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The effect of deactivating Facebook and Instagram on users' emotional state

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Re: The effect of deactivating Facebook and Instagram on users' emotional state

#351

Post by jjulius »

scyzoryk_xyz wrote: post #293

I have a love/hate thing with Instagram. I’ve been an avid user and it has been incredibly popular in my IRL social-circles over the last 5-10 years. Much has been said about the mechanics underpinning it but I’ve embarked on this experiment since the beginning of this year: I started deleting Instagram every Sunday evening and installing every Friday. I had this hypothesis that it’s the weekends that people have the…

>... but I’ve also felt a bit of a mourning period not being reminded about acquaintances’ lives.

We don't need to be reminded of acquaintances lives - what people I barely know do in their free time has zero bearing on my life. They're acquaintances, not friends, so their actual importance/impact to my life is next to nil.

I never smoked but often hung out with smokers outside on their lunch breaks. If an acquaintance is truly important to us, we can be reminded of our acquaintances lives by making an effort to turn them into real friendships that interact with each other in meatspace.

Re: The effect of deactivating Facebook and Instagram on users' emotional state

#352

Post by celsoazevedo »

donatj wrote: post #111

Before its fall, I had over 700 followers on Twitter. I could post any random thought and within minutes be having an interesting conversation with some rando about it. For example I pondered why phone manufacturers didn't use a p2p protocol for distributing updates and had an enlightening conversation with a person who worked for a major telco chiming in as to why that would be problematic for their infrastructure.…

> Instagram is just brainrot these days.

PixelFed reminds me a bit of the old Instagram. Not many users, but people are there to post their pictures. You kinda have to rely on tags and trending content to find accounts/content, but that's not always a bad thing.

Re: The effect of deactivating Facebook and Instagram on users' emotional state

#353

Post by jmount »

I'd worry a bit about the summary of what is being reported.

> Facebook and Instagram deactivation improved emotional state index by 0.060 standard deviations (p The link didn't click through to the appendix. This seems off, as small effects (the small number of standard deviations) tend to be associated with undesirable high p-values, not low ones. Though also, the 0.060 itself seems lower than the visual graphs indicate.

Re: The effect of deactivating Facebook and Instagram on users' emotional state

#354

Post by dfxm12 »

8s2ngy wrote: post #41

I believe many of the problems in our current social media landscape could be solved by eliminating the "feed" and instead displaying posts, updates, and pictures from friends, family, and those we know in real life. This approach might conflict with the profit models of big tech social media and could go against what most people have become accustomed to. Personally, I would love a smaller social network where I can…

I think the fact that "the algorithm" capitalizes on negative emotion has been known for a while. The problem is that Zuck (and Elon, etc.) is at best motivated by making money, at worst motivated by swaying public opinion, and certainly not motivating by improving the emotional state of the users of these services, or even giving them a good experience.

I think this goes beyond social media to all kinds of media.

Re: The effect of deactivating Facebook and Instagram on users' emotional state

#358

Post by sullivantrevor »

8s2ngy wrote: post #41

I believe many of the problems in our current social media landscape could be solved by eliminating the "feed" and instead displaying posts, updates, and pictures from friends, family, and those we know in real life. This approach might conflict with the profit models of big tech social media and could go against what most people have become accustomed to. Personally, I would love a smaller social network where I can…

I agree with you and I am building this app right now.

elswhr.app

Would love to hear your feedback and any feature requests you might have.

Re: The effect of deactivating Facebook and Instagram on users' emotional state

#359

Post by jjulius »

physicsguy wrote: post #150

Facebook can be hard to get rid of if you actually have hobbies and things because so much gets organised via it. I tried to get rid but my Running club exclusively posts stuff on Facebook. For Instagram with you needing to log in to view pages, you find that you can’t find opening times for restaurants etc because many places use it to advertise that they’re open/closed at short notice.

This is probably a "YMMV" kinda thing, because I thought that I would experience the same struggle, but in reality I've found out that I encounter those moments but... I don't really care. It's like being removed from all of the bullshit that comes with social media is worth the tradeoff of occasionally missing a detail like that.

I went and found forums for the hobbies I'm into, rather than social media groups. Thankfully, most of the underground music I'm into also maintain their own websites, while some of the more hush-hush groups maintain members-only email lists. If they don't do either? Well, nearly all of them sell tickets online via mainstream ticket vendors regardless of how underground they try to be, so I'll see the info eventually (and, hell - I know the event's coming up and I've put it on my calendar, I don't need to see an IG story about it every single day for two months reminding me). For backpacking, forums are fantastic compared to the oft-repeated and overrun social media groups.

For restaurants? Meh. So what if I show up and a place is closed on short notice? Worse things can happen than wasting a little bit of time. Do they only share their menu on social media but my friends swear it's amazing? Fine, I'll experience it O'Reilly-style ("We'll do it live! Fuck it!").

I don't need to know everything all the time, that's part of the adventure! And if I really do need to know something about a place that only posts on social media, I've found that I can usually find that info elsewhere if I dig hard enough.

Re: The effect of deactivating Facebook and Instagram on users' emotional state

#360

Post by jjulius »

PaulRobinson wrote: post #175
physicsguy wrote: post #150

Facebook can be hard to get rid of if you actually have hobbies and things because so much gets organised via it. I tried to get rid but my Running club exclusively posts stuff on Facebook. For Instagram with you needing to log in to view pages, you find that you can’t find opening times for restaurants etc because many places use it to advertise that they’re open/closed at short notice.

If you really value your running club, why not help them set something else up? You could offer to help the people who do all that posting to get it onto an email list or some other platform away from Facebook. A small indie website somewhere, even a blog. I know this sounds like work, and you just want to enjoy your running club, but if it gets sticky, the people who are currently posting everything on FB will event…

>I know this sounds like work...

Yup! At the risk of being flippant, all healthy relationships require work.

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