Social Graph Tie Strength as a Result of Social Networking Activity
In a paper for the 2014 ACM Conference on Human Factors in Computing (CHI), Facebook Data Scientist Moira Burke and Professor Robert Kraut of Carnegie Mellon University examine the effect of social networking sites (SNS) on relative tie strength among social graph connections. The authors studied over 82,000 Facebook friendships in order to test the assertion that social media interaction is a causal factor in the strengthening of interpersonal relationships.
Through the use of a longitudinal analysis, the researchers found that communication over SNS does increase tie strength, but not equally across all types of ties and forms of SNS-enabled communication. The study found that Facebook was far more effective in increasing tie-strength among dyads without other means of consistent communication, as well as among non-familial relationships. Additionally, direct, composed communications such as wall posts or direct messages were found to be much more effective in building tie strength than “one click” actions such as likes and pokes.
One of the most interesting revelations of the article, however, is the fact that receiving passive “broadcast” updates from someone has the same positive effects on tie strength as receiving directed, composed updates. Sending these broadcast updates does not, however, serve to increase tie strength. While not directly addressed in the article, the implication of such findings seem to be that “lurking” or “Facebook stalking” does more to make one feel connected to other members of their social graph than sharing about themselves, though less so than actually talking to those same ties.
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