title: Contingencies of self-worth and social-networking-site behavior.
abstract: Social-networking sites like Facebook enable people to share a range of personal information with expansive groups of "friends." With the growing popularity of media sharing online, many questions remain regarding antecedent conditions for this behavior. Contingencies of self-worth afford a more nuanced approach to variable traits that affect self-esteem, and may help explain online behavior. A total of 311 participants completed an online survey measuring such contingencies and typical behaviors on Facebook. First, exploratory factor analyses revealed an underlying structure to the seven dimensions of self-worth. Public-based contingencies explained online photo sharing (β = 0.158, p < 0.01), while private-based contingencies demonstrated a negative relationship with time online (β = -0.186, p < 0.001). Finally, the appearance contingency for self-worth had the strongest relationship with the intensity of online photo sharing (β = 0.242), although no relationship was evident for time spent managing profiles.
authors.affiliation: Department of Communication, University at Buffalo, Buffalo, New York 14260, USA. ms297@buffalo.edu
authors.forename: Michael A
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: Stefanone
authors.forename: Derek
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Lackaff
authors.forename: Devan
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Rosen
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D020407:Internet; D008297:Male; D010551:Personality; D012649:Self Concept; D012650:Self Disclosure; D012737:Sex Factors; D012919:Social Behavior; D012931:Social Environment; D013694:Temperament; D014584:User-Computer Interface; D055815:Young Adult