What kind of Facebook user are you? There may be an answer
With 890 million daily users and nearly two billion logging into the social media website every month, Facebook has become an inescapable influence in our times. That Facebook is routine for most internet users in India proves its influence.
Studies have shown that most Facebook users spend a great amount of time on the website every day, but now new research by United States' Brigham Young University has shed more light on how exactly we spend our time on the website.
In an attempt to answer why Facebook has practically taken over the web, the study's lead author, Tom Robinson and his fellow researchers list multiple reasons to explain why many of us have assimilated this creation of the virtual world into our lives.
Based on the responses to a questionnaire, the researchers have put users under four broad categories — relationship builders, town criers, selfies, or window shoppers and explained their motivations ranging from "building on real-world relationships" to focussing on "likes" and attention.
So which one are you?
Relationship builders
The first category of users, according to the study, uses Facebook "as an extension of their real life, with their family and real-life friends". It claims these people use Facebook to post updates, respond to other people’s posts, and send messages in a way to strengthen relationships that lie outside Facebook.
It further says that people in this group identified strongly with statements such as "Facebook helps me to express love to my family and lets my family express love to me".
Selfies
The next set is the selfie user. Much like relationship builders, this group uses the platform as an extension of their real life, using the platform extensively for promoting their individual brands. However, unlike the first group, they post selfies, pictures, videos and text updates on Facebook to focus on getting attention, likes and comments and not strengthening relationships.
Their purpose is to "to present a certain image of themselves, whether it's accurate or not". They are the ones that identified strongly with the statement: "The more Like notification alarms I receive, the more I feel approved by my peers."
The town crier
Next up are the town criers. This group uses the social media platform not to build relationships or promote themselves, but instead to focus on sharing content like news stories and other events of importance.
Their time is spent not sharing personal updates, but rather pushing out information. They don't use Facebook as a social tool to interact with others, "but to inform everybody about what's going on," said Robinson. They inform people of major events, but often neglect their own profile pages, and prefer to communicate with family and friends through alternative methods.
Window shoppers
Last but not the least are the "window shoppers". This group rarely shares information regarding their personal lives but uses Facebook as a tool to observe others. These users, co-author Clark Callahan says, "want to see what other people are doing. It's the social-media equivalent of people watching".
They don’t post on Facebook, but spend time trawling through Facebook to know what other people are doing.
Can you find your category?
Well, as the researchers point out, Facebook users might identify with more than one category, but will usually relate to one group more than the others. As co-author of the research, Kris Boyle points out: "Everybody we've talked to will say, 'I'm part of this and part of this, but I'm mostly this."