Are you suffering from Facebook anxiety?

For a significant number of Facebook users the negative effects outweighs benefits, says study.

A new study carried out by Scottish researchers show that the more Facebook ‘friends’ you have, the more likely you are to feel stressed out by the social networking site.

For a significant number of Facebook users the negative effects outweighed the benefits, the study by psychologists at Edinburgh Napier University concluded.

“The results threw up a number of paradoxes,” said Dr Kathy Charles, who led the study.

“For instance, although there is great pressure to be on Facebook there is also considerable ambivalence amongst users about its benefits. Our data also suggests that there is a significant minority of users who experience considerable Facebook-related anxiety, with only very modest or tenuous rewards. And we found it was actually those with the most contacts, those who had invested the most time in the site, who were the ones most likely to be stressed.”

Dr Charles further said that “An overwhelming majority of respondents reported that the best thing about Facebook was ‘keeping in touch’, often without any further explanation,” said Dr Charles.

“But many also told us they were anxious about withdrawing from the site for fear of missing important social information or offending contacts. Like gambling, Facebook keeps users in a neurotic limbo, not knowing whether they should hang on in there just in case they miss out on something good.”

She said other causes of tension included removing people from their ‘friends’ lists purging unwanted contacts, the pressure to be inventive and entertaining, and having to use appropriate etiquette for different types of ‘friends’.

Dr Charles added: “The other responses we got in focus groups and one-to-one interviews suggests that the survey figures actually under represent aspects of stress and anxiety felt by some Facebook users, whether it’s through feelings of exclusion, pressure to be entertaining, paranoia or envy of others’ lifestyles.”

Of those surveyed:

• 12 per cent said that Facebook made them feel anxious.  Of these, respondents had an average of 117 'friends' each.  The remaining 88% of respondents, who said that Facebook did not make them feel anxious, had an average of 75 'friends' each

• 63 per cent delayed replying to friend requests

• 32 per cent said rejecting friend requests led to feelings of guilt and discomfort
• 10 per cent admitted disliking receiving friend requests