The other man’s grass is always greener.
And
the other man’s Facebook page frequently leaves visitors green with
envy, according to German researchers who recently released a study
entitled “Envy on Facebook: A hidden threat to users’ life
satisfaction?”
Social scientists at Berlin’s Humboldt University and
Darmstadt’s Technical University document a reduced “sense of personal
happiness” among many people who see Facebook-posted images and written
accounts of other folks’ fun vacations, heartwarming family moments and
even exciting nights out on the town.
A majority of
the 357 people surveyed, predominately German university students, even
said they felt jealous when viewing Facebook pages that have drawn more
“likes” than their own.
The researchers wrote: “Our
findings signal that users frequently perceive Facebook as a stressful
environment, which may, in the long run, endanger platform
sustainability.”
Behold another troubling side-effect
from the strange new world of social media. In that often-illusory cyber
realm, a Notre Dame football star was a dupe and/or duper in the
fabrication of a story about a girlfriend who died, when in reality she
did not exist.
And that’s only one of countless
instances in which a wide range of misinformation and hoaxes spread
through assorted personal websites at staggering speed. Thus, a
technological advance in self-expression fuels widespread diminishment
of self-esteem.
Of course, there’s nothing new about wondering why somebody else seems to have it better than you — on or off the Internet.
But
just as you can’t judge a book by its cover, you can’t judge a person’s
“life satisfaction” by a Facebook page — including your own.
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