Understanding the Psychology Behind Social Media Likes

Instagram, Facebook, and other apps have implemented themselves into the daily rhythm and even created new workplaces. Why are these social media apps are so overtaking, and why do people count their Instagram likes per month like crazy? We will highlight the reasons for that to you.

How Your Brain Feels

By now the scientists proved, that social media triggers the same center in our brain, that is responsible for rewards. In other words, the center of pleasure. Every time you see a bigger number of likes, your brain initiates the huge increase of the hormone called dopamine. It is commonly known as a hormone of happiness.

Remember that feeling when you eat chocolate, kiss your beloved one, drink a fine cocktail, or smell your favorite aroma? That’s what dopamine does. It gives you these chills. Sometimes more, sometimes less, as we are all unique beings. Likes on social media are giving you that feeling as well. Many people are easily addicted to dopamine stimulation, and becoming an Instagram celebrity is one of the methods to get yourself a constant injection of this hormone to your brain.

It is not bad or good. It’s just how the human organism works. But it is important to keep yourself calm about likes, number of followers, comments, and reposts, and here’s why. The pleasure center of our brain, which is stimulated by dopamine, is quite a narcissistic fella. It always tries to force the organism for getting more and more of this hormone.

To illustrate the case, here is a short recap of the experiment, which was held to explore the pleasure center and its power. A group of rats had implantation of special electrodes to their heads. These electrodes were connected to the special lever inside their cage. By pushing the lever, rats were triggering the pleasure center of their brains, and thus they had a dose of dopamine.

Within a short time, rats became addicted to the process and eventually abandoned food, water, procreating, nursing their newborn pups, and any other activity except pushing the lever. They could push it up to seven thousand times a day. The lever was replacing the whole world to them. The animals had to be disconnected from the electrodes to prevent their death from starvation. That is what this hormone is capable of.

It is a terrible power, and humans, thankfully, have a more complicated neuro system than rats. But still, the addiction to social media activity can cause serious problems with mental health. Of course, you probably won’t forget about food and water, but your life will be affected.

FOMO

FOMO stands for the Fear Of Missing Out. This newly discovered psychological problem is caused entirely by social media. It’s based on anxiety and the basic pattern of social behavior. People are social animals, so communication and interaction in real life are very important for maintaining a normal mental state.

That statement is true even to introverts – they just need a lesser amount of it. The problem that can seriously affect the whole life of a person is the possibility of the social network to substitute real-life communication with virtual.

FOMO is developed when a person is concerned with other people’s virtual life and his or her own participation in it much more than about the real-life experience. Likes in this kind of situation are serving as a silent sign of presence online. Sometimes this action becomes automatic – opening the app and there you go tapping, tapping, tapping without even concentrating the attention on the content.

This happens because of the tendency of people to reveal the maximum of their life. Lifestyle bloggers are usually producing content constantly, especially on platforms like Instagram or Snapchat. So their followers can become dependent on consuming this content and are afraid to lose it. The consequences that may occur due to FOMO are:

— Preferring virtual communication before real-time.

— Losing the wish to go outdoors and meet friends and family.

— Constant checking the device to see if there is anything new on the feed, even if being in the middle of the conversation.

— Feeling anxiety and fear before meeting someone offline.

Likes On Social Media And Self-Esteem

The positive side of getting many likes is that they make you feel joy and happiness. This is approval and support to your ideas, thoughts and events in your life. Remember, what does the absolute majority of people post on their social profiles?

That would be selfies and sunrises from a foreign country, wedding and marriage, children, cooking, sports, pets, work, hobbies… The list is endless, but the key characteristic that unites all these is a simple fact: all these things are your accomplishments. Something that you are proud of. And no wonder that people share things they cherish about their life the most.

So getting likes is a friendly pat on the back from your friends, family, and colleagues. This helps people to feel that they are doing something significant and approved by society. And as we know, people are social animals so they need to get the positive reaction of society to feel pleased.

However, there is a darker side to it. Internet celebrities often set the trends of living, that are not reachable for most of their followers. Spending months in Bali or in Thailand, visiting fancy restaurants almost every day, buying luxurious branded clothes, living in big apartments or houses…This is a refined, ideal picture of what a life should be.

People often forget that you can easily manage your profile photos, stories, etc., to make it look perfect. But it is not always true. No one of these bloggers won’t ever show you, how they really live, because it will not get the result they want.

But for their followers, the result can be astonishingly worse. People tend to compare themselves to others, so watching the perfect images from ll over the internet can cause severe depression, eating disorders, and decreasing of self-esteem.

By 2020, we can say that social media try to fight this toxic tendency, but it is hard to overrun the human nature. Celebrities are dictating what you should wear, what you should eat, and what size you have to be. This is not normal, but it is happening.

Conclusion

Fortunately, all the social platforms have equal opportunities for everyone. And nowadays different organizations and groups are standing against unrealistic standards of living and looks. Body positive community, for instance, promotes a healthy attitude towards your body, because size and condition is not important at all. All people are different, and that diversity is what we need to cherish.

Social media sites and apps are here to help people to express themselves and get appreciation and support that you need. So it is very important to keep the internet presence polite and friendly. The world is moving towards changes. And social platforms should not be a place for bullying, hatred, or violence.

Another positive feature of likes is that they are helping your voice to be heard and your talent seen. Many problems of the world could stay a secret, if we wouldn’t have social platforms. For example, in the latest events in Belarus, many hideous things that occurred to protesting people, would be unknown. But the protestants used social media to be heard.

To show their tragedy and fight to the world. What will happen next, remains to be seen. But the very fact that the average people who were hurt by their government, could share their story freely and get support and help, is amazing.

The power of social media likes is enormous. But remember that you have to think carefully and analyze why are you hitting the little heart-shaped symbol. Well, unless this is a photo of a flower your mom had posted.