Facebook Psychology Question

What is the psychological effect of Facebook?

That is dependant on the type interaction and which brain hemisphere we are using, if the interaction puts stress/pressure on us it can stimulate the faulty right anxious/negative brain, if we already have high right brain use we will seek out short term anxiety relief and those with negative/harmful thought and feeling can do much damage.I practice EGMi maximising use of the left logical/positive brain with a feeling of oneness, facebook can be a great tool to spread goodness/brain energy efficiency and new practices increase this.

Internet Psychology and Sociology: What are the consequences of having a limited Facebook profile?

I will provide a fairly parsimonious answer.  By not having a Facebook profile you limit yourself in two ways:People who have a Facebook profile get more opportunities to develop their identities.  Those who chose not to have a Facebook profile simply lose this ability.  All of us have a desire to show ourselves to the world on our terms.  Facebook and other social applications give you this ability.  Having an opportunity to accentuate our positives can be pleasing to all of us (e.g. you are a voracious reader and so you show all of the books you've read in a Kindle App).  Or, getting the opportunity to present oneself to the world in ways that you see fit is also something that is of benefit to us (e.g. you see yourself as cosmopolitan, and so you join groups that discuss travel, and you put pictures of places you have been on your profile). People who have a Facebook profile get to develop more weak ties.  There is strong empirical evidence that shows that people who use social networks develop more connections with casual acquaintances.  These weak ties can turn into access to jobs, opportunities, or just cool info.  In some cases, those weak ties can turn into close friendships.

Can you use Facebook as a tool for psychology?

Yes you can. You can use facebook for learning a bit about how people think, reading their page. It's not a foolproof method, or even perhaps a very accurate one, but on larger scales it could be a very useful diagnostic tool. And, it can be used for controlling your own mood, or other peoples' mood if you talk to them a lot on facebook; for a while, Facebook regulated posts people saw to make them either contain more negative or more positive words. People who saw more negative posts created more negative ones themselves (based on a lot of keywords they used). People who saw more happy posts created more happy or neutral ones.Also, you can follow lots of psychology pages and read about psychology news on facebook

What are the psychological differences between Facebook friends and Twitter followers?

You pretty much answered your own question in the question details.I'm not sure the rather complex insight you're looking for here exists.Psychologically, Twitter is slightly more EGO ORIENTED because it let's you see the n° of followers you have and n° of people you follow. Twitter like FB also has another measure of popularity which is favorites, retweets and comments left, like FB has likes, shares and comments.The higher this ratio (followers/following) is, the higher the ego in a way that the user feels like he's famous or smart/interesting and has way more followers than people he follows.The lower that ratio is, the more you feel Twitter sucks and few people you've followed think you're interesting enought to be followed by them.Another differene in psychology is that, Twitter tends to be more formal and FB rather informal simply because the people you follow on Twitter aren't your friends and language isn't the same.The problem I often see nowadays, which explains why FB limits n° of friends to 5000, is that popular teenagers and especially girls tend to accept almost anyone to their FB friends list and I've seen some girls that can't add more friends because they've reached 5000. Those ego driven people don't seem to get that FB isn't the place for that, but Instagram and Twitter is a place where you can have millions of followers leaving you thousands of favorites and comments to make someone feel special but FB isn't a "CELEBRITY" ONE TO ALL TYPE OF SOCIAL NETWORK COMMUNICATION (profiles not pages or groups)Last but not least, in general if a stranger follows you on Twitter and you're not famous, it's probably because he/she liked what you tweeted on a particular subject (hashtags used) and they want to get more news from you on this subject which is quite different from FB, where your followers basically want see what you look like or do but on twitter, following someone is more of an intellectual/knowledge sharing thing than on FB.

Is there any psychological significance to Facebook covers?

Psychology is the study of the human mind and the way it works, and how the mind's functions affect behaviour in a specific context.  If our given specific context is "select Facebook cover", then I think the answer to your question must be "yes".  A user's cover picture is their choice of how they want to represent themselves to their audience.Exactly what drives some people to make the odd, quirky and, in some cases, down right foolish choices that they do would certainly make an interesting psychological study.

Psychology: What is the best psychological explanation for compulsive/incendiary Facebook users?

I am no psychologist, but I know people like to connect with others by sharing experiences, ideas, and thoughts. This individual may just be very interested in connecting. One reason you enjoy watching this train wreck because it makes you feel better about your life. People laugh or mock others to make themselves feel better and to bond with others. Some could interpret your posting of this question as an attempt to bond with others over the mockery of this individual's behavior. Again, I am no psychologist, just an opinionated individual, who enjoys learning about psychology.

Question That Contains Assumptions: How does Facebook use psychology to encourage "closeted gay" users to "come out"?

I don't think it's by design, but when you see groups, posts, freinds, and family sharing their support or experiences it makes it easier for people to accept it and for some to eventually disclose their own sexuality. Facebook is also a way to meet people with common interests, sometimes it's the carnal or intimate kind. By its nature it's a tool for social networking, whether it's over hobbies, occupation, or mutual interests.