Looking at Social Media and the Personality Trait of Individual - Essay Example

Critical Essay on Personality Psychology Name Institution Introduction Can personality predict how social media is used? Using personality traits of individual’s online; research can be done to explain this statement. This paper is going to give an argumentative perspective of the statement. Looking at the social media and the personality trait of individual hence after that come with a concluding factor that supports the statement. Using credible research done in 2005 by survey of social network and some previous personality test research done by McCrae & Costa which has a consistency in their findings (McCrae Robert R.: Cista Jr., 1997).it also brings out the Big Five model and its application. The picture of extraversion and introversion personalities is brought out clear and states their interaction over the social media use. It brings about the conclusion that social media use can be dictated by personality, and proves it throughout the development of this paper. Its intention is to set up straight and clear cut argument that can be used to verify the social media use control by individuals’ personality. Many researchers have been done on personality and social media many being of predicting one's personality from their social media perspective. With regards research studies such as the one carried out by Hampton, Sessions and Goulet, (2011), it’s through the resultant findings that we conclude the usefulness of combining the exploration of the digital media usage and personality traits. While relying on ‘Big Five Framework’ as a theoretical approach, data has been collected on the research. That is, from a survey data carried out by the national sample of U. S adults, it has shown that extraverted individuals have more likelihood of using social media for video chats and instant messaging while the rest who are open to new experiences usually use the social media more often. Also, those who have negative emotional stability tend to use the social media on specific terms. The findings by Frazier, Tix, and Barron (2004) confirm the usefulness of combining the exploration of personality and media usage. With the evolution of web growing it opens up more opportunities and spaces for which the individuals are interacting, creation and sharing of in formations, socializing and promoting their work online. Through a study that was carried out by late 2012, around 48hrs of the video were uploaded to youtube every minute. In another case study of 2011, the number of individuals using the social media networking was double the number in 2008 of which nearly half had used social media networking such as Facebook or linked to it. (Hampton, Session, and Goulet, 2011). The early periods of the Internet, individuals went online, looking for seeking the mystery it offered (McKenna & Bargh, 2000) but now as it has grown they use it to socialize with different people from all over and expand their networks.(Jones & Fox, 2009). With these increasing interaction and involvement of the users of the web, there has been a rise in the necessity of exploring the types of people that take part in the tools participatory and psychological factors. That is; how dispositional and stable features rooted in biology may have a significant effect on the way people engage with digital media tools and social media in particular (Hamburger, 2002) Most work on media pays a lot of its concern on the demographics and some of the psychological characteristics of the users. These features may change over time as people change. They become less motivated, satisfied with their lives and efficacious. It’s important that one pays more close attention to the psychological traits such as the personality. These are deeply rooted biologically and may have greater effects on the use of media and digital tools in particular. Through uncovering the events that assists or prevents implementation of social media which enables web content producers and the policy makers to increase media access and to have a better understanding and making it acceptable to the different users (Cain, Pincus & Ansell, 2008). It is by the researchers of psychology that brought rise to the five categories in various individual personality. These include; emotional stability, characterized by anxiousness; sensitivity, being moody; or being easily pushed to negative emotions, cooperativeness. Besides, being helpful distinguishes agreeableness, while openness to new experiences is characterized by intelligence, curiosity imaginativeness being sophisticated and artistic and conscientiousness ( McCrae & Costa, 1997). The study by Tosun and Timo was to establish how and if the relationship between a personality trait and Facebook use. The result showed that individuals who spent more than two hours on Facebook on a daily basis were extroverted and outgoing and tended to have more friends on Facebook. In their research Tosun and Timo claim that the extroverted individuals mostly use the social media accounts to maintain the relationship that they had already formed by face to face encounters. However, other researchers such as Moore and McElroy claim that these individuals use it less frequently as a way of keeping in touch with people (Moore and McElroy 2012; Tosun and Timo, n.d). Interestingly even before the social websites and instant messaging came to live, the internet was still used as an escape and created an anonymous shield from one’s true identity. Introverted individuals were using chat rooms even more than extroverted individuals. This is so because it was a way of them interacting. This was a form of isolation, a separate universe that attracted many more isolated individuals. It’s from various studies that it has been proven and shown that there is more potential to integrate personality results into social media to enhance the accuracy of some particular features. The research on interface and personality that has already been done shows that users of social media prefer interface presented design (McKenna, Katelyn, and Bargh, 2000). With the ability to infer the user’s personality in social media websites, the e-commerce retailers can be tailored to reflect user’s personality trait and present the information of which the user will be receptive to it. It’s through these that markets are trying to spread and widen their market area and produce product that is reliable and trusted by the consumers by presenting them to the consumer the way they want them. This same idea can be extended to advertisement agencies whereby through the personality traits of the user on the social media, individuals can now utilize that opportunity of social media profiles to determine the personality of the consumers hence make it easy to implement and benefit from this knowledge. In other words, the character of individuals in the social media has brought change to the use of social media whereby people have started to use the social media to sell their products to the desired people with ease (Cain, Pincus & Ansell, 2008). The internet is where both the extrovert and the introvert can maintain their relationship with one another. It has been proven through research that the extroverts tend to use the social media network mostly than their counterparts the introverts. It also shows that the extroverts individual maintain their previously face to face contact with the social media (Goldberg et al., 2006). These are important because it gives evidence that personality is a great factor in determining the online behaviors of the users. Also, the introverts mostly use the social media to compensate for the interaction that is missing in their real lives scenarios. It’s through the interaction of the introverts and extroverts in the social media that also their personality does change after a given time as compared to their real lives (Goldberg et al., 2006). More so the level of extraversion may affect the introvert’s use of social media. The researches that have been done have also shown that those who are communication avoidant during face to face interaction they communicate better when they are online. It’s through the internet that both personality trait, the extrovert and introverts are joined and both their needs are met and fulfilled but for different reasons. Different people have got different communication behaviors of which mostly are based on the psychological and social factors (Hamburger, 2002). The psychological and social factors influence how well the social media can serve and also satisfy the individual’s needs and wants. It’s widely known that the Internet competes with other sources, but people do use the internet for the gratification of their personal needs of which they have difficulty in fulfilling them through the other means of communication (Barrick & Mount, 1991). On research that was carried out and a report written by Erin Ryan, it showed that there is a larger number of the population use the social media such as Facebook for distraction mostly during class, out of habits, boredom, socializing and also entertainment (Moore and McElroy, 2012). They say that Facebook is much addictive but also a way to unwind your mind. Through his report he stated that the light Facebook users are considered as introverts with little percentage said to be reserved while the heavy users are deemed to be extroverts and outgoing, being so much talkative and demands face to face communication. But to his conclusion, he said that both the introvert and extrovert enjoy the use of social media. The social media is an extension of the extrovert’s world though it seems like it fulfills their needs also. While the internet can affect one’s personality, their personality can also affect the use of the internet and social media. It’s through these traits that one can use to predict the utilization of the social media as a whole (Moore and McElroy, 2012). From another case study, the different characteristics that are included in personality such, desire for narcissism and fame affects how social media is used and the choice of where the individual will post. The study was useful to distinguish the styles of using the social media arena and one’s personal character trait and also considering that that field of social media is rapidly growing. This study further supports the claims of previous researches that state personality as a significant contributor in general research consumer and also helpful to the application on different medias (Moore and McElroy, 2012). Research from the past have tried to look into personality traits that mostly influences individual actions online. It’s so because personality affects people motivations and the interaction behavior during both online and offline interactions (Frazier, Tix & Barron, 2004). A literature review of which is a great deal of past research sought to find out the various ways that personality affects one use of the social media. These personality traits differ between mostly three or five character traits of personality. Frazier, Tix & Barron (2004), argues that one’s personality on a given factor wholly depends on the stand in the other factor of which gives a suggestion that one’s personality shapes up their behavior online. Exposure to specific media outlets online is always connected with individual’s personal characteristics. That is; all the backgrounds that make the person interact online included. It is through these character traits that sources can use to predict the use of media through a case study of the sample of individual in a given area with different personality traits (Frazier, Tix & Barron, 2004). The paper that was presented to conferences, journals and online articles are trying to address and come up with answers to the questions that were brought up for the current study. Through the study of past research hypothesis and analysis, some questions were formed of which later were followed by a survey that used the closed-ended questions to investigate individuals on social media and their personality style (Vul et al., 2009). There is a central measure in neuroticism that is used that is emotional stability. It shows that individuals with neurotic tendencies tend to have more social outlets more often than the ones who are emotionally stable. The facts remain that electronic outlets give room for contemplation, careful selection, and control when sending out information in the communication of which the neurotic individuals prefer to have when communicating. It’s the person’s personality that makes up that influence. It’s the driving force and the motive. It’s no different when it comes to the implementation whether physical or abstract are put into place it’s their personality that will determine how they respond to the stimulus, just like these relatively new social media sites (McKenna. Katelyn Y A and Bargh, 2000). It came to prove that different persons with different personality always use the social media with various but particular reason. Thus, these demonstrate that when we look at the personality of individuals from these angles and perspective, it can be used to predict the use of social media as it continues to grow and influence our day to day lives and activities. In conclusion, this paper looked at the critical and significant researches that have been done on personality traits. The various personality traits that have been discussed, mostly the extrovert and the introvert personality together with the five personality. The personalities include; emotional stability, characterized by anxiousness, sensitivity, being moody, or being easily pushed to negative emotions. It is worth noting that cooperativeness, being helpful is characterized by agreeableness, nurturing, optimistic and trusting others. On the other hand; openness to new experiences is characterized by intelligence, curiosity imaginativeness being sophisticated and artistic, and conscientiousness (Vul et al., 2009). These broad character traits have been used to distinguish the use of social media and also show how the personality traits of individuals can be used to predict the use of social media. Different personality have different use of the social media network hence making it easy to predict how the use of social media through personality. In examples of social media used is Facebook. These have shown a greater effect (Vul et al., 2009). There is a significant requirement for further consultation and study to improve on the previous research and better their findings full proof. Throughout the paper, there have been shortcomings like on previous studies the time wasn’t sufficient to collect and outsource all the information needed thus using the available resources of college students to represent the greater good of humankind. Another shortcoming is that most of the work have relied on personal reports that were self-biased since some were an accurate reflection of the writer’s outbound social behavior. Sufficient amount of time has to be taken and should be precise for the dedication to this research that is being done. A wider range of individuals can be used in the research at least to give a broader scope of the general population not only the student’s personality traits. Further researches to be done should use other alternatives to gather the required information that is much reliable and more so independent that will be utilized in the case study and more research (Goldberg et al., 2006). It should cross over different age groups and demographics. The goal of this paper was to verify if personality trait can be used to predict the use of social media. Taking this objective into perspective, the conclusive information that came up was that the use of social media can be predicted using personality trait after keenly using various personality traits and identified the pattern of the use of social media. Much still has remained to be uncovered as the growth of social media becomes vast and increasingly being technical. This current study will contribute to a greater good in the society, thus selecting a particular case study group that could be beneficial and qualitative on cumulative accounts. Hoping this will be a pillar of future investigation and lay the foundation for further investigation into the issue being studied and also other related fields of study. It’s with great concern that it should be noted that these and gives appreciation to the deserved fields, and work researchers have done. References Barrick, M. R., & Mount, M. K. (1991). The big five personality dimensions and job performance: a meta‐analysis. Personnel psychology, 44(1), 1-26. Cain, N. M., Pincus, A. L., & Ansell, E. B. (2008). Narcissism at the crossroads: Phenotypic description of pathological narcissism across clinical theory, social/personality psychology, and psychiatric diagnosis. Clinical psychology review, 28(4), 638-656. Frazier, P. A., Tix, A. P., & Barron, K. E. (2004). Testing moderator and mediator effects in counseling psychology research. Journal of counseling psychology, 51(1), 115. Goldberg, L. R., Johnson, J. A., Eber, H. W., Hogan, R., Ashton, M. C., Cloninger, C. R., & Gough, H. 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