Not-So-Social Media: The Distortion of Friendship through Social Media

By Brinna Mulligan

With the rapid rise of social media, friendships have become hybridized between offline and online interactions via social media. In light of the importance of friendships to the social and moral development of youth, it is imperative to understand the effects of social media use on friendships. This paper aims to answer the question: how does social media affect users’ understanding of friendship? More specifically, this paper seeks to build an understanding of friendship according to Aristotle’s definition in the Nicomachean Ethics and to demonstrate how social media negatively distorts this definition of friendship by framing friendships as mere transactions.

Within the past thirty years, social media has become an integral part of life around the globe, transforming the way people work and live.1 In America, social media use increased dramatically in just fifteen years: while only 5% of adults actively used social media in 2005, by 2020, 72% of adults used social media.2 Most important, the increased use of social media has transformed friendships.3 With the development and integration of social media, friendships have become hybridized, allowing friends to communicate not only in person but also through a screen.4 This shift has revolutionized the ability to connect with people: Facebook has become a “full-fledged friendship lifeline.” Instagram allows users to share their lives, follow friends and influencers, and browse tailored content; Snapchat lets users connect with friends through fleeting pictures, videos, and chats.5 However, with the ease of technology, there are also unintended consequences that can distort the way users approach friendship. Social media itself warps the meaning of friendship by teaching users that friendship is transactional. By clarifying the definition of friendship and minimizing the ways that social media platforms can distort that definition, one can encourage a healthy understanding of friendship and promote the use of social media as a helpful tool, rather than a detriment to friendships.

First, it is necessary to understand what friendship is. Drawing from Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics, friendship is a mutually recognized goodwill between two people “in the respect in which they love each other.”6 That complex definition, however, can be more simply broken down into three necessary qualities of friendship: first, “mutually recognized” can simply be referred to as reciprocity; second, “goodwill” (i.e., engagement with another in which one wills the other’s good) involves active choice; and finally, “in the respect in which they love each other” can be referred to as “for the sake of.”7 The third quality of friendship– “for the sake of”–must be understood as the reason for which two people have been joined in friendship. Aristotle offers virtue (i.e., for the sake of the friend himself), pleasure (i.e., for the sake of enjoyable gain), and utility (i.e., for the sake of useful gain) as reasons for friendship.8 Friendships of pleasure and utility are transactional friendships; friends in these relationships expect a return of equal or greater value for what they give, and friendships can dissolve the moment the perceived utility or pleasure ceases.9 These types of friendships are different from friendships of virtue, which exist not for gain, but for the appreciation of the good of the friend himself.10 In Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, Victor Frankenstein also offers valuable insight on the meaning of friendship: “[W]e are unfashioned creatures, but half made up, if one wiser, better, dearer than ourselves–such a friend ought to be–do not lend his aid to perfectionate our weak and faulty natures.”11 In other words, friendship should give each friend the opportunity to grow. The appreciation of virtue allows for each friend to work towards growth in virtue as the friendship itself grows and deepens.

In contrast with Aristotle’s definition of virtuous friendship, social media uses language that reduces the meaning of friendship, such as the term “friending,” or following, in which two social media accounts choose to receive updates from each other but hold no meaningful connection.12 The opposite of friending is unfriending, which means “to stop interacting online with another” by revoking their connection to one’s account. This term will later be compared to the termination of friendship in the offline world.13 Comparisons between friendship and friending, as well as friendship termination and unfriending, will be explored later in the paper.

Other definitions which must be explored are those relating to social media. Social media includes “any online resource that is designed to facilitate engagement between individuals.”14 This paper will specifically consider examples from the platforms of Instagram, Facebook, and Snapchat.15 This paper will also discuss “fear of missing out” (referred to as FoMO) and online social comparison. FoMO, according to a study conducted by Tandon et al., is the “[e]xperience of apprehension and concern by social media users that they may be disconnected or absent from an experience received and/or enjoyed by others, such as peers, family, or friends.” According to the same study, social media stalking is the “voyeuristic tendency of users to engage in persistent monitoring of others’ social media profiles and shared content to gather information without any malicious intent.” Online social comparison is “[t]he tendency of users to experience negative feelings while engaging in an increased comparison of themselves vis-a-vis others during social media use.”16

Social media allows friends to communicate outside space and time. The ability to communicate without being hindered by immediate proximity or availability is what makes social media such a valuable tool; however, it also leads to the distortion of friendships.17 Social media reduces the expression of all friendships–even friendships of virtue–to transactions. Communication over social media occurs in two ways: one, a person posts and another person responds to that post by liking or commenting; and two, instant messaging, in which one person sends a chat and the other responds with another chat.18 These types of interactions are characterized by three parts: first, initiation, such as through posting or sending a message; second, expectation, in which the initiator waits for a response to their post or message; and finally, response, in which the other person responds to the initiation by commenting or liking the post or replying with a message of their own.19 Interactions such as these are transactional because they involve the exchange of messages, posts, likes, or comments, with each initiation expecting a response of sufficient value.20 Social media transactions can express friendships for the sake of utility (e.g., share useful information, gain social status through likes, etc.), pleasure (e.g., exchange jokes, etc.), or virtue (e.g., offer comfort or words of encouragement, etc.), but ultimately the friendships are expressed transactionally. Although virtue is an element of messages exchanged over social media, it does not make sense to classify social media interactions as virtuous because all initiations ultimately demand a satisfactory response.21 For example, it is considered rude not to reply to a direct text over social media (i.e., transactional interactions require measurable return), but it is not considered rude to receive a gift without also giving a gift (i.e., virtuous interactions do not require measurable return).22 Social media is a tool, but it has a limited ability to express friendships.

While the nature of a friendship itself is ultimately not changed, the transactional expression of the friendship through social media can lead to misunderstandings, which increase anxiety among those involved. Social media interactions are more uncertain than offline interactions because they are outside space and time.23 Recall that social media interactions are characterized by initiation, expectation, and response.24 In-person interactions remove the hurdle of expectation, because a person’s presence makes their response immediately perceivable. Over social media, however, whether a response occurs depends on three factors: one, whether the receiver sees the message or post; two, whether the receiver is able to respond; or three, whether the receiver chooses to respond.25 The uncertainty of when and whether a response will come can lead to misunderstandings about ghosting or lack of caring.26 These misunderstandings are exacerbated by features on some social media platforms, such as Instagram and Snapchat, which display a user’s activity status and leave read receipts (i.e., viewable timestamps recording the time at which a message was last viewed). Aristotle explains that transactional friendships easily dissolve when perceived pleasure or utility ends; in the same way, social media can harm friendships because it forces them to be expressed transactionally, making them more likely to dissolve if the expectation for a response is not satisfied.27

The element of expectation present in social media interactions also makes terminating friendships easier through unfriending, blocking, or ghosting.28 Recall that there are three factors which determine whether a response occurs. The third factor, whether the receiver chooses to respond, is characteristic of three harmful methods of friendship termination over social media: unfriending, blocking, and ghosting.29 Before the advent of technology, friendships were based on proximity; ending friendships necessarily involved mutual understanding that the friendship was over due to confrontation, the natural dissolution of a transactional friendship, or relocation out of proximity.30 Avoiding someone was nearly impossible because one’s relationship had initially begun due to mutual physical proximity. Social media, however, has removed the constraint of proximity, because it allows interactions to occur outside space and time; friendships can begin and end with the click of a button, and mutual understanding is not required for a friendship to be ended.31 The one-sidedness of unfriending, blocking, or ghosting someone on social media is incredibly harmful to the meaning of friendship, because it solidifies the problematic view that friendships are merely transactional. These forms of friendship termination also avoid communication, which is necessary to the growth aspect of friendship.32 It is okay to end a friendship, but there should be mutual understanding that it is over–and why it ended–in order to avoid harmful misunderstandings, which can lead to the distortion of friendship.

Unfriending, blocking, and ghosting are especially problematic in friendships with “dissimilar aims” (i.e., friends are invested in the friendship for different reasons).33 Social media provides an environment for unknowingly fostering friendships with dissimilar aims; it is easy to begin interacting with anyone over social media for any reason at all, and people who interact in friendly ways over social media may have different reasons for wanting to befriend each other. Aristotle further explains that “[t]hose who are quick to treat each other in friendly ways wish to be friends, but are not friends, unless they are also lovable, and know this. For though the wish for friendship comes quickly, friendship does not.”34 For example, one person may believe that someone they interact with over social media views them in the manner of a virtuous friendship; if the other person actually views that friendship transactionally and chooses to quickly end it when it becomes tiresome by unfriending, blocking, or ghosting, they can harm the other’s understanding of friendship. While friendships with dissimilar aims are not inherently problematic, the ending of these friendships can be.

Another harmful aspect of social media is its competitive environment. Influencers compete for follower attention and following size; users compete for likes and social status; and friends are internally pitted against one another as negative emotions related to fear of missing out (FoMO), social media stalking, and online social comparison take over. FoMO, social media stalking, and online social comparison negatively affect friendships by turning friendships into sources of insecurity, convincing users that at any moment, they could be losing the unspoken social competition promoted by social media.35 Although social media platforms encourage beneficial interactions and community development, they can also harmfully teach users that friendships are innately competitive. While competition can be healthy, it often cannot coexist with mutual love, which is a key part of Aristotle’s definition of friendship.36 Competition solidifies the incorrect understanding that all friendships are merely transactional and reduces the meaning of friendship further by introducing selfishness; instead of wanting what is best for the other person, friends become jealous of the other’s good fortune, wanting good fortune of equal or greater value for themselves even at the other’s expense.37 This understanding of friendship is directly in conflict with Aristotle’s definition of friendship, which states that goodwill must exist between friends.38

Social media platforms such as Facebook and Snapchat also make the meaning of friendship more confusing by calling all followers “friends.” Followers are merely those who have chosen to receive updates from those they follow; they are different from friends in the sense that friends are recognized, active participants in the lives of another.39 By calling followers “friends,” social media teaches users that friendships include people who only passively interact with them rather than engaging in exclusively mutual, personal connections. The equivocation of non-friends and friends contributes to the issue of misvaluing friendships, which involves failing to correctly prioritize relationships based on their importance.40 For example, a person who misvalues friendships might fail to prioritize virtuous friendships over transactional friendships or to prioritize friends over non-friends. Treating a friend as comparatively less important than they are can make them feel unloved; this is problematic because love is necessary to friendship.41 A more extreme version of misvaluing friendships involves overexerting oneself in order to treat all relationships equally, socially fatiguing oneself.42

Social media’s contribution to the distortion of friendship has led to fewer friendships among Americans. In 2021, the American Survey Center compiled data from an American Perspectives survey to assess the state of friendship in America. The data was compiled more than one year after the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020, which had forced Americans to go online. The increased use of social media as a means of connecting with others during the pandemic makes the statistics directly relevant to understanding how social media changes the way friendship is viewed.43 The American Survey Center compares data from 2021 to data from 1990, before the introduction of social media in 1994.44 There were several notable negative changes which support the argument that social media is negatively impacting friendship. For example, the statistics show that “the number of close friendships that Americans have has declined.” In 2021, 12% of Americans reported having no close friendships compared to 3% in 1990. Only 13% of Americans reported having ten or more close friendships compared to 33% in 1990. The decline of close friendships since 1990, despite the widespread use of social media, suggests that social media is neither entirely beneficial nor sufficient for the development and maintenance of friendships, despite what some studies suggest. Furthermore, the survey also shows that “fewer Americans today have a ‘best friend.’” In 2021, only 59% reported having one person they considered a best friend compared to 75% in 1990. It was also noted that longevity of a friendship plays a role in having a best friend–those with childhood friends were found more likely to have a best friend. In 2021, 65% of Americans with a childhood friend reported having a best friend while only 47% without a childhood friend reported having a best friend. These statistics seem to be in conflict with the belief that social media is sufficient to maintain close childhood friendships.45 It is possible that the transactional expression of relationships over social media has hurt Americans’ ability to maintain friendships of virtue.

In order to avoid further distortion of the meaning of friendship through social media, platforms should make displaying activity status and read receipts optional to minimize misunderstandings which could arise from the expectation of a response. Instagram, for example, has made activity status an optional feature; however, read receipts are still permanent features on the platform. In place of activity status, social media platforms can introduce the option for users to display a “Do Not Disturb” status on their account. A “Do Not Disturb” feature would signal to other users when one is unavailable to respond, further minimizing misunderstandings related to expecting a response. Social media platforms can also introduce an ability to selectively allow notifications in-app, such as Facebook has done, making it possible for users to choose from which followers or influencers they receive notifications.46 A feature such as this could lessen FOMO and social comparison by minimizing the number of updates from other accounts which immediately reach a user. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, platforms should stop collectively referring to followers as “friends.” The assumption that all followers are friends is problematic, and it is necessary to minimize the association of friendship with the various non-friendship interactions which occur via social media.47

In conclusion, social media can damage the meaning of friendship among users by creating circumstances which reduce friendships to mere transactions. Friendships are invaluable for social and moral development, and thus the distortion of friendship as understood by social media users is worrisome. Social media has taken an integral role in modern-day life, and future generations will grow up with the constant influence of social media. If the way social media portrays friendship is left unchecked, the social and moral development of future generations may be at stake. Without the corrective influence of friendship, the youth of the future may destructively grow under the deception that they are perfect as they are.

ENDNOTES

1 Thomas Aichner et al., “Twenty-Five Years of Social Media: A Review of Social Media Applications and Definitions from 1994 to 2019,” Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking 24, no. 4 (April 9, 2021): 215-22, https://doi.org/10.1089/cyber.2020.0134, 1.

2 “Social Media Fact Sheet,” Pew Research Center: Internet, Science & Tech (Pew Research Center, April 7, 2021), https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/fact-sheet/social-media/.

3 Jacqueline Nesi, Sophia Choukas-Bradley, and Mitchell J. Prinstein, “Transformation of Adolescent Peer Relations in the Social Media Context: Part 1—A Theoretical Framework and Application to Dyadic Peer Relationships,” Clinical Child and Family Psychology Review 21, no. 3 (April 7, 2018): pp. 267-94, https://doi.org/10.1007/s10567-018-0261-x, 1.

4 Tiffany Patricini, Friendship and Technology: A Philosophical Approach to Computer-Mediated Communication (New York, NY: Routledge, 2022), https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003188810, 72.

5 Patricini, Friendship and Technology, 105.

6 Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, trans. Terence Irwin, 3rd ed. (Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Publishing Company, Inc., 2019), 143.

7 Patricini, Friendship and Technology, 15, 60, 110; Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 143, 169.

8 Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 143, 144.

9 Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 160, 166; Patricini, Friendship and Technology, 103.

10 Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 146, 151.

11 Mary Shelley, Frankenstein (New York: Penguin Books, 2003), 30.

12 Maria Bakardjieva, “Social Media and the McDonaldization of Friendship,” Communications 39, no. 4 (November 1, 2014), https://doi.org/10.1515/commun-2014-0017, 2, 3; Tiffany Patricini, Friendship and Technology, 9.

13 Michael Nycyk, Facebook: Exploring the Social Network and Its Challenges, version PDF (Brisbane, Australia: Michael Nycyk, 2020), https://www.academia.edu/43676571/Facebook_Exploring_the_Social_Network_and_its_Challenges, 19.

14 Thomas Aichner et al., “Twenty-Five Years of Social Media,” 219.

15 I am excluding video chatting via social media platforms from the discussion because I maintain that they are distinct forms of interaction. First, video chatting interactions are constrained by time in the sense that a person must be digitally present in order to interact. Social media interactions are not constrained by time. Second, video chatting involves a face-to-face conversation with a person, just as would occur offline; it just so happens that the conversation occurs digitally. In this sense, video chatting is not really mediated because the interaction is not affected by the social media app being used.

16 Anushree Tandon et al., “Dark Consequences of Social Media-Induced Fear of Missing out (FOMO): Social Media Stalking, Comparisons, and Fatigue,” Technological Forecasting and Social Change 171 (October 2021), https://doi.org/10.1016/j.techfore.2021.120931, 4.

17 Tiffany Patricini, Friendship and Technology, 17.

18 Anabel Quan-Haase and Alyson L. Young, “Uses and Gratifications of Social Media: A Comparison of Facebook and Instant Messaging,” Bulletin of Science, Technology & Society 30, no. 5 (September 14, 2010): 350-61, https://doi.org/10.1177/0270467610380009, 350.

19 Tiffany Patricini, Friendship and Technology, 50, 53; Jennifer Murphy, “Left on ‘Read’: Expectations and Perceptions of Response Time in Mobile Instant Messaging,” Institute of Art, Design & Technology Dun Laoghaire (dissertation, Research@THEA, 2018), https://research.thea.ie/bitstream/handle/20.500.12065/3780/Murphy%20J-2018-Left%20on%20%27read%27-Expectations%20and%20perceptions%20of%20response%20time%20in%20mobile%20instant....pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y, 25.

20 Patricini, Friendship and Technology, 76.

21 Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 160, 166; Tiffany Patricini, Friendship and Technology, 50.

22 Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 151, 160.

23 Patricini, Friendship and Technology, 17.

24 Ibid,, 53; Murphy, “Left on ‘Read,’” 25.

25 Murphy, “Left on ‘Read,’” 21, 24.

26 Ibid., 18.

27 Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 152; Patricini, Friendship and Technology, 106.

28 Ibid., 100, 108.

29 Murphy, “Left on ‘Read,’” 24.

30 Patricini, Friendship and Technology, 108.

31 Ibid., 17, 107.

32 Mary Shelley, Frankenstein, 30; Patricini, Friendship and Technology, 108.

33 Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 162.

34 Ibid., 145.

35 Anushree Tandon et al., “Dark Consequences of Social Media-Induced Fear of Missing out (FOMO): Social Media Stalking, Comparisons, and Fatigue,” Technological Forecasting and Social Change 171 (October 2021), https://doi.org/10.1016/j.techfore.2021.120931, 4.

36 Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 143.

37 Ibid., 173.

38 Tiffany Patricini, Friendship and Technology, 110; Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 143, 169.

39 Maria Bakardjieva, “Social Media and the McDonaldization of Friendship,” 2, 3; Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 143.

40 Giuseppe Riva, Brenda K. Wiederhold, and Pietro Cipresso, “1. Psychology Of Social Media: From Technology To Identity,” The Psychology of Social Networking Vol.1, 2015, pp. 4-14, https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110473780-003, 10, 12.

41 Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, 173.

42 Giuseppe Riva, Brenda K. Wiederhold, and Pietro Cipresso, “1. Psychology Of Social Media,” 10, 12.

43 Youngrong Lee et al., “Social Media Use and Mental Health during the COVID-19 Pandemic in Young Adults: A Meta-Analysis of 14 Cross-Sectional Studies,” BMC Public Health 22, no. 1 (May 17, 2022), https://doi.org/10.1186/s12889-022-13409-0, 1.

44 Thomas Aichner et al., “Twenty-Five Years of Social Media: A Review of Social Media Applications and Definitions from 1994 to 2019,” Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking 24, no. 4 (April 9, 2021): 215-22, https://doi.org/10.1089/cyber.2020.0134, 1.

45 Daniel A. Cox, Brent Orrell, and Karlyn Bowman, “The State of American Friendship: Change, Challenges, and Loss,” The Survey Center on American Life, June 7, 2021, https://www.americansurveycenter.org/research/the-state-of-american-friendship-change-challenges-and-loss/.

46 Michael Nycyk, Facebook, 16.

47 Giuseppe Riva, Brenda K. Wiederhold, and Pietro Cipresso, “1. Psychology Of Social Media,” 10, 12.

Report abuse