Abstract
Previous studies
have shown that many differences exist between female and male Facebook users
among college students. These differences can be used to explore the
personality differences between females and males. Totally 167 surveys about
social media were taken in Texas Tech University between October 12, 2014 and
October 23, 2014. Based on the results of all the surveys, we analyzed the
personality differences between females and males in two aspects: neuroticism
and extraversion. Through analyzing the time spent on Facebook and frequency of
checking Facebook, we found males were more neurotic than females. By
investigating the participants’ activities on Facebook, we figured out that
males were more extraverted than females. From these two conclusions, we can
also deduce that people who have a strong sense of loneliness may not always
lack social activities.
Introduction
Social
media, as internet-based applications, were created for social interactions.
Through social networks people can establish or keep connections, share
information, and express feelings with friends. Emergence of tablet computers
and smart phones has led to more wide and frequent usage of social media in
modern society. Social media have become an indispensable part of our modern
life, especially for young people. Facebook is considered as one of the most
popular social media among college students in the United States (U.S.).
Approximately 94% of undergraduate students were reported to have Facebook
accounts with a 150-200 friends list (Ellison et al., 2007). Stern and Taylor
(2007) stated 96% out of 364 college students spend 10 to 60 minutes every day
on Facebook. Consequently, Facebook provides a huge amount of information for
social media research.
Literature
review
Many
studies have proved that men and women are more different than alike in
personality characteristics (Rettner, 2012; Costa Jr et al., 2001; Collins,
2012; Del Giudice et al., 2012). Collins (2012) found females were more
sensitivity, warmth, and apprehension than males through analyzing a survey of
10,000 people. Rettner (2012) utilized 15 personality scales, such as warmth,
sensitivity, and perfectionism, to test personality differences between men and
women. The results showed very large differences between sexes. Previous
studies have also indicated that social media could be used as an effective
tool to investigate personality differences between young female and male users
(Orchard et al., 2014; Amichai-Hamburger, 2002; Amichai-Hamburger et al., 2010;
Correa et al, 2010). Facebook, as one of the most popular social media, is
widely used to explore personality differences (Ross et al., 2009; Ellison et
al., 2007). Personality differences can be reflected from the number of
Facebook friends, Facebook profile design, the time spent on Facebook,
frequency of posting pictures and sharing links, and ways of expressing
feelings. As we mentioned above, personality is identified from many aspects,
such as warmth, sensitivity, perfectionism, apprehension. In general, the most
universally accepted model to describe personality features was created by
McCrae in 1992. McCrae (1992) invented a Five-Factor Model (FFM) to describe
personality in five aspects: neuroticism, extraversion, openness to experience,
agreeableness, and conscientiousness. Neuroticism is a reflection of people’s
distress and sensitivity extents. Butt and Phillips (2008) and Wolfradt and
Doll (2001) indicated people at high level of neuroticism spent more time on
internet communication to alleviate loneliness. In this case, neuroticism
difference between males and females can be detected by the frequency of
checking Facebook and the time spent on Facebook. Extraversion is a reflection
of people’s sociable ability (Ross et al., 2009). Consequently, the number of
friends on Facebook accounts and the amount of sharing personal information,
such as posting personal, family, or friends’ photos, are indexes to measure
the extraversion level. In this study, a survey of 160 participants in Texas
Tech University will be taken to explore their basic Facebook account
information and activities on Facebook. Based on these data, I will focus on
analyzing two aspects of personality differences (neuroticism and extraversion)
between male and female college students.
Research
question
What personality
differences can be detected by comparing males and females’ activities on Facebook?
Hypothesis
Females are at a relatively
higher level of neuroticism and extraversion than males by analyzing their
activities on Facebook.
Data
and Methods
To
collect data about social media, 167 surveys were taken in Texas Tech
University between October 12, 2014 and October 23, 2014. Texas Tech University
is a public research university located in Lubbock, Texas. It is the sixth largest
university in Texas, and is the largest institution of higher education in west
Texas. The current enrollment is about 33,111, including approximately 93% of Americans
and 7% of international students. Most of the students come from Texas (85.17%)
and some are from New Mexico, California, Oklahoma, Colorado, and Kansas.
During the past 85 years, the university has granted 173,551 bachelor degrees,
34,541 master degrees, 5,906 doctoral degrees, and 7,092 law degrees (Student
Wellness Center, 2014).
The
questions of this survey were created by Thomas Leverett, who teaches Advanced
Writing for International Students (ESL 5301 in fall, 2014). The survey had two
versions: online (Google Forms) version and paper version (one sheet and double
sides). The online version was made by Shabboo Valipoor in Cincinnati, Ohio. Thomas
Leverett, two teaching assistants, and seven students in this class were in
charge of sending out these surveys. Each person was required to find at least
ten Texas Tech undergraduate or graduate students from the United States (U.S.)
including five females and five males. If some participants filled out the
survey but they were found to be not students or they were international
students, their surveys should be put in another pile. Additionally, everyone
needed to ask five more people to complete the surveys. These five persons
could be students, faculty members, friends, close friends, or surveyors
themselves. When they took the surveys, surveyors should not give any advice or
suggestions to fill them out. For example, it generally does not say whether to
check one or check multiple answers. All the answers depend on the participants
themselves. If someone left something blank surveyors should not put any
pressure on them, unless they forgot to fill out the back, in which case they
could get a gentle reminder. If someone was angry about taking the survey or
didn’t feel comfortable about the questions, surveyors should apologize and
back down. If someone would like to share something about the survey questions,
surveyors should listen carefully, patiently, and keep track. If someone was
curious about the reason for doing the survey surveyors should explain it in
detail. One important thing is that all participants should be told the results
would be uploaded online anonymously and not have statistical significance.
Most
of the participants were very glad to take these questionnaires and felt
interested. Some interesting stories happened when taking these surveys. Thamas
Leverett said one woman said, “Facebook is the devil” and felt she was forced
to tweet in a literary criticism class. Feixiong said his friends shared a
personal story with him. His friend met a girl through a social media website.
After communicating with each other they established a relationship and finally
got married. From this story we cannot deny the power of social media. Some
students talked much about the feelings when they took ice bucket challenge.
Ying said that a boy described how he would rather have for all diseases and
autoimmune disorder and another boy said he had killed a few when he dumped a
bucket of ice water onto his head. A student from Shabboo Valipoor’s department
even hated the ice bucket challenge. Some participants said they only texted at
stop signs while driving, so there might be one more answer to question 2.
Additionally, a few students said they did not care about the “real name”
policy of Facebook, so they wrote comments like “neutral” for question 7.
Totally
167 survey questionnaires were returned, including 152 paper versions and 15
online versions. As we counted these surveys we figured out two major issues.
Fifteen participants failed to check whether they were undergraduate students,
graduate students, or other occupations, or where they were from, international
or not. In this case, these 15 surveys were excluded. Thus, we obtained 152
surveys in total as original data for our social media study.
Results
Ten
surveyors were in charge of collecting our questionnaires. They were T.
Leverett, who created the survey, M. Gries, R. Branch, Y. Liu, F. Luo, K. Aric,
S. Kaleli, C. Rios-Blanco, who also organized the results of the survey, F. Almutlaq,
and S. Valipoor, who made the online version of the survey. Totally 167
questionnaires were returned, and 15 were excluded due to lack of certain
information. After summarizing, 80 females and 72 males participated in this
survey. The numbers of females and males maintained a balance, which was
reasonable for our research on the differences between females and males in
using social media. To keep a balance in age, 59 graduate students (older than
24 years old) and 85 undergraduate students (younger than 24 years old) were
included. There were also 8 participants who were teaching assistants, faculty
members, friends, or close friends with the surveyors. Six of the surveyors
were international students, which provided a good opportunity to take surveys
among international students. In total, 32 international students who came from
at least four foreign countries were involved in the survey. Figure 1 shows the
general information about the participants’ gender, educational level, and
citizenship (American or international).
The
usages of the top nine types of social media (Facebook, Twitter, YouTube,
Instagram, Pinterest, Snapchat, Ello, Vine, and Google+) were investigated in
this survey (Figure 2).
Figure
2 indicates that Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube are the most popular social
media. Before the survey was taken it was assumed that Facebook was becoming
less popular than Twitter. Unexpectedly, the results show Facebook owns more
users than Twitter. Figure 2 shows 93.4% and 66.4% of the participants had
Facebook and Twitter accounts respectively. Moreover, people posted information
on Facebook more frequently than they did on Twitter. The percentage of people
who posted information occasionally and regularly on Facebook was 13.15% higher
than that on Twitter. Although people
did not post information on YouTube as frequently as they did on Facebook and
Twitter, 81.6% of the participants had YouTube accounts. In contrast, few
people knew about Pinterest, Ello, and Vine.
Females
and males have different attitudes towards social media. In this survey, we
investigated whether females and males had different opinions on social media’s
impact on their friendships (Figure 3). Most people thought social media had no
good or bad influence on their friendships. However, males had more positive
attitudes than females. Approximately 34.72% of males indicated social media
totally benefitted their friendships overall, which was 14.72% more than
females. Almost the same proportions of females and males thought social media
affected their friendships badly.
Since
relationship status is relatively private, some people do not like to publish news
about their relationships on their social media accounts. Females and males
also report differently on publishing relationships. Figure 4 implies that
males are more likely to share their relationship status with others. Moreover,
a higher percentage of females (11.25%) publish their relationships only under
pressure, which is about 7% higher than that of males.
Figure
5 displays the general information of female and male participants on Facebook,
such as whether they have Facebook accounts, the frequency of posting. The
results indicate more females than males said they had Facebook accounts.
However, a higher percentage of males than females said they posted information
regularly.
Table
1 below shows differences between females and males on the time spent on Facebook,
frequency of checking Facebook, and the usage change on Facebook. A majority of
females (61.25%) said they spent less than half an hour on Facebook every day.
About 76.06% of males reported that it cost them less than an hour on Facebook
every day. Among these male participants half of them said they spent less than
30 minutes on Facebook per day and the other half of them played with Facebook
between 30 and 60 minutes per day. The percentage of female Facebook users who
stated that they spent more than an hour on Facebook is 5.19% lower than that
of male Facebook users. It is approximately 19.71% of males said they spent about
60 to 90 minutes on Facebook every day, which is 7.20% higher than female
Facebook users. Yet, female Facebook users who extremely like hanging out on
Facebook are more than male Facebook users. The result shows the difference of
the frequency of checking Facebook accounts between male and females users is
almost similar with the result of time spent on Facebook. A majority of females
check their Facebook accounts less than three times per day. Most males check
their Facebook accounts between four times and seven times every day. The
percentages of females who said they checked their Facebook account between
four and seven times a day and between eight times and twelve times a day are 18.19%
and 1.39% lower than those of males respectively. While the percentage of
females who said they checked Facebook account more than twelve time is a
little bit higher than that of males. Table 1 also shows that fewer and fewer
people use Facebook. Approximately half of the participants said they used
Facebook less than before.
Although
females said they checked their Facebook relatively less than males, they love
to check their social media before going to bed. Figure 6 shows that 60% of females
often use social media before sleeping while only 5.63% males do the same
thing. A majority of males rarely check their social media before sleeping.
Female
and male users have great differences on their Facebook activities. Table 2
displays the percentages of females and males’ seven main activities on
Facebook. Apparently, males like posting pictures, sharing feelings, and
messaging with old friends on Facebook better than females. Neither females nor
males like using apps or hashtags on Facebook.
Also
when people visit their Facebook account, females and males are concerned with
different contents. Table 3 indicates that males have more interaction with
their family and are more interested in politics.
Discussion
The
usages of the top nine social media (Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram,
Pinterest, Snapchat, Ello, Vine, and Google+) were investigated in this survey.
Approximately 93.4% and 66.4% of the participants use Facebook and Twitter
respectively (Figure 2). Facebook and Twitter are the most two most popular
social media among college students, which is the same as our expectations.
Many research studies have proved that young people spend more time on
smartphones than traditional computers (Halleck, 2014). Consequently, it was
assumed that the usage of Twitter was increasing and Facebook was decreasing. However,
figure 2 indicates Facebook is still more popular than Twitter, which was unexpected.
There are some possible reasons. For example, the instant messaging feature of
Facebook was allowed users to chat with certain friends instantly and
conveniently. Although Twitter can be used to chat, every tweet is limited to
within 140 characters, which is not as user-friendly as Facebook. Additionally,
Facebook has more entertainment apps, which
helps people to kill time.
Figure
2 also shows an interesting thing, that although Google+ has the second largest
number of registered users, the users seldom post through Google+. The large
number of registered users could be due to Google’ E-mail (Gmail), which is the
most popular E-mail in the United States and even in the world (Rosenfeld,
2014). In most cases, when people register for Gmail they automatically have
Google+ accounts. Yet, the complexity of posting photos and information on
Google+ may frustrate its users. Before posting users need to find connections
to add to circles, add suggestions and friends to circles, and then post to
specific people by choosing certain circles.
Ello
and Vine are much less popular among all the social media. The major reason may
be that they are newly developed. Ello was created by Paul Budnitz and Todd Berger
in March, 2014 and Vine was founded two years earlier than Ello (McKinney,
2014; Langer, 2013). Compared with Facebook and Twitter, Ello and Vine are too
young. Thus, it is reasonable that they have the smallest numbers of users.
Additionally, YouTube has more registered users who post less because most
people just enjoy watching videos from it.
From
figure 2 it is apparent that Facebook is the mainstream medium in social
networks, so in this study we attempt to investigate personality differences
between female and male college students through their Facebook activities from
two aspects: neuroticism and extraversion. Previous studies indicated people
who spent more time on Facebook and checked Facebook more frequently were much
more neurotic, because online communication was an effective way to alleviate
loneliness. For example, when I had just come to the United States from China I
spent a lot of time online, because I did not have any friends here and felt
seriously alone. I messaged to my friends and my parents in China, checked my
social media account frequently to look at their status updates, and played
games developed by social media. Nearly every night the last thing I did before
sleeping was checking my social media account, and I messaged my parents to say
“good night”. Social media helped me kill time and reduced my loneliness.
Additionally, neuroticism can reflect people’s sensitivity extent (McCrae,
1992). Sensitive people sometimes like to chat with friends online by texting
and do not like face-to-face talking. For example, when my husband does
something that impresses me a lot I always message him through Facebook to
express my gratefulness instead of directly saying my thankfulness. Similarly,
we only say we love each other is by messaging. Thus, people with higher level
of neuroticism tend to spend more time on social media and check their social media
account more frequently.
Table
1 shows male Facebook users spend relatively more time on Facebook every day. More
than half of female users spent less than half an hour on Facebook. The
percentage of males who spend more than half an hour on Facebook every day is
21.81% higher than that of females. It is obvious in table 1 that males check
their Facebook accounts more frequently than females. The percentages of males
who check their Facebook accounts more than 4 times and 8 times per day are
18.19% and 1.39% higher than those of females. In table 2, it shows males use
Facebook apps more than females. Consequently, male college students are more
neuroticism than female college students. Unexpectedly, figure 6 shows females
like to check Facebook accounts many more times than males. These results are
opposite of my hypothesis that females are more neurotic than males. I think
one reason may be that some females didn’t tell the truth when they took our
surveys, because some people don’t like to admit that they are neurotic. Pedersen
(2014) stated that romantic relationships could stabilize neurotic people, so another
possible reason might be that most female participants had already had stable
relationships or been married.
Ross
et al. (2009) stated that extraversion is a reflection of people’s sociable
ability. People’s activities, such as posting photos, sharing feelings, and
connecting with public figures on social media, can imply their extraversion
levels. For example, when I join parties with my friends on weekends I am used
to taking funny photos and posting these photos on my social media account
later. Thus, people who post photos more frequently usually have more social
activities. Table 2 shows male college students post photos on their Facebook
more frequently than females. The percentages of males who “sometimes”,
“often”, and “usually” post photos on Facebook are 6.1%, 3.7%, and 8.6% higher
than those of females respectively. Table 3 indicates males are more concerned
with photos posted by their friends. Communications with friends through social
media reflect not only people’s neuroticism level but also their frequency of
social activities. In the survey, people were asked the frequency of connecting
with old friends and messaging people. The results show males are more likely
to communicate with friends on Facebook. From these points, male college
students are more social than female college students.
The
major finding of this survey is that male college students are at a higher
level of neuroticism and extraversion than female college students. An
interesting thing can be deduced, which is that people who feel much lonelier
are not always lacking social activities. Feeling lonely sometimes is a vital
reason that people like to attend and organize social activities, such as
parties.
There
are also some limitations in our study. The most important one was that the
number of our participants in the survey was not statistically enough. If we
can get funding in the future we can have more samples and the further study
will be conducted. Additionally, a few places of our survey should be revised
and reedited. For example, when people were asked their activity of posting
pictures on Facebook they used “never”, “rarely”, “sometimes”, “often”, or
“usually” to describe the frequency. This is not very accurate, because people
have different definitions of these frequency concepts. For example, I think
posting pictures more than five times should be defined as “usually”, but my
husband insists more than five times should be just “often”. Thus, if we used
total number of times to describe the frequency of posting in the survey it would
be better. Also, the first line of our survey should be separated into three
individual parts. In this case, participants will not ignore checking their
education level, sex, or whether they are from America or are international.
Conclusion
Based on the survey results, we analyzed the personality
differences between female and male college students. We compared the time
spent on Facebook and the frequency of checking Facebook between females and
males to detect their neuroticism differences. The result was unexpected, that
male college students were much more neurotic than females. Two possible
reasons were figured out. One was that some participants might tell lies
because they did not want to admit neuroticism. The other reason was that most
female participants might have stable relationships or be married, which made
them less neurotic. According to the participants’ major activities on
Facebook, we explored the extraversion differences between females and males.
The results showed that males were more extraverted and more likely to attend
social activities. Consequently, male college students are more neurotic and
extraverted than females. According to this point we can deduce that people who
have a strong sense of loneliness may not always lack of social activities.
Charts
tables and graphs
Female
|
Male
|
||
Time spent on Facebook every day
|
0-30min
|
61.25%
|
39.44%
|
30-60min
|
20%
|
36.62%
|
|
60-90min
|
12.5%
|
19.71%
|
|
>90min
|
6.25%
|
4.23%
|
|
Frequency of checking Facebook account
|
0-3
|
52.5%
|
34.72%
|
4-7
|
26.25%
|
44.44%
|
|
8-12
|
12.5%
|
13.89%
|
|
>12
|
8.75%
|
6.94%
|
|
Usage change on Facebook
|
Use
it more
|
8.75%
|
16.67%
|
Use
it less
|
43.75%
|
43.06%
|
|
The
same
|
32.5%
|
33.33%
|
|
Never
use
|
15%
|
6.94%
|
Table 1. Females and males’ time spent on Facebook,
frequency to check Facebook, and the usage change on Facebook.
Facebook
Activity
|
||||||||||
Never
|
Rarely
|
Sometimes
|
Often
|
Usually
|
||||||
F
|
M
|
F
|
M
|
F
|
M
|
F
|
M
|
F
|
M
|
|
Post pictures
|
15.8%
|
5.6%
|
27.6%
|
16.7%
|
34.2%
|
40.3%
|
17.1%
|
20.8%
|
5.3%
|
13.9%
|
Share feelings
|
46.1%
|
27.8%
|
28.9%
|
38.9%
|
22.4%
|
19.4%
|
2.6%
|
8.3%
|
0
|
1.4%
|
Connect with old friends
|
13.2%
|
5.6%
|
28.9%
|
16.9%
|
40.8%
|
39.4%
|
13.2%
|
13.9%
|
3.9%
|
11.2%
|
Use apps
|
77.6%
|
64.8%
|
17.1%
|
23.9%
|
2.6%
|
4.2%
|
1.3%
|
1.4%
|
1.3%
|
1.4%
|
Connect to public figures
|
60%
|
41.7%
|
24%
|
33.3%
|
10.7%
|
15.3%
|
4%
|
1.4%
|
1.3%
|
1.4%
|
Message people
|
17.3%
|
4.2%
|
26.7%
|
20.8%
|
37.3%
|
31.9%
|
10.7%
|
16.7%
|
8%
|
16.7%
|
Use hashtags
|
63.2%
|
63.9%
|
21.1%
|
19.4%
|
9.2%
|
9.7%
|
6.6%
|
1.4%
|
0
|
1.4%
|
Friends’ photos
|
Friends’ status updates
|
Family interaction
|
Professional development
|
Politics
|
|
Female
|
81.25%
|
67.5%
|
47.5%
|
33.75%
|
13.75%
|
Male
|
86.11%
|
75%
|
55.56%
|
33.33%
|
19.44%
|
Table 3. The types of information people care about
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(YL)
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