Diving deep into quitting facebook psychology
More than a decade ago, social networking sites were searching it’s ground as unprecedented mode of communication and in this race of virtualization of human to human relationship, different developers across the world were trying their best to come up with unique features to sensationalize the wave of euphoria in newly and meantime developed concept of virtual social networking.
Orkut was leading the race in this war of features and feasibility as it had come up with unique design and various user friendly interfaces which made it hugely popular among masses. It looked like that orkut dominance in social networking market will last forever and many of them were quick to forecast that the said war has came to its end and orkut has won the race. Many of them were saying that it’s the end towards beginning of almost a monopolistic era of broaden social networking where there would be hardly any room for new way of conceptualization in this arena. Although in coming years, this had to be proved just as a myopic ideology because as many creative coders were working hard to profoundly look beyond the shallowness of thoughts and wanted to come up with something innovative which could put them stand out of the box in the social network war. They were doing so in different niches but when this gave birth to facebook which was launched at the same time and which in a short span of time almost dominated entire social networking world. This was in real terms triggered an inception of an era of internet based individual to individual social relationship and in coming years which had to take almost one sixth of world population in its grip. The huge success of facebook has been driven by its deep understanding of human psychology and it’s variable nature under changing circumstances. How we interact in real social life, is equally applicable in the virtual world of social networking and this has led facebook to consecutively innovates and integrates new ideas to its hugely popular platform.
Although, Its almost a decade has passed and facebook has written a great story of success and almost revolutionized the way of virtual networking. But, despite of this, its popularity is declining since last few years. Its not in terms of number of users but in terms of average time they use it.
Why it so and whats the basic reason behind this fall in its popularity among youths.
Facebook is just an alternative mode of networking with your friends wherever and whenever you want. So, it has somehow to a considerable extent eliminated the necessity of hanging around with your friends or pick up your phone and give a call to them. The updates keep on coming at regular interval and you keep on getting information about your friends. This has created a kind of reluctancy to communicate for several inbound reasons. A real communication between individuals are often triggered by some kind of curiosity and interest but if that is missing for whatsoever reason, a real connection between them is difficult to establish. Many facebook users have unknowingly realized this and so when it comes to extended and real communication gap due to virtual compaction of the same, they are trying their best to abstain from this as far as practicable.
Facebook is a show up platform as well where you broadcast your status with utter pride. If you have just checked in a five star hotel, why not just tell the world as this may make you land among distinguished creature of the society. This is more or less give you a feeling of superiority complex but more than this, it triggers an inferiority complex among your not so close facebook friends. As it happens in real life, when you get success in life, both appreciation and jealousy comes hand in hand. Those who appreciate you on your success may be jealous and those who are jealous can be fake appreciative.
As I have written in my introductory paragraph that facebook team has profound understanding of human psychology and so the introduction of this vary feature has a noticing contribution in facebook success story.
A platform for illusionized glorification
Facebook has become like a spherical mirror where you can see your image as magnified in your own conceived view. Although everyone who use facebook partially or wholly has similar conception about themselves but this may or may not be apparently applicable on someone who already have magnified image in society outside the perview of facebook like a popular actor or player. Apart from, this notion also includes someone who has contributed something considerably to the society. Most of facebook users are victimized by self appeasing and self centered image. They feel a sense of satisfaction when someone sends them a friend request, like their post, make a comment or tag them. These things affect them in a manner where they get victimized by the widespread illusion around which the whole concept of facebook has been developed.
Many users see security concern as primary reason for discontinuing with facebook. Although facebook has more than sufficient customize security features according to users requirement and this is what makes it a robust as far as it’s usability is concerned. However, many of them has no or little knowledge about its advanced security settings and that’s why there is always a menace to get exposed the privacy concern of an user. Getting into its psychological analysis reveals that most conservative societies across the world have larger number of facebook users who are quitting or less active because of the fear concerning towards getting exposed in front of their friends and family.
No more oblivious nostalgic value
Facebook let you peeps into your past moments and keeps on reminding like this day that year kind of nostalgia. Although it’s good to have so well connected with moments of your life you already have lived, however it looks more like a burden than a feeling of relief as this has subsidized the true nostalgic value of that oblivion moments of your lives, you just don’t want to recall so oftenly. A frequent attachment with your past good or bad is something not so appreciative kind of things as it simply kills its nostalgic value.
An addiction going nowhere
Our mind is always attracted towards things of curiosity and whether it has something valuable to grasp hardly matters. We always have an inclination towards something which can quench our thirst of dopamine. When that’s turn into an addiction it’s hard to get rid of that. When you always have a device as a means to quench your thirst of that vary neurotransmitters flow between your neurons, addiction is obvious as it’s temporarily give you a kind of satisfaction. Where this addiction takes you is so complicated to predict but one thing is clear, it’s taking you nowhere because it has hardly any inherited value which let you feel like a true sense of achievement you have obsessively wanted as a significant goal of your life. This self magnified kind of persona lands you in perplexing situation getting rid of which is a tedious task. As we always say if something you frequently do out of compulsion or unwanted addiction, it takes you at the doorstep of anxiety as your expectations from those actions fail to meet because of its subsistence in mere illusionism.
Facebook affects your relationship in real life
Facebook is affecting users relationships in their real life as well. Whenever you see a post of your friend on facebook, will you engage with that totally depend on your frame of mind at that moment. It’s often happens with all of us that our mood swing depend upon circumstances we have recently gone through. Our prejudices play a significant role in our state of mind at any given time and we react to that accordingly. This results in reciprocating effect on relationship both on facebook and in real life. Ebbing mutual engagements affect their relationship adversely and it’s continuity for a longer period of time results in development of unwillingness to continue using facebook for the said social networking.
Plethora of moral science lessons
It seems being on facebook is like attending moral science classes. Everyone other user looks like a preacher on facebook who keep on preaching you by sharing. There are millions of pages and people who are giving discourse for free. You go to your timeline only to find out these so called lifemanship lectures shared or liked by your friends. To some extent, it’s good to have this as they keep you reminding the ethical code of conduct you are bound to follow in your life, but when these so called waves of ocean of knowledge keep striking your mind, it turns into an irritation. Adding to this, who the hell is sharing these plethora of knowledge, some of them you know so closely that it looks like the huge difference between their behavioural conduct in real life and on facebook. It’s simply like Steal the goose, and give the giblets in alms. This is why many facebook users quit or abstain from the platform.
Anxiety of non acceptance
As a human being, we try to live in Rome like romans and so when we see that people are abstaining from indulging in particular action, we too go the same way as an inclination towards doing the things what crowd do. Those facebook users who join the platform almost at the time of its inception and were actively using and engaging with it for later years because most of their friends were doing the same. However, when they saw that diminishing utility is being derived from facebook with the passage of time, they initiated abstaining from this to greater extent. This behavioral change among many of facebook users has been triggered by their apprehensions towards non acceptance. It has given birth to anxiety among those and that has not just limited to their interaction on facebook, but also extended in their real life. Facebook anxiety effect has started encroaching in their different aspects of life particularly while making choices or taking any decision, you may feel more anxiety striking your mind than earlier. A social media behavioural research company has confirmed that many facebook users have backed to their normal level of anxiety in their life after completely abstaining from facebook for a month.
Facebook has revolutionized the way we communicate and has emerged as a remarkable intermediary between our friends and when we look at its astonishing number of users, we can’t say they are considerably going to get disillusioned soon as it has became an integral part of our life. Even if they try to abstain from it, their covered face presence cannot be wiped out.
Originally published on medium
“Diving deep into quitting facebook psychology” by Prashant Ranjan https://link.medium.com/C8rJY2SgXY
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