“What is a wedding ring, but a status report?”

Indeed, single is no longer the most common status, Mr. Rosenn said. “Back in the day, when we were primarily a college site, that was more common,” he said. Taking its data to heart, a surprising stability would seem to have spread across Facebook’s terrain. The most common status, he reports, is married (35 percent of users), with an additional 22 percent in a relationship and 32 percent saying they are single…

It is with breakups that Facebook can be most stressful to its users, Professor Gershon said: “When do you announce it publicly? How do you deal with the responses?” And there is the lingering question: do you change your status immediately to “single” or do you give it some time?

As put forth by Tomfoolery (one of thousands of blogs found in searching the phrase “Facebook relationship status etiquette” on Google), “All of your friends get that update in real time; not a fun way to find out that the dream is over.”