According to internal Facebook documents, the company’s researchers found that one-eighth of its users are addicted to using this app, which damages their sleep, work, relationships and parenting. Researchers estimate that these issues affect 12.5% of Facebook’s more than 2.9 billion users, which is equivalent to more than 360 million people.
In this document, the researchers stated that these findings are the result of users’ compulsive use of the application, which is commonly referred to as “Internet addiction.”
The study also said that people believe that Facebook’s user addiction is more serious than any other major social media platform.
This research on the possible harms of using social media to people’s daily lives was initiated a few years ago by a Facebook team focused on mitigating destructive behaviors. The team put forward a series of repair suggestions, although Facebook implemented some of these suggestions, but later closed the team in 2019. The team shared its findings in an internal report in March 2020.
The team found that some users “have no control over the time they spend on Facebook” and therefore have problems in their lives.
These problems include: when people stop completing tasks in their lives to frequently check Facebook, work efficiency will decrease; when they stay up late to use apps, they will suffer insomnia; when people use online time instead of spending time together, interpersonal relationships will deteriorate. In some cases, “parents pay more attention to Facebook than to take care of or communicate with their children.”
“I’m on Facebook every day, every moment, really every moment, only when I take a shower,” said a 22-year-old female user, “I lost the concept of time.”
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