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Social comparison in social media: a look at facebook and twitter

Published: 26 April 2014 Publication History

Abstract

Recent attention has focused on the tendency for social media, namely Facebook and its News Feed, to promote unfavorable social comparisons, or envy. We extend this work in a survey that looks at three main questions. First, are people who exhibit lower well-being more vulnerable to unfavorable social comparisons in social media? Second, how do Facebook and Twitter differ in their tendencies to promote unfavorable social comparisons? And third, what structural factors in each platform might explain differences? We find substantial evidence that, indeed, low well-being individuals are more vulnerable to unfavorable social comparisons in social media and that across the board, users are more prone to envy on Facebook than Twitter. Finally, we find suggestive evidence that greater references to the self on Facebook and a larger presence of public figures and organizations on Twitter help account for the difference.

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Cited By

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  • (2024)Digital Mental Health Application to Develop Students’ Cyber Behavioral, Social and Emotional CompetenciesInterdisciplinary Approaches for Educators' and Learners’ Well-being10.1007/978-3-031-65215-8_12(149-158)Online publication date: 26-Jul-2024
  • (2022)Sosyal Ağ Sitelerinde Sosyal Karşılaştırma Davranışı: Instagram- Twitter KarşılaştırmasıYeni Medya Dergisi10.55609/yenimedya.10510442022:12(1-16)Online publication date: 30-Jun-2022
  • (2022)The electoral success of social media losers: a study on the usage and influence of Twitter in times of elections in ParaguaySN Social Sciences10.1007/s43545-022-00392-x2:7Online publication date: 27-Jun-2022
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    cover image ACM Conferences
    CHI EA '14: CHI '14 Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems
    April 2014
    2620 pages
    ISBN:9781450324748
    DOI:10.1145/2559206
    Permission to make digital or hard copies of part or all of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for third-party components of this work must be honored. For all other uses, contact the Owner/Author.

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    New York, NY, United States

    Publication History

    Published: 26 April 2014

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    Author Tags

    1. comparison orientation
    2. depression
    3. differential effects
    4. envy
    5. facebook
    6. happiness
    7. life satisfaction
    8. news feed
    9. passive consumption
    10. reference groups
    11. social comparison
    12. survey
    13. twitter
    14. wellbeing

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    CHI '14: CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems
    April 26 - May 1, 2014
    Ontario, Toronto, Canada

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    CHI EA '14 Paper Acceptance Rate 1,000 of 3,200 submissions, 31%;
    Overall Acceptance Rate 6,164 of 23,696 submissions, 26%

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    Cited By

    View all
    • (2024)Digital Mental Health Application to Develop Students’ Cyber Behavioral, Social and Emotional CompetenciesInterdisciplinary Approaches for Educators' and Learners’ Well-being10.1007/978-3-031-65215-8_12(149-158)Online publication date: 26-Jul-2024
    • (2022)Sosyal Ağ Sitelerinde Sosyal Karşılaştırma Davranışı: Instagram- Twitter KarşılaştırmasıYeni Medya Dergisi10.55609/yenimedya.10510442022:12(1-16)Online publication date: 30-Jun-2022
    • (2022)The electoral success of social media losers: a study on the usage and influence of Twitter in times of elections in ParaguaySN Social Sciences10.1007/s43545-022-00392-x2:7Online publication date: 27-Jun-2022
    • (2020)The Psychological Motivations of Online Conspicuous ConsumptionInternational Journal of E-Business Research10.4018/IJEBR.202004010116:2(1-16)Online publication date: Apr-2020
    • (2020)Passive Facebook Use and DepressionJournal of Media Psychology10.1027/1864-1105/a00026932:4(165-175)Online publication date: Oct-2020
    • (2020)Envy in Social Comparison–Behaviour Relationship: Is Social Comparison Always Bad?Psychological Studies10.1007/s12646-020-00575-7Online publication date: 19-Nov-2020
    • (2020)Perceived Use and Effects of Social Media for 1 to 2.5 Generation Immigrant College Students with Depression: Results from a Mixed Methods SurveySustainable Digital Communities10.1007/978-3-030-43687-2_11(130-150)Online publication date: 19-Mar-2020
    • (2018)People Tend to Wind Down, Not Up, When They Browse Social MediaProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/32744022:CSCW(1-29)Online publication date: 1-Nov-2018
    • (2018)Enhancing Positive Psychology Coaching PracticeCoaching for Rational Living10.1007/978-3-319-74067-6_5(87-101)Online publication date: 12-Jun-2018
    • (2017)Envy Sensitivity on Twitter and Facebook Among Japanese Young AdultsInternational Journal of Cyber Behavior, Psychology and Learning10.4018/IJCBPL.20170101027:1(18-33)Online publication date: Jan-2017
    • Show More Cited By

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