Social media sites often present users with social exclusion information that may actually inhibit intelligent thought, according to the co-author of a University at Buffalo study that takes a critical look not just at Facebook and other similar platforms, but at the peculiarities of the systems on which these sites operate.
Social media sites often present users with social exclusion information that may actually inhibit intelligent thought, according to the co-author of a University at Buffalo study that takes a critical look not just at Facebook and other similar platforms, but at the peculiarities of the systems on which these sites operate.
The short-term effects of these posts create negative emotions in the users who read them, and may affect thought processes in ways that make users more susceptible to advertising messages.
What’s particularly alarming is that the social exclusion present in these posts is not intentional. Users are not callously sharing exclusion information with their friends. Social media sites, nevertheless, by design make most information available from one friend to another and the consequences resulting from the interpretation of these messages are significant.
“These findings are compelling,” says Michael Stefanone, an associate professor in UB’s Department of Communication and an expert in computer-mediated communication and social networks. “We’re using these technologies daily and they’re pushing information to users about their networks, which is what the sites are designed to do, but in the end there’s negative effect on people’s well-being.”
Read more at University at Buffalo
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