Study shows social media makes us MORE lonely and unhappy and LESS sociable

 A new study from the University of Michigan psychologist Ethan Kross shows how online social media, rather than making us feel connected, contributes to loneliness and reduces overall life-satisfaction.

Facebook may have 1.1 billion users across the globe, but according to the study, the technology is having a fundamentally negative effect on the way we interact with others, and the way we perceive ourselves.

The study's 82 participants were text messaged five times a day over a two-week period with a link to an online survey about their Facebook use, their feelings of well-being and the amount of face-to-face social interaction they had engaged in.
Kross and his team discovered that the more time participants had spent on Facebook, the less happy they felt over time.
'The more people used Facebook at one time point, the worse they felt the next time we text-messaged them; the more they used Facebook over two weeks, the more their life satisfaction levels declined over time,' reports the study.
These results were not moderated by the amount of Facebook friends, the perceived supportiveness of the Facebook connections, motivation for using Facebook, gender, loneliness, self-esteem, or depression, according to the study.
Kross says the study shows that Facebook was making the participants unhappy. He notes that other, cross-sectional studies have revealed positive associations with Facebook use, but notes that his is the first to study subjective well-being over time
Loneliness and social interaction in a world where we're increasingly connected is a growing problem.

Increased feelings of isolation and a decreased sense of well-being seems connected with the way in which we use social media, such as Facebook or Instagram: passively or actively.

A 2010 study from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh found that when interacting directly with friends on Facebook - whether posting messages or pictures on wall, tagging photos or 'liking' things, feelings of well-being and sociability increased.

But when they passively consumed content on Facebook, the opposite was true. An earlier study from the same researcher found that increased internet use led to a decline in communications with friends and family, and increased depression and loneliness.

Earlier this year, author Jonathan Safran Foer wrote in The New York Times on the issue.

'Technology celebrates connectedness, but encourages retreat,' he wrote.

'Each step "forward" has made it easier, just a little, to avoid the emotional work of being present, to convey information rather than humanity.'

too, weighed in on the issue in April 2012.

'We are living in an isolation that would have been unimaginable to our ancestors, and yet we have never been more accessible,' wrote Stephen Marche.

The passive consumption of other people's lives over social media - their idealized pictures of holidays, work, meals and family - seem to result in a more negative perception of our own lives and social interactions.

Kross' study concludes, 'On the surface, Facebook provides an invaluable resource for fulfilling the basic human need for social connection. Rather than enhancing well-being, however, these findings suggest that Facebook may undermine it.'