Break From Facebook

I'm taking a break from Facebook (for a couple of weeks) to focus on my health and balance. All things in moderation.
Samuel Long ️

“ DOES SOCIAL MEDIA AFFECT THE QUALITY OF OUR LIVES?

THIS EXPERIMENT WAS CONDUCTED ON 1095 PEOPLE IN DENMARK. WE RANDOMLY ASSIGNED HALF OF THEM TO THE FOLLOWING TASK:

DO NOT USE FACEBOOK FOR ONE WEEK.

94%visit Facebook as part of a daily routine
78% use Facebook30 minutes or more daily
86% browse the news feed often or very often
69% prefer to post pictures of the great thingsthey experience
61% prefer to post their good sides on Facebook

SOCIAL MEDIA IS A NON STOP GREAT NEWS CHANNEL. A CONSTANT FLOW OF EDITED LIVES WHICH DISTORTS OUR PERCEPTION OF REALITY.

THE HAPPINESS RESEARCH INSTITUTE: WHAT WE DID


In this experimental study we wanted to test if Facebook use affects our subjective well-being. 1095 people participated in the experiment. We asked them to evaluate their lives on different dimensions.Then we randomly allocated the participants to either:

-The control group (continue to use Facebook as usual)
-The treatment group (no Facebook use for an entire week)

After one week we asked all of them to evaluate their lives again.

AFTER ONE WEEK WITHOUT FACEBOOK THE TREATMENT GROUP REPORTED A SIGNIFICANTLY HIGHER LEVEL OF LIFE SATISFACTION.

AFTER ONE WEEK WITHOUT FACEBOOK THE TREATMENT GROUP EXPERIENCED LESS CONCENTRATION DIFFICULTIES.

PEOPLE ON FACEBOOK ARE 55% MORE LIKELYTO FEEL STRESSED.

PEOPLE TAKING A BREAK FROM FACEBOOK ARE 18% MORELIKELY TO FEEL PRESENT IN THE MOMENT.

AFTER ONE WEEK WITHOUT FACEBOOK THE TREATMENT GROUP FELT THEY WASTED THEIR TIME LESS.

5 OUT OF 10 ENVY THE #AMAZING EXPERIENCES OF OTHERS POSTED ON FACEBOOK
1 OUT OF 3 ENVY HOW #HAPPY OTHER PEOPLE SEEM ON FACEBOOK
4 OUT OF 10 ENVY THE APPARENT #SUCCESS OF OTHERS ON FACEBOOK
PEOPLE ON FACEBOOK ARE 39% MORE LIKELY TO FEEL LESS HAPPY THAN THEIR FRIENDS.

INSTEAD OF FOCUSING ON WHAT WE ACTUALLY NEED, WE HAVE AN UNFORTUNATE TENDENCY TO FOCUS ON WHAT OTHER PEOPLE HAVE.”

~ The Happiness Research Institute,
Suomisvej 4
1927 Frederiksberg (Copenhagen)
Denmark

"How do you measure happiness?
Building on measurement guidelines and benchmarks from the OECD and UN, we combine qualitative and quantitative methods to provide insights on the level of well-being, happiness and quality of life.

Whether we measure happiness, well-being or quality of life we are faced with the same challenges. They are all complex concepts. Therefore, we need to analyze different components. Much like when we examine how the economy is doing we can look at GDP per capita, growth, unemployment, inflation and interest rates. Each indicator gives us information about the status of the economy. Similarly, when we measure quality of life - we can examine different dimensions such as the cognitive, the affective and the eudaimonic dimension.The cognitive dimension focuses on an overall life satisfaction and is the indicator, which is the basis for many international rankings such as the World Happiness Report. The affective dimension focus more on what kind of emotions – both positive and negative - people experience on a daily basis such as joy, worry and stress. The eudaimomic dimension builds on Aristotle’s perception of the good life and thus focuses on purpose and meaning.These are all subjective measures – and we consider that to be a good thing.

What we care about is how people feel about their life. We believe people themselves are the best judge of whether they are happy or not. Working with subjective measures is difficult, but it is not impossible. We do it all the time, when it comes to stress, anxiety and depression – which are also subjective phenomenons - at the end of the day, it is all about how we as individuals experience our lives. What we ideally do is we follow people over time, and see how changes in life circumstances impact the different dimensions of happiness. How does e.g. unemployment, sickness, or a raise in income affect the different dimensions?"