Everyone thinks Everyone Else's Social Lives are More Exciting
Recently, I was talking to some friends (of which I have several) about Instagram Stories. One had said she thought their purpose was to make people left out, and the other agreed — the type of story she saw most often in her feed was something I’ll call the Social-Gathering Sweep: a pan of one’s lively, blurry party surroundings, done too quickly to make out any one detail, but slow enough that you can see that there are other people out there having fun while you’re at home. Alone. Watching Instagram Stories.
I knew what my friends were referring to immediately, not only because I have seen these videos — I have also made them. I have been at parties with nothing particularly notable to see and still thought, “I should document this,” the subtext being “so people know I have a life.” I don’t enjoy watching these brief and badly composed party videos, and I can’t imagine anyone else does, either. Their only purpose is to reassure ourselves, and the people who follow us, that we have places to go and people to see.
Of course, I like to think I have an excuse. I am an influencer and it is sometimes literally my job to go to parties and make them look cool to my followers in order to promote whomever or whatever is throwing said event. It would be unprofessional for me to admit that I am not having any fun and plan to leave as soon as I am done instagramming. Still. I fully recognize that it doesn't just make the brand, business or magazine I'm promoting look good for me to selectively post videos and photos of the three cute people in the one glamourous-looking corner of the room of a painfully mediocre party. It makes me look cool too, for being there. I'm not honestly sure which of these reasons motivates me more.
As it happens, this is probably something many of us feel insecure about. A new study led by Cornell University researcher Sebastian Deri claims that most people believe that other people have richer and more active social lives than they themselves do. This finding contrasts with the general principle by which people are quick to self-flattery: Studies show we typically rate ourselves as smarter, happier, healthier, more moral, and safer drivers than our counterparts. And yet when it comes to our social lives, we’re more likely to believe the grass is having way more fun on the other side.
Deri and his colleagues hypothesized that part of the reason people rate their social lives so negatively is because we measure ourselves not against a representative sample, but against those examples most easily called to mind. (Imagine the most glamorous Instagram Social-Gathering Sweep you’ve ever seen, then wonder why it only took you five seconds to recall it.) Furthermore, the researchers suggest that hanging out in groups forces most individuals to more closely examine (and imagine) the interior lives of other people than you would typically do alone. And generally speaking, we assume those other people are all having a blast.
As expected, the researchers found that subjects rated their social lives as inferior to those of their friends, family, and acquaintances, and they’re not happy about it, either — a significant portion of the respondents said they wished their social lives were as healthy and active as their peers’. Then again, if almost everybody thinks almost everybody else has a better social life than they do, somebody has to be wrong.
30 comments
So true. And I hate to sound like a snob, but I feel like as bloggers this impacts us the most-- because it is our job to look cool and connected and popular. I know that none of these events are any fun, but every time I see that a bunch of girls all went to the same event at NYFW or Basel, I am suddenly so upset that I missed out. It's so dumb.
ReplyDeleteEvery influencer has a girl crush on every other influencer. I love our mutual admiration society, senseless jealousy and copycatting included! xx
DeleteDude. Same. I am over here at a party bored out of my mind, standing in a corner even though I'd rather be at home watching Netflix because this party is "the place to be" and "everyone is here" and I can't leave until I let eveyone on instagram know that I am also here, at the place to be. Lame.
ReplyDeleteI'm in the corner too! But a different corner because yours is already taken. ;-)
DeleteSo much truth here. I think we all know it and yet can't help ourselves every time we check instagram.
ReplyDeleteEvery. Single. Time.
DeleteIt's so funny that while we love to and choose to believe that we are healthier, smarter and morally superior to our friends, we also believe they are cooler than we are. I guess because instagram doesn't judge our intelligence or goodness, only our popularity and travel and luxury shoe purchases. It really seems that without IG, we'd probably think we had better social lives too.
ReplyDeleteEnjoy it whilst it lasts. I'm sure the next social media phenom will find a way to judge all of those things.
DeleteAnd oh my dear, do not even get me started on the need to announce every pair of shoes I acquire on instagram. What a headache!
It's so hard to control those feelings of fomo and jealousy though! I try so hard to force myself to remember this, but I am uncontrollably jealous of everyone I follow on instagram!
ReplyDeleteWe are all masochists. Following the most glamorous accounts we can find and then hating ourselves for not also getting a yacht for our birthdays.
DeleteI love the part about how we basically think we are superior to others in every way EXCEPT our social lives. Instagram, man. In our minds we know that the whole point is to post the "highlights", but then, some peoples highlights are higher than ours!
ReplyDeleteWhat's more, if people posted less highlighty highlights, we'd unfollow them for being lame. There is no winning in this instagram thing. ;-P
DeleteI love everything you write, Ash!!! Thank you for another awesome article! x
ReplyDeleteThank YOU! You're the sweetest.
DeleteI love instagram, but also I think it's ruining my life. Or at least my self esteem. I'm so nostalgic for the days when I thought I was cool because I thought I'd discovered an underground band wore leggings as pants.
ReplyDeleteLeggings are decidedly not pants. If you don't want to wear pants, fine. Just go pantsless, but leggings are a travesty.... unless paired with a long chunky sweater.
DeleteYea, instagram is ruining my life. But. I. Can't. Stop.
ReplyDeleteNeither. Can. I.
DeleteI hate to say this, but I think the reason that we, looking at instagram, decide that other people have better social lives than we do is because people sometimes do have better social lives than we do. Obviously the Kardashians are cooler than we are, and they remind us daily with their social media posts. I know my friends from high school are just doing laundry today. I'm not jealous of them. I'm jealous of celebrities whose lives I would have never known so much about if it weren't for social media. So sometimes, Im just a crazy girl who is upset about missing a party that looks way more fun than it actually is. But other times, I actually am the lame one doing laundry while Kendall Jenner hangs out at the Golden Globes. Sorry. This is really long. Love you.
ReplyDeleteThe thing I dislike to most about instagram-- which I otherwise love-- is how it seems to create competition between people who are otherwise just friends, acquaintances or complete strangers. It's not really instaram that did it, but all of us on instagram, because while I want to just be happy for everyone and support them in the cool things they do, it's just human or girl-world nature that I'm helplessly jealous and suddenly feel the need to post a video of myself doing something equally awesome.
ReplyDeleteLove reading everything you right. Your honesty about how you don't really love all your fancy parties is so refreshing. Although, I'd still like to try them out someday! x
ReplyDeleteIt's true that because of social media, we compare ourselves to other people whom we would never compare ourselves to otherwise. We probably wouldn't know a lot of these people exist in order to know or care about what they're doing on the weekend! Still, I think cutting myself off so I can't see what anyone else is doing and therefore think my own social life the grandest by default is not the answer either.
ReplyDeleteHumans. We are so weird, right?
ReplyDeleteI agree with a few of the above comments which imply that looking at other people's instagrams makes us feel that our social lives are inferior because our social lives are in fact inferior. I mean, forget comparing ourselves to models in magazines. Now we have models sharing their super cool social plans on instagram every day. And actresses. And heiresses. And bloggers.
ReplyDeleteIt's so refreshing to know that I'm not the only ridiculous person sitting in bed, eating chips, watching instagram stories and feeling sorry for myself, a person with a good job, a great boyfriend and a full passport. Honestly.
ReplyDeleteThat's why Instagram so depressing and so engaging at the same time. And that's the reason why it's so intangible for marketing campaigns. With tools like Zen-promo one can easily get wired on your content https://zen-promo.com/like_bot_instagram.
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