can actually cause a person to feel lonely.  Eva in the article touched base on this saying that the online support shown during hard times can actually fool our brain into thinking we are surrounded by people who love us, which in long past times was essential to our survival. 

            Culturally Facebook is changing the way we interact with other people online and in real life.  Having so many Facebook friends and seeing their everyday posts and pictures can cause of feeling of deep friendship when in reality can be superficial if not kept up by in person hanging out or phone calls. Friendships are being changed from having several deep ones, to having a myriad amount that are shallow.  Spending time with a friend seems like too much work when you can just connect with the person online by looking at their pictures or statues. It can cause a person to become lazy in the friendship while in their mind they view themselves as being very active in it.

            We are also becoming defined by our online Facebook identity. Our sense of self is defined by how many likes/comments our statues and pictures have as well as the number of online friends we have. We can feel down if not a lot of people have showed interest in what we have posted or have not accepted our friend request. When in actuality, it is not a reflection of who we really are or how popular we are.