If Your Life is about Happiness, then the Truth is a Relative Concept: an analysis of the effects Facebook has on happiness

The paper investigates the effects Facebook has on happiness. 165 individuals (mostly young adults and college educated students) answered to the survey. The author tries to show how personality factors mediate the relationship between Facebook use and subjective well-being. In the specific, the main findings of the research are the following. First, Facebook use does not have a positive or negative impact by itself. Second, individuals with high self-esteem are not significantly differently affected by Facebook use compared to individuals with low self-esteem. Third, having an active behaviour on Facebook positively affects life satisfaction compared to a passive approach. Fourth and lastly, an idealistic online self-image should be fostered in contrast to an actual self-representation. The last non supported hypothesis of the paper is that individuals with high self-esteem will be more positively affected by an idealistic self-image compare to individuals with a low self-esteem. The paper digs inside human personality and online social behaviour. It sheds lights over certain behavioural and cognitive patterns. Nonetheless future research should investigate this topic more in detailed with a more extended dataset in order to obtain more useful Insights. Therefore, this study should be seen as a pilot research on which more scholars should build on.