Materialistic individuals utilize Facebook more intensely and frequently, treat their online buddies as “digital objects,” and feel a greater requirement to evaluate themselves to their equivalent on the social networking site, claim the scientists. The research also discovered that they have more buddies as compared to users who are less concerned in possessions. Materialistic individuals utilize Facebook to both feel good and achieve their goals, as per the survey.
“Materialistic individuals utilize Facebook more regularly since they tend to objectify their buddies on Facebook. They obtain Facebook buddies to elevate their possession,” claimed Ruhr-University Bochum’s Phillip Ozimek from Germany to the media. “Facebook offers the ideal platform for social evaluations, with information and billions of profiles about people. And it is free. Materialists love services that do not need money!” claimed Ozimek.
Scientists first carried out an online survey with 242 users of Facebook. The survey asked members to rate their conformity with statements so as to evaluate their tendency for social comparison, Facebook activity, objectification, materialism, and instrumentalization of Facebook buddies. The results recommended that the connection between Facebook activity and materialism can be partly clarified by materialists having more Facebook buddies, showing a sturdier social evaluation orientation, and instrumentalising & objectifying their buddies more powerfully.
Scientist replicated the method with a different sample of 289 users of Facebook, having less students and more men in comparison to the 1st sample, and they arrived at the same results. The “Social Online Self-Regulation Theory” they designed expands this additional, claiming that social media is an instrument for attaining significant goals in life. For materialists, Facebook is an instrument to find out how far away they are from their objective to turn out to be wealthy.
The scientists emphasize that their outcome must not present social media in a negative light; as an alternative, they suppose individuals use platforms such as Facebook to have fun, feel good, and achieve their objectives. “Social media platforms are not that diverse from other life activities. They are operational instruments for users who need to accomplish objective in life, and some may have unenthusiastic consequences for society,” Ozimek claimed.