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Self-affirmation underlies Facebook use.

Catalina L Toma1, Jeffrey T Hancock

  • 1University of Wisconsin-Madison, 53706, USA. ctoma@wisc.edu

Personality & Social Psychology Bulletin
|January 30, 2013
PubMed
Summary
This summary is machine-generated.

Social network sites like Facebook are popular because they fulfill ego needs, helping users maintain self-worth and self-integrity. People unconsciously use profiles to repair their self-perception after ego threats.

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Area of Science:

  • Psychology
  • Social Media Studies
  • Human-Computer Interaction

Background:

  • Social network sites (SNS) have gained immense popularity, but the underlying psychological drivers remain unclear.
  • Understanding user engagement is crucial for SNS development and psychological theory.
  • Ego needs and self-affirmation theory offer a potential framework for explaining SNS appeal.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate the role of ego needs in the attractiveness of social network sites.
  • To test the hypothesis that SNS profiles serve a self-affirming function.
  • To extend self-affirmation theory by examining its operation in everyday digital environments.

Main Methods:

  • Study 1: Assessed the self-affirming qualities of Facebook profiles in relation to users' needs for self-worth and self-integrity.
  • Study 2: Examined user behavior on Facebook profiles following ego-threatening events, testing for unconscious self-repair mechanisms.

Main Results:

  • Facebook profiles were found to be self-affirming, bolstering users' sense of self-worth and integrity.
  • Participants engaged more with their Facebook profiles after experiencing blows to their ego.
  • This engagement appears to be an unconscious effort to restore self-perceptions.

Conclusions:

  • The popularity of social network sites like Facebook can be attributed to their ability to fulfill users' ego needs.
  • SNS profiles act as a tool for self-affirmation, helping individuals maintain psychological well-being.
  • The findings provide empirical support for self-affirmation theory in the context of online behavior and everyday environments.