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Background: Social networking sites like Facebook represent a potentially valuable means for individuals with low self-esteem or interpersonal difficulties to connect with others; however, recent research indicates that individuals who are most in need of social benefits from Facebook may be ineffective in their communication strategies, and thereby sabotage their potential to benefit interpersonally. The current study tested whether reassurance seeking via Facebook negatively influenced self-esteem, and whether this change in self-esteem mediated the relationship between Facebook reassurance seeking and greater thwarted belongingness and perceived burdensomeness., Method: Participants completed measures online at two time-points approximately 24 days apart., Results: Results provided evidence that Facebook reassurance seeking predicted lower levels of self-esteem, which in turn predicted increased feelings that one does not belong and that one is a burden., Limitations: Key limitations to this study include our use of a predominantly young, female, Caucasian sample, a novel reassurance seeking measure, and only evaluating two time points., Conclusions: These results suggest that Facebook usage has the potential for negative and far-reaching influences on one's interpersonal functioning., (Published by Elsevier B.V.)

Background: The current study examined the effects of online social evaluations and comparisons on body dissatisfaction and bulimic symptoms., Methods: We tested the effects of maladaptive Facebook usage (defined as the tendency to seek negative social evaluations and/or engage in social comparisons via Facebook) on body dissatisfaction and bulimic symptoms in a sample of 232 college females followed for approximately 4 weeks., Results: Results provided evidence that maladaptive Facebook usage significantly predicted increases in bulimic symptoms and episodes of over-eating approximately four weeks later. Body dissatisfaction was found to fully mediate the relationship between maladaptive Facebook usage and increases in over-eating episodes, whereas body dissatisfaction partially mediated the relationship between maladaptive Facebook usage and increases in bulimic symptoms more broadly., Limitations: Limitations include the use of a novel measure of maladaptive Facebook usage due to the absence of an existing measure and a non-clinical sample., Conclusions: The results of this study suggest that reducing maladaptive Facebook usage may be a fruitful target for interventions aimed at reducing body dissatisfaction and symptoms of eating pathology., (Copyright © 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)