Social media and our misconceptions of the realities

This article will review the current laws of the expectations of privacy under the two-pronged Katz test, and more specifically other cases that the courts have tried to interpret the test as applicable to social media such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and email. Since there seems to be ‘no light at the end of the tunnel’ with any uniform decision within the courts on the Fourth Amendment protections against search and seizure when there is a reasonable expectation of privacy with social media. This reasonable expectation standard is developed by the users themselves who will allow their rights to be infringed upon for the approval to access sites like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.     

Communication in the face of a school crisis: Examining the volume and content of social media mentions during active shooter incidents

Little is known about the effectiveness of social media in delivering information during active shooter incidents at the P-12 level. This study analyzed social media activity that occurred during and after two active shooter events on September 30, 2014. Over 5000 social media posts from Facebook, Twitter, blogs, and mainstream news outlets were analyzed. Social media analysis outlined the scope of online communication during the first week following the incidents, revealed social media frequency, increases in conversation, misinformation, and differences between parent and student posts. Results revealed spikes in social media chatter following the release of the identities of shooters and victims. Consistent with media dependency theory and the high levels of uncertainty characteristic of the incident, users’ social media posts contained more information than affect displays during the active shooter event. Implications for scholars and P-12 administrators are discussed.     

User adoption of social networking sites: Eliciting uses and gratifications through a means–end approach

This research examines users’ motives for adopting and using social networking sites (SNSs), with the aim of providing a better understanding of the fundamental reasons behind SNS adoption behavior. To uncover the relationship between the attributes of SNSs and users’ perceptions of their consequences and values, this study integrates a means–end approach with uses and gratifications theory and thereby extends the technique to a communication media selection context. Laddering interviews identify users’ perceptions of five attributes, 10 consequences, and four values associated with SNS adoption (i.e., Facebook). The results show that belonging, hedonism, self-esteem, and reciprocity are the four main values users attain through SNS adoption. Furthermore, the chains associated with SNS adoption can be represented in a hierarchical value map. This study should help practitioners design online communication platforms that more closely fit their users’ needs and provide users with safer, more friendly, and thus more attractive environments.     

Who wants to be “friend-rich”? Social compensatory friending on Facebook and the moderating role of public self-consciousness

The present research aims to provide insight into social compensatory friending on social network sites by investigating the effects of self-esteem and self-consciousness on number of friends in the context of Facebook use. It was hypothesized that Facebook users low in self-esteem, when compared with high-self-esteem individuals, would engage in friending more actively and thereby accumulate a large number of friends as a way to compensate for the deficiency in self-esteem. We also hypothesized that the relationship between self-esteem and number of Facebook friends would vary depending on the levels of public self-consciousness. Data were collected from a college student sample in the United States (N = 234) based on an online cross-sectional survey. The results supported the hypothesis on social compensatory friending, demonstrating a negative association between self-esteem and number of Facebook friends. Furthermore, the data yielded support for the hypothesized moderating role of public self-consciousness in social compensatory friending: the negative association between self-esteem and number of Facebook friends was significant only for Facebook users who are high in public self-consciousness but not for those who are low in public self-consciousness. Implications for understanding social network site users’ friending behavior in light of social compensation motives are discussed.     

A comparison study of user behavior on Facebook and Gmail

Email is one of the most important communication media to date, and millions of Internet users around the world spend the bulk of their time writing and reading electronic messages. The growing popularity of Social Network Sites (SNS) as a communication medium motivated us to explore the relationship between user behavior on SNS and email. In this paper, we collected objective, privacy-preserved behavior data from participants that were both active Facebook and Gmail users. We show that a large proportion of social interactions still occur through email messages, while participants tend to be more emotional on Facebook. We found that producing more content on Facebook does not necessarily decrease or increase the production of emails. By utilizing the quantitative analysis of usage data instead of surveys, we show that user behavior is likely consistent across SNS and email in some aspects, for example, users with more Facebook friends seem to email to more people, Facebook and Gmail share similar trend of “happiness”.     

Cultural Effects on Use of Online Social Media for Health-Related Information Acquisition and Sharing in Taiwan

The aims of this study were to use the technology acceptance model to examine how the cultural characteristics of social media users in Taiwan affect their use of social media for acquiring and sharing health-related information and to examine how their use of online social media benefits their social relationships and health self-efficacy. The research model in this quantitative cross-sectional study was tested with data collected from 321 active Facebook users in Taiwan. All three cultural characteristics/dimensions considered in the research model (masculinity, collectivism, and uncertainty avoidance) significantly affected the perceived usefulness and the perceived ease of using the online social media platform. However, masculinity had a significant positive effect on perceived usefulness but not on perceived ease of use. These results imply that technology tools for people in high masculinity cultures should be designed to maximize the effectiveness of the technology for achieving goals rather than to maximize the ease of using the technology. On the other hand, the use of online social media for acquiring and sharing health-related information significantly affected the social relationships of users but not their health self-efficacy. The results of this study imply that participants in online communities share health-related information not only to enhance their health but also to form strong social connections. This study proposes a new construct of technology acceptance, acquisition, and sharing of health-related information and investigates its effects on social relationships and health self-efficacy.     

The role of social interaction on users motivation to exercise: A persuasive web framework to enhance the self-management of a healthy lifestyle

The current research guidelines of the European community suggest the importance of the development of systems that help users manage their health themselves. The increasing amount of communication technologies and devices from which users can access information, and the possibility to interact through social media channels, play an important role in this scenario. Based on these considerations, in this paper we present an innovative persuasive web application, designed both to exploit social networking sites and to cooperate with a mobile application that already operates in the e-health and motivational domains. In particular, the innovative aspects introduced by the web application are the possibility to access also from a web browser some features previously available only through a mobile application and a more direct and user-friendly integration of social network sites. Indeed, thanks to an extensive interaction with the Facebook social network, users are allowed to share their experience with the application. This generates a strong social influence effect, which inspires and motivates other users to improve their exercising activity. Experimental results put in evidence that our web application, also thanks to social interactions, is favoring an enhancement of users’ motivation to a more active lifestyle. This is mainly due to its capability to have an impact on the other users thanks to the posts generated on the Facebook social network.     

Social comparison on Facebook: Motivation,affective consequences,self-esteem,and Facebook fatigue

A growing body of research examines social comparison on Facebook, a social media environment where users can present optimized versions of themselves. To grasp the complexity of social comparison on Facebook, the researchers followed Helgeson and Mickelson’s (1995) functional approach, focusing on motives (i.e., self-enhancement, self-improvement, self-evaluation, and self-destruction) rather than fixed targets (i.e., downward, upward, and unilateral comparison) of social comparison. Social comparison motivations were explored in relation to self-esteem and affective consequences of comparison. A college-student sample (N = 267) reported engaging in social comparison frequently on Facebook and low-self-esteem (LSE) individuals were more likely than those with higher self-esteem (HSE) to compare themselves to others on Facebook for self-evaluation, self-enhancement, self-improvement, and self-destruction motives. Moreover, LSEs perceived increased levels of social comparison on Facebook, although the relationship between self-esteem and actual social comparison behavior proved non-significant. Significant moderating effects of self-esteem were observed in the relationship between motivation and affect. A self-improvement motive produced greater positive affect among HSEs compared to LSEs, while self-enhancement motives engendered positive affect more prominently among LSEs compared to HSEs. The paper also begins to distill a popular phenomenon, Facebook fatigue, in social comparison empirical work.     

Control your Facebook: An analysis of online privacy literacy

For an effective and responsible communication on social network sites (SNSs) users must decide between withholding and disclosing personal information. For this so-called privacy regulation, users need to have the respective skills—in other words, they need to have online privacy literacy. In this study, we discuss factors that potentially contribute to and result from online privacy literacy. In an online questionnaire with 630 Facebook users, we found that people who spend more time on Facebook and who have changed their privacy settings more frequently reported to have more online privacy literacy. People with more online privacy literacy, in turn, felt more secure on Facebook and implemented more social privacy settings. A mediation analysis showed that time spend on Facebook and experience with privacy regulation did not per se increase safety and privacy behavior directly, stressing the importance of online privacy literacy as a mediator to a safe and privacy-enhancing online behavior. We conclude that Internet experience leads to more online privacy literacy, which fosters a more cautious privacy behavior on SNSs.     

Facebook self-disclosure: Examining the role of traits,social cohesion,and motives

Facebook has been shown to be the most popular social network in the United States. Facebook not only has implications in the online world, but face-to-face connections are also affected by this medium. This study explores the uses of Facebook for self-disclosure behavior utilizing the uses and gratifications perspective. Using a convenience sample of Facebook users, this study examines individual and sociological factors as well as Facebook motives to discover the impact on depth, breadth, and amount of user self-disclosure. Path analyses showed that the Big Five personality factors, self-esteem, social cohesion, and motives contribute to self-disclosure dimensions. However, demographic variables did not impact disclosiveness. Limitations are discussed and directions for future research are proposed.     

Looking for trouble: A multilevel analysis of disagreeable contacts in online social networks

Identifying characteristics of troublemakers in online social networks, those contacts who violate norms via disagreeable or unsociable behaviour, is vital for supporting preventative strategies for undesirable, psychologically damaging online interactions. To date characterising troublemakers has relied on self-reports focused on the network holder, largely overlooking the role of network friends. In the present study, information was obtained on 5113 network contacts from 52 UK-based Facebook users (age range 13–45; 75% female) using digitally derived data and in-depth network surveys. Participants rated their contacts in terms of online disagreement, relational closeness and interaction patterns. Characteristics of online troublemakers were explored using binary logistic multilevel analysis. Instances of online disagreement were most apparent in the networks of emerging adults (19–21 years). Contacts were more likely to be identified as online troublemakers if they were well connected within the network. Rates of offline and Facebook exchanges interacted such that contacts known well offline but with low rates of Facebook communication were more likely to be identified as troublemakers. This may indicate that users were harbouring known troublemakers in a bid to preserve offline relationships and reputational status. Implications are discussed in terms of an individual's susceptibility to undesirable encounters online.     

The uses and gratifications of using Facebook music listening applications

Despite rapid adoption of social media as a means of music listening, little is known about users’ motivations. This study applies the uses and gratifications approach to users’ motivations for using music listening applications on Facebook. Participants completed an online survey, and 153 out of 576 respondents indicated that they used a Facebook music listening application. A principal axis factor analysis identified three different motivations for this usage, namely entertainment, communication, and habitual diversion gratifications. The entertainment and communication gratifications replicate those found in prior uses and gratifications research concerning other social networking features, illustrating the strong similarity between uses of music and social media. However, the habitual diversion gratification may serve to distinguish listening applications from other features. Identifying and explaining these factors is relevant to social media users, musicians and application designers, as they explain what motivates a means of music listening that is gaining prominence.     

The effects of social media on students’ behaviors; Facebook as a case study

Social networks are one of the most used communication methods of today's world. Their use in different fields has been examined in several research studies. This study aims to examine the effects of social media on student's behaviors which will mainly focus on Facebook. Whether there is a positive relationship between confidence, social media participation and social media related behaviors will also be assed with regard to using Facebook. In order to collect the primary data, a general scanning model was used to observe attitudes of high school students. The participants chosen were 362 high school students from level 9 to 12. The findings highlight that Facebook is used for communication entertainment and sharing news, pictures and songs. In addition, their Facebook profile picture is alone and students were aware that swearing is considered a form of misconduct, which is a good sign. The study also indicates that students were aware of protecting their social identity as their Facebook shares are not public. Furthermore, they respect privacy as they do not use their friend's Facebook account.     

The case analysis on sentiment based ranking of nodes in social media space

Now-a-days, social network sites have become quite popular for communication in the society. People have entangled their day-to-day activities around social media platforms. Social Networks have allowed the users to share their opinions on different topics. In social media, sentiment analysis is an important character to determine opinions of users. Moreover, user’s can be ranked to determine their relative influence. This paper proposes a methodology to rank the users involving sentiment related parameters such as likes, comments and corresponding likescount. Analysis of users’ comments is carried-out. Weights are assigned to these parameters and scores are calculated for each user. Users are ranked on the basis of scores obtained and compared with existing technique. In order to verify the effectiveness of proposed methodology, data is extracted from a verified Facebook page ‘Panjab University, Chandigarh’. Mean, standard deviation and variance are computed to capture the usefulness of ranks obtained by the proposed method. Results depict that the proposed methodology is better than existing technique since it incorporates several features indicating positive and negative behavior of users. This technique can be used to determine the highly trusted and the most distrusted users in a social media user’s profile. Users with negative scores can be considered for outlier analysis. The proposed methodology can also be extended to work on other social media platforms.     

Text-based communication influences self-esteem more than face-to-face or cellphone communication

Meaningful social interactions are positively associated with improvements in self-esteem, but this phenomenon has largely been unexplored in digital media despite the prevalence of new, text-based communication (e.g. Facebook, texting, email, etc.). To address this gap in the literature the frequency and quality, or meaningfulness, of communication was measured in mediated and non-mediated channels across a random sample of 3649 social interactions using Experience Sampling Methods. Results revealed that most communication took place face-to-face (62%), with less text-based (about 22%) and cell phone voice (14%) communication. Meaningful face-to-face and text-based communication were associated with changes in self-esteem according to a marginally significant and significant finding, respectively. Text-based communication was more important for self-esteem than face-to-face or phone communication, which is consistent with research on the magnifying effect of text-based communication on interpersonal processes. According to the Internet enhanced self-disclosure hypothesis, the psychological benefits of text-based communication stems from enhanced self-disclosure, which is also supported in the data. Additional work is needed to better understand the mechanisms underlying the positive relationship between meaningful text-based interactions and self-esteem, but findings point to the important role of digital communication for psychological health.     

Personality and social characteristics of Facebook non-users and frequent users

Facebook is currently the largest social networking website with an estimated one billion of monthly active users in 2012. While most of the prior research has explored characteristics of Facebook users, less is known about the characteristics of individuals who do not use Facebook. The current study examined personality and social factors that might influence the decision to use Facebook and explored differences between Facebook non-users and frequent users. Online questionnaires examining levels of trust and self-disclosure, number of intimate friendships, peer usage of Facebook and scores on overt and covert narcissism were used for the purpose of the study. The results showed that non-users and frequent users differed on several social and personality characteristics. Facebook non-users had lower tendency to self-disclose, fewer peers participating in the social network and higher covert narcissistic traits. Frequent Facebook users scored higher on overt narcissism and reported more intimate friendships than non-users, indicating that close friendships might actually extend to social networks and contribute to a feeling of closeness and intimacy between friends in both an online and offline context.     

To connect or promote?: An exploratory examination of Facebook pages dedicated to moms

Mothers are increasingly using Facebook for a variety of communication functions. As an initial step toward understanding how mothers use Facebook, this exploratory study examines the types of messages mothers receive from Facebook pages solely designated for them. Using a content analysis, twelve Facebook pages and 526 administrators’ posts were analyzed. The majority of pages identified purpose as conversational/ discussion starter, while the majority of administrators’ posts were coded as informational/promotional. The discrepancies between the pages’ and posts’ purpose are considered. Directions for extending the research examining mothers and social networking sites are also suggested.     

Disclosures about important life events on Facebook: Relationships with stress and quality of life

The current study examined the relationship between general perceived levels of stress, quality of life, social networking usage, and disclosing important life events on Facebook in order to better understand the complex relationship between online disclosure and individual well-being. An online survey was completed by adult Facebook users aged 18–70. Results indicate that the more time spent on and the more social network memberships, the higher stress and lower quality of life; Facebook-specific usage was unrelated to either well-being variable. Together, these findings suggest that the current increase in social media variety and usage may be detrimental to user well-being. Users who shared important, bad health news on Facebook had higher stress and lower quality of life than those who did not, with no significant differences for sharing good health news. The more that users did not share important news on Facebook for self-protection and friend unresponsiveness reasons, the greater their stress. The self-protection reason was also negatively related to quality of life. These inconsistent findings can likely be partially explained by the nature of the information that is shared. These findings are discussed in light of disclosure and relationship patterns on social networks.