The article “How Facebook Makes Us Unhappy” by Maria Konnikova shows that Facebook can have a negative impact on our mood.
Many studies suggest that the longer people are on Facebook the unhappier they feel afterwards. According to Kraut (1998) the same goes for the Internet in general as “the more people used the Web, the lonelier and more depressed they felt.”
Furthermore some researchers argue that social networks provoke envy and hence can be seen as a burden on relationships.
Yet the author acknowledges that there have been other surveys that come to the opposite conclusion. For instance, Valezuela (2009) states that Facebook “increases social trust and engagement – and even encourages political participation.” However, this applies mainly to people who use social networks in an active way by sharing information.
The author therefore concludes that we need to differentiate between the positive effects of interacting with other people and the negative ones of passively reading through a lot of content.
Personally speaking, I can largely agree upon the effects it can have on your mood. On the one hand social networks tend to put a lot of pressure on teenagers who feel like they have to keep up with their peer’s “perfect life”, since many people mainly use Facebook to present themselves in a way they want to be seen by others. Looking at pictures of all the great things one was missing out on is hardly going to raise anyone’s spirit.
On the other hand we shouldn’t forget that Facebook allows us to stay in contact with friends who may live in a different country and their messages will certainly brighten up our day.
http://www.newyorker.com/tech/elements/how-facebook-makes-us-unhappy
Academic Cultures 