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Facebook Doesn't Make Us Antisocial, Study Says

by Amar Toor on November 24, 2010 at 12:50 PM

socializing with computerWasting your life away on Facebook may not seem like the most social of activities, but, according to a new study from the University of Texas, all those hours you spend on the social network may actually strengthen your personal ties with friends and family.

To test the effects of Facebook on real-world relationships, researchers at the University of Texas questioned 900 college students and recent graduates about how they interact with their friends on the social network, and which friends they engage most often. More than 60-percent of users cited status updates as a typical means of interaction, 60-percent said they frequently communicate with their friends via comments on their profiles, and 49-percent said they often interact by sending personal messages or Wall posts to their friends.

These results, according to lead researcher S. Craig Watkins, "suggest that Facebook is not supplanting face-to-face interactions between friends, family and colleagues," but merely opening up "opportunities for new expressions of friendship, intimacy and community." Of course, different demographic groups use social media in different ways, but the underlying point is the same; Facebook isn't turning us into heartless robots, and it isn't even making us all that anti-social, either. If anything, it's just provided us with new ways to interact with broader groups of people. And that's pretty reassuring.

Tags: college, facebook, family, friends, interaction, relationships, SocialNetworking, students, study, top, UniversityOfTexas, Web

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