How Does the Experience of Social Power Affect the Amount of Facebook Activity?

Our study sought to reveal whether social power affects Facebook behaviour in a similar manner that it affects behaviour in the real world. We predicted that participants in the high power condition would be more active on Facebook compared to both low power and control conditions, while low power participants would be less active on Facebook. Participants in the experimental condition went through a double manipulation of heightened or lowered social power and were instructed to login on Facebook and use it for five minutes afterwards. A self-report questionnaire was presented after the Facebook task in order to measure the amount of messages, comments, posts, reactions, and shares participants made on Facebook. The total amount of Facebook activity was compared between the groups, however, no significant results were discovered. Methodological limitations and suggestions for future research are discussed