Buoying your ‘friend’ships
The more you click, the stronger your online relationships. Hitting the ‘Like’ button, commenting on photos of friends, sending birthday wishes and tagging others are just some of the ways in which Facebook allows you to engage in “social grooming.” All these tiny, fleeting contacts help users maintain relationships with large numbers of people with relative ease.
Molding the image you want to project
The more you reveal, the greater your chances of successful self-presentation. Studies have shown that strategic self-presentation is a key feature of Facebook use. Users shape their online identity by revealing which concert they went to and with whom, which causes they support, which rallies they attend and so on. In this way, you can curate your online self and manage others’ impressions of you, something that would be impossible to do in real life with such regularity and precision. Online, you get to project the ideal version of yourself all the time.
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