Ethnography and Analysis

“Some moron tried to convince me that [my relationship is] not legitimate because I don’t have it on Facebook.” - Annie Geitner, college sophomore (Time 2009)

“I’m not willing to date anyone exclusively unless she feels comfortable going Facebook-public.” - Trevor Babcock, college student (Time 2009)

 

Relationships are tricky things.  So are relationship statuses.  About 60% of Facebook users have some kind of relationship status declared.  It seems that the online world has given rise to new types of relationship-defining ideas.  Why is being Facebook official important to some people and not important to others?  Status Options

One of the most widespread reasons people use these statuses is because, on the internet, information spreads rapidly.  In an instant, people can tell hundreds of people they know about their new, exciting change.   When Facebook first started, there was no News Feed like there is today.  This limited the knowledge of your friends to their ability to check your page.  But now, the instant the change is made, it is broadcast to your entire network of friends.  Social scientists have said that humans enjoy this “ambient awareness” (Van Manen 2010).  The idea that, online, we use these informational cues to create cues and connections with people in our social network and as a form of social comparison. 

 

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“My take on Facebook ‘Relationship Status’ is that I would never put a relationship on Facebook, unless I was pretty confident in it. My reason for this is, removing your status can be pretty dramatic and it’s drama that I don’t need to deal with.”

“Not only are you proudly announcing that you are with somebody, but you are gambling that this one will last longer than a month or two.  The evolution of the relationship is changing, and it's facebook's fault.  Now, the path consists of 1) you go on a date, 2) you go on dates regularly, 3) you are only dating each other, 4) boyfriend/girlfriend, 5) Facebook official” - Ana Fernatt, Chicago Now opinion writer

 

There is some discerning quality to posting a relationship status.  You must go through an intellectual process of evaluating the relationship before posting it publicly.

Liz Vennum, a 25-year old secretary from Chattanooga Tennessee says, “You change your Facebook status when it’s official.  When you’re okay with calling the person your girlfriend or boyfriend.  Proper breakup etiquette is not to change the status until after you’ve had the ‘ we need to talk’ Status Changetalk.  Then you race each other home (or back to the iPhone) to be the first to change your status to single.”  (Time 2009)  I think there are two things to be made of this statement.  The first is the idea of ‘Facebook Official’.  It’s an attempt to define a relationship. In any relationship, there are necessary symbols that are part of the social norm of progression of the relationship. For something that many consider to be a big step, it takes a less intimate approach than past symbols. With an engagement or wedding ring, you choose to put on this symbol every day to show your bond. Same with the now out of fashion tradition of wearing someone's pin as a symbol of dating. A relationship status, while a gesture that seems to supplement other symbols in healthy relationships, is something you put up once and leave until it changes. The second thing to point out in Liz’s statement is the fact that she (along with many others who talk about relationship status) mentions the idea of breaking up in the same thought as starting a relationship.  Especially because most regular Facebook users are younger and just exploring monogamous relationships, it is more likely that they will form relationships and break up. So it is no wonder why this would be. But is this also just a new era of short term dating, or has Facebook actually made people more aware of the fact that a breakup is highly possible?  It may have even deterred people from entering questionable relationships (if they are adamant about posting a status).

Wendy Atterby asks the questions, “What if one person thinks she’s in a relationship, but the other person disagrees? Is Facebook sort of like a passive-aggressive way to make a point with the person you’re dating that you’re ready to be exclusive? Or, is it more like a way to announce to people that you’re off the market?” One striking example comes from the blog DivineCaroline.com.  After one reader, calling herself 'Single Mom Seeking', approached her boyfriend of four months about changing their Facebook status he declined citing the fact that he wanted to keep some privacy.  She wrote, “He shows me every day that he wants to be in a relationship with me.  So why do I care if we’re “out” on Facebook?”  She attributes it to honesty issues (Many of the comments on her blog post are from women who warn this reader to be wary of this relationship because of her partner’s reluctance to publicly acknowledge their status). It is definitely a step that makes a relationship more publicly official. Because of the public nature, though, it seems to be very serious. Rather than the previous relationship symbols where face-to-face interaction was the only way you'd be aware of the commitment, this is something that is broadcast to people you know well and probably others you don't know as well.

 

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"Single? In a Relationship? Engaged/Married?  These options just don't cut it...Forget 'It's Complicated'...we're fricking complicated! Relationships in general are 'complicated'!  Need we post the obvious for all the world to see?” - from the Facebook Group 'Facebook Relationship Status Options are Insufficient'

 

It seems as if relationships statuses are insufficient as forms of self-expression, a commonly thought use for declaring a status in the first place.  A survey done by psychologists at Georgetown University (Pempek 2009) is telling of how college students feel about New Status Optionsrelationship statuses.  46.94% of those surveyed thought it was important for people to know.  The second most students (32.65%) responded that they list their status primarily just because Facebook has an option for it.  Only 18.37% see it as a form of self-expression.  Not an insignificant number but different from notions of why youths use social networks.  Maybe it is because they see it as an inadequate form of expression. It seems as though the complexity of actual human relationships is too immense to limit to a handful of choices. People don't feel they can accurately express the status of their relationship. I think the main difference here is the term relationship status, rather than marital status. One is more official. The other is a means by which to tell people the stage of a relationship and even the feelings involved (such as It's Complicated).

When searching 'relationship status' in Facebook, the first thing you will get is a long list of groups dedicated to petitioning Facebook for more options. People want to have things like "Widowed", "In a Bromance", "Has a crush on", and even "Having sex with" as options. People seem to want to be able to express exactly how they feel or what situation they are in with their relationship status. The types of people who create and post on these groups, though, seem to come from the same population. Many of them seem to have similar online personas. They typically spell using phonetic spellings and 'e-speak', while also using profanity excessively. Many members of these pages only post once or twice and never come back to the group again. This may be a form of catharsis as they are experiencing a desire to express this thought, and with Facebook hindering the process of broadcasting it through their page via their relationship status, they state it with this group. There is also a dimension of confidentiality in a group, as most of the people there don't know you usually, or don't care to look you up. Here you can express your relationship thoughts without the inhibition of your social network seeing.

Going back to the study of Facebook use, I think it’s interesting to see how people’s main concern is disseminating information, but many people have ironic relationships.  For those not really in a relationship, it both mocks the concept of relationship status, while at the same time confirming it’s power by elevating a personal relationship above the rest.  Some people are offended by the idea of this ironic status.  There is a Facebook Group entitled “Students Against Fake Facebook Homosexuality”. Several other groups have been formed with the hopes of petitioning Facebook to disallow fake relationships, while, as previously stated, many are petitioning the expansion of these statuses to allow them.

 

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People who were in their college and younger when Facebook was developed will never lead adult live without social networking sites. 

See here for a very telling example of how the generation of college students right before Facebook was invented encounter relationship statuses on the site: http://boards.askmen.com/showthread.php?105497-Facebook-relationship-status

This online component to relationships has an effect on how we relate to them in the real world.  Our lives are now mediated by this new form of technology. Relationships can be strengthened by Facebook. It can make for more openly committed partners and forces those who take it seriously to consider the reprecussions of using it as a symbol of a relationship. Relationships can also be damaged by the medium. The melding of public and private life has never been such a fine line. It has become accepted socially as a new step in the relationship. But at what level of commitment is it fo?. In its transitional phase from information to expression, there are still some kinks to be worked out. Soon maybe marriages will be conducted solely through Facebook.  Kidding…kind of.