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May 23, 2011

College Guys Who Reference Alcohol On Facebook Have More Friends



Undergraduate men who often mention or post photos of alcohol have more Facebook friends than those who don’t, according to a study that will soon be published in the American Journal of Men’s Health.
The study combed through the public profiles of 225 male undergraduate students at one university for references to alcohol, including photos that contained an alcoholic drink — not just a cup — and specific textual references. It found that 85.53% of the profiles contained at least one reference to alcohol. On average, they contained 8.5.

Men older than 21 made about 4.5 times as many references to alcohol on their profiles than younger men did. And the number of references a man posted significantly correlated with the number of Facebook friends.
How students reference drinking on Facebook is of interest to those who want to prevent collegiate alcohol abuse. The study cites research published in 2002 that shows the strongest influence of alcohol consumption rates among college students is perceived peer use (which often exceeds actual peer use). Another suggests that media may exceed traditional peer influences for forming peer social norms.
“Our hypothesis is that because alcohol in college students is a predictor of social acceptance, there could be a similar correlation in the social networking world with alcohol references…[posting alcoholic references] might be a mechanism for peer acceptance,” says Katie Egan, who led the research as an undergraduate at the University of Wisconsin in 2009.

39 comments:

  1. The one who owns the watering hole has the most people to come visit.

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  2. People don't usually drink by themselves

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  3. Seems like an odd topic of study.

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  4. so more booze = more friends?
    didn't we already know that?

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  5. Hmmm... so if I make more references to alcohol on facebook, I'll get more friends you say. Haha

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  6. stupidity will bring you friends on facebook that is a fact.

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  7. ahh. facebook taking over our lives. :/

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  8. sad but true :/

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  9. drinking leads to socialising. I'm not particularly surprised by this

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  10. Sounds like a drunk man came up with this study.

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  11. lol, referee to alcohol and you get more friends? anyway fun fact to know.

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  12. thats probably because they party more and socialize with alot of people

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  13. ive got a firned who only drinks and he's in college. he's alwys on about gettin 'crunk yo' and he's know by a lot of people on facebook

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  14. I never liked alcohol. My luck! =)

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  15. I can picture the two being correlated. I'm a stats major myself and now I'm kinda interested in the study they will release.

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  16. Reasons like this are exactly why im abstinent from alcohol.

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  17. But, alas, their usually idiots

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  18. Probably get laid a lot more too.. wish I woulda known this when I was in college.

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  19. So, If I just post the word "Alcohol", I'll get more friends?

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  20. i can believe this. alcohol is an extremely easy way to make friends and also stupid decisions

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  21. wow what a sad statistic. definitely true though!

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  22. I wish alcohol was banned from earth. I find it hard to drink with moderation.

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  23. I just laughed very loud. Thanks for the facts and nice post!

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  24. I suppose it's even more lonely when you're like me and don't even have a Facebook lol

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  25. Is someone really that bored as to study this further? Wow.

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  26. I actually read an article that moderate drinkers have longer lifespans than sober people and heavy drinkers, just because the social aspect that comes with drinking is so important. People with a lot of friends live longer (according to this article). So the above makes sense.

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  27. Gosh, and here I don't even have a FB account.

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  28. I'd rather be a liver than have one =P

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  29. Hmm, not sure if this is a very accurate survey...

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  30. drinking alone sucks. so this blog is helpful

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  31. now that's an announcement I like to hear!

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  32. This is true, I reference alcohol all the time and get laid frequently due to it.

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