Stanford Study: Time Off From Facebook Leaves People Less Informed, Polarized
STANFORD (CBS SF) – Researchers at Stanford University last week announced the findings from a study of nearly 3,000 Facebook users showing those who deactivated their accounts before an election were less informed, but also less likely to be politically polarized.
Several of the participants were paid to deactivate their accounts in the run-up to the midterm elections in November.
Those who didn't use their accounts reported small improvements in overall happiness and spent less time online overall, but knew less about current events, according to the study.
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"What you see from this study is that the rise of social media - and Facebook, in particular - has been a double-edged sword," economics professor Matthew Gentzkow said in a statement.
Researchers also found 23 percent of users who deactivated their account were less likely to return to the platform four weeks after the experiment ended.
The average user asked for at least $100 to deactivate their account, but that number dropped slightly after a month of being off the platform.
"It turns out a four-week break does cause people to re-evaluate how they use Facebook, but they're still willing to pay a lot of money to stay on the platform," Hunt Allcott, a co-author from New York University, said in a statement. "Measured in economic terms, Facebook seems to provide a whole lot of value for its users."
Researchers contradicted the social media giant's own findings that passive users of the site, such as those who simply scroll through their news feed, were more prone to anxiety and unhappiness than active users.
The study will be used as a jumping off point to research the nuances of using social media, especially between different age groups, political ideologies, education levels and additional characteristics.
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