Medical Daily: Facebook Damages Relationships for People With Low Self-Esteem

Facebook Damages Relationships for People With Low Self-Esteem

Facebook may seem like the perfect virtual world for people with low self-esteem to maximize and improve their social relationships because it reduces the need for uncomfortable face-to-face sharing. Wrong.

Researchers from the University of Waterloo said that sharing is essential for improving friendships, but people with low self-esteem seem to behave “counter-productively” by “bombarding their friends with negative tidbits about their lives and making themselves less likeable,” according to a statement released on Wednesday.

“We had this idea that Facebook could be a really fantastic place for people to strengthen their relationships,” said co-author Amanda Forest in a statement.

Forest and Joanne Wood studied the effects of self-esteem on the kinds of emotions people express, as well as how people with low self esteem perceive Facebook.

Researchers found that people with confidence issues are significantly more likely to think that Facebook provided a safe haven that reduces the risk of awkward social situations and as a place of greater opportunity to make social connections.

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