Study: Users Not Trying To Brag On Facebook
ORANGE, Calif. (CBS Sacramento) -- According to a new study, people are more modest and humble about sharing good news on Facebook than they are about bad news, Live Science reports.
In the study from Chapman University in California, Professor Jennifer Bevan looked at how Facebook users shared information such as engagements, breakups, job promotions, medical diagnoses, and job loss.
What she found was that users indirectly shared their good news with friends and directly shared bad news.
"We suspect that there are 'face' considerations related to this finding," study leader Jennifer Bevan, a professor of communication studies at Chapman University in California, wrote in an email. "Meaning that users may be trying to actually not brag and instead be simply trying to inform their friends the best way they can think of so as to not look too proud of themselves."
In other words, humble bragging online is very real.
Users who wanted to announce a pregnancy may take a picture of their hands over their stomach without any caption, or those who wanted to share a recent marriage may simply change their last name on the site, emphasizing an indirect way of share positive news.
On the other hand, when bad news was shared, it was done in a more direct way such as a simple status update or wall post.
"Users probably just wanted to 'get it over with' and be as clear and direct as possible," Bevan later said.
The study, which surveyed 599 Facebook users online, including 332 college students, asked participants if they shared important life events like engagements, job promotions, and weddings and how they did it.
Participants were also asked how likely they were to share good news and bad news on Facebook in general.
The final word from Bevan, "Facebook users share good news indirectly and bad news directly; privacy has little impact."
The study was published on Jan. 13 in the journal Cyberpsychology, Behavior and Social Networking.
