The Influence Of Social Comparison On Emotions In Social Media

The social comparison in social media is an extension of social comparison in real life.In human society,widespread social comparison has extremely important evolutionary value for human survival and development.Social media,as an indispensable model of interpersonal communication in modern society,has become a significant platform for individual social comparison.The existing studies of social comparison in social media mainly focused on the social comparison frequency,upward social comparison,and the influence of upward social comparison on emotion,etc.However,the correlation studies on this subject are lacking related contents and having one-sided results;The distinction about online social comparison objects are not clear enough;Questionnaire survey is mainly research methods.Therefore,in order to promote the scientific and reasonable social comparison of individuals in social media.It is necessary to understand the influence of social comparison on emotion.This study is based on the previous researches,and it attempts explore the different effects of various social comparison on emotion.further,investigating the role of interpersonal familiarity between individual and the compared target in it.This study is divided into three parts: the preliminary study is about the basic situation of social comparison in social media among college students,which is gained by way of questionnaire survey.study 1 explores the influence of various types of social comparison on emotions by setting up real online situations.In study 2,according to the self-evaluation of questionnaire and mock online situations,this article explores regulating function of interpersonal familiarity in the influence of social comparison on emotions.The main conclusions of this study:(1)It is very widespread for college students to compare with others when using social media.There are two ways of comparison: active and passive comparisons,and three directions: upward,parallel,and downward comparisons.Passive comparison from passive browsing as well as upward comparison created by positive information are more common.(2)Active comparison brings positive emotions,while passive comparison brings negative emotions.Compared with parallel comparison,upward comparison produces more negative emotions,and downward comparison generates more positive emotions.When individuals are faced with upward and parallel comparisons information,their active comparisons produce more positive emotions,comparing with passive comparison.(3)The interpersonal familiarity could regulate the influence of social comparison initiative on emotions.When people face familiar friends,their active comparison could produce more positive emotions,compared with passive comparison.While when they are faced with unfamiliar friends,there is no significant difference between effects of their active and passive comparisons.