New Research: University of Michigan Study Links Social Media and Narcissism

From the U. of Michigan:

Facebook is a mirror and Twitter is a megaphone, according to a new University of Michigan study exploring how social media reflect and amplify the culture’s growing levels of narcissism.
The study, published online in Computers in Human Behavior, was conducted by U-M researchers Elliot Panek, Yioryos Nardis and Sara Konrath.
“Among young adult college students, we found that those who scored higher in certain types of narcissism posted more often on Twitter,” said Panek, who recently received his doctorate in communication studies from U-M and will join Drexel University this fall as a visiting fellow.
“But among middle-aged adults from the general population, narcissists posted more frequent status updates on Facebook.”
According to Panek, Facebook serves narcissistic adults as a mirror.
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For one part of the study, the researchers recruited 486 college undergraduates. Three-quarters were female and the median age was 19. Participants answered questions about the extent of their social media use, and also took a personality assessment measuring different aspects of narcissism, including exhibitionism, exploitativeness, superiority, authority and self-sufficiency.
For the second part of the study, the researchers asked 93 adults, mostly white females, with an average age of 35, to complete an online survey.

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Note: The title of this article is, “Mirror or Megaphone?: How relationships between narcissism and social networking site use differ on Facebook and Twitter” and it appears in the September, 2013 issue of Computers in Human Behavior.

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