If you 'surf' a bit on Social Networking Sites (SNSs) one thing is very noticeable among adolescent users: there is love everywhere! Smileys, hearts, declarations of love: young people do not hesitate to praise each other online, both on each other's profile and on each other's (often sexy or tough) profile pictures. But is it love? Or is it 'just' a process of giving, receiving and asking for confirmation?
That was one of the questions that made me want to take a closer look at the use of SNSs by young people. After all, SNSs have quickly become one of the most popular activities on the Internet, and especially among adolescents: worldwide, 73% of young people are members of at least 1 SNS.
SNSs and their appeal to young people
It is not without reason that SNSs are so popular among young people. Adolescents find it important to 'belong somewhere' and to be accepted and therefore want to make a good impression on their environment. The use of SNSs is very useful for this, because they enable young people to profile themselves in a certain way to the outside world. An SNS profile can be completely adjusted to the wishes of the user. For example, young people can make a number of photos visible on their profile with which they think they make a good impression.
In addition, SNSs have more aspects that match the needs of adolescents. For example, they offer various functions to maintain contacts on the site: SNSs make it possible for adolescents to stay in touch with each other continuously. Also, acceptance by peers and giving mutual feedback to each other (giving and receiving comments on the profile and the profile picture) are both important characteristics. Because of all these (for young people) important facets of SNSs, it is likely that their use can influence the social self-confidence and well-being of adolescents. Whether this is actually the case, I recently investigated in my graduation research.
Research
Following Valkenburg, Peter and Schouten (2006) I have done research oman phone number list on the influence of SNSs on the self-confidence of young people. For this I have developed a research model with the most important factors of SNSs and the psychological factors 'self-confidence' and 'well-being'.
In order to measure the various factors and to test the connections in this model, an online questionnaire was administered to young people between the ages of 12 and 19 who were members of the SNS 'Hyves'. The aim of the research was to find out how often and what kind of reactions young people receive on their profile and profile picture and what the use of these sites means for their self-confidence and sense of satisfaction.
The results of the study showed that young people on an SNS are indeed very complimentary towards each other. 94.9% of the young people indicated that the tone of the reactions to their profile was 'always' or 'almost always' positive. The reactions to the profile photo were even slightly more positive: 96.6% of the young people received 'always' or 'almost always' positive reactions. But do young people who receive a lot of positive reactions also have more self-confidence? The answer is 'yes': the more positive feedback young people received on their profile (photo), the more self-confidence they had. Young people who mainly receive positive reactions therefore show relatively much self-confidence and a sense of satisfaction.