Introduction to Psychology Homework 3 - Essay Example

Narcissism This refers to excessive fascination and love for oneself. This behavior is common in Facebook where people post excessively good things about themselves. Such people post almost flawless profile pictures of them and feel good when others like and comment positively on their updates. (Miller et al., 2011) Narcissists tend to swear a lot, participate in arguments and disagree with almost everyone. It has been found that the majority of narcissists are females. In addition, narcissists are also linked with impulsive sexual behavior.

(Miller et al., 351) Extraversion This refers to the responsiveness to things around one especially material things and not oneself. They take pleasure in social interactions and focus on things that are not ideal. People with this personality are characterized by enthusiasm, excitement, assertiveness and are sociable. They tend to have a large number of Facebook friends. Because of their sociable nature, extroverts often decorate their houses or offices and wear clothes that are decorative. How Extraversion and Narcissism relate to Usage of Social Network Site (as discussed in the introduction of Ong et al., 2011). According to the introduction of Ong et al.

, 2011, extraversion and narcissism are good determinants of Facebook usage. (Correa et al. 2010, in Ong et al. 2011.)Since in most cases only users are in control of what they post, social networking sites like Facebook display the traits of the users. Sometimes posts and comments are blocked from these sites when they are inappropriate, abusive or inciting. Narcissists and extroverts display their best profile photos which are liked by their friends. The more the likes one has, the more popular they are.

This then relates to how they feel about themselves. Also important is the number of friends one has. Narcissists and extroverts feel good about themselves and in control of their lives when they are popular. This is usually not the real situation since most of these many friends are always strangers who one has nothing in common with. Ong et al.’s (2011) findings on the relationships between extraversion, narcissism and Facebook profile features. Ong et al found out that narcissism was the greatest predictor of Facebook profile picture ratings and that of Facebook status updates.

They also found out that narcissism did not predict the number of Facebook friends and Facebook photos. This means that the first two hypotheses stating that narcissism predicted higher self ratings on Facebook profile pictures and status updates were accepted; while the last two relating narcissism to Facebook friends and photos were rejected. Do you agree with these results? Yes I do. These results hold true because narcissism as described earlier is based on an individual’s feeling about themselves and thus their actions are implemented by themselves.

This is evident in status updates which are posted by one and profile pictures which are also uploaded by self. On the other hand, the number of friends is estimated by the system and Facebook photos tagged by friends and so not directly under one’s control. Is it worthwhile to study how personality traits relate to real?world behaviors like Facebook use? Yes it is. Learning about these personality traits is important as it can help one control their behavior and avoid the negative extremities of such traits.

Narcissists and extroverts have portrayed tendencies of being non empathic and bullies.