About The Influence Of Facebook On Long-Term Relationships (Essay Sample)

Healthcare
The Influence of Facebook on Long-term Relationships
Institutional Affiliation:
Professor:
Date:
Introduction
Communication is an art that has undergone evolution from primitive language into technology supported communication. The most important facet of a relationship is communication. Before the inception of technology, people used face-to-face ended, to build a relationship.
People use verbal and non-verbal cues when communicating with each other and in the process develop a relationship. A relationship can be between family members, friends, workmates, classmates, colleagues, or even lovers. It can be short or long-term.
Use of technology in the form of social media has allowed people to communicate with each other without meeting physically. Both short term and long term relationships pass through the following four stages according to Taylor and Altman’s social penetration theory. Orientation, exploratory affective exchange, effective exchange, and stable exchange.
Some technological changes are very good additions to our lives; on balance, Facebook is a significant and far-reaching destructive addition to social relationships (Jin, 2015). This is especially so in the way it has altered relationships for the long term. The primary purpose of this paper is to determine how Facebook has changed the mode of relationship from short-term into a long-term.
Background
The first step into changing a relationship from short-term affair into a long-term affair is the provision of a platform that allows for other forms of communications apart from face-to-face. Facebook enables people who come from different geographical places to communicate and maintain their relationships. When people in a relationship do not meet physically, there are chances that they would not often disagree.
Consequently, their relationship will tend to stay healthy for a very long time as opposed to people who meet physically while in a relationship. A relationship built on Facebook and other social media platforms allow more room for privacy since one cannot physically monitor the activities of the other. It lacks emotional connection (Jin, 2015).
Findings
Facebook change in the Orientation stage of a relationship
Orientation is the first stage of communication and allows the people with the intention of entering into a relationship to make a judgment on each other’s personality for the first time. It is associated with the short-term relationship whereby the parties reinforce relationship components such as intimacy, commitment, trust, and even love. However, Facebook does not allow for self-disclosure. It has totally changed the way people develop and maintain relationships (Jin, 2015).
Through Facebook initiators of the relationships predetermine the kind of people they want to meet while the other parties also accept relationships from people who meet their interests. The feature of Facebook relationship goes against the normal orientation stage hence leads to the development of a long-term relationship (Hollenbaugh & Ferris, 2014).
Facebook change in the stage of a relationship
It is the stage of the relationship whereby the parties become more acquitted with each other. They can communicate easily but cautiously with one another. Most the relationships built on face to face communications die at this stage because the parties can easily access one another’s personal life and behaviors. However, Facebook has really changed this stage of relationships.
Most of the traditional relationships involved face to face communication, therefore, it was easy for the parties to public displays of one another. It is not possible to exhibit public display of affections using Facebook hence the presence of the public display of commitment only. Facebook, therefore, allows for pretense and insincere acts.
Facebook may give the relationship a lot of life even if it does not deserve one. It gives the parties in a relationship a false sense of security but in reality. Again it does not depict the actual picture (Burke & Kraut, 2014, April).
Facebook change in the Affective Exchange stage of a relationship
At this stage, the parties in a relationship can comfortably and easily interact with each other. They can involve themselves in a continuous flow of communications without confusions. It is at this stage that the parties start to indulge in intimate activities and can authoritatively declare themselves intimates.
When in a traditional relationship, people can physically show their intimate feelings to another and enjoy the moment. However, this moment can end anytime in case of disagreements, betrayal, or dishonesty. Most traditional relationships end at this level hence short-term relationships (Jin, 2015).
Facebook also allows the parties in a relationship to declare their status to express their intimate feelings and show commitment to one another. However, as opposed to face-to-face communication, Facebook as a medium enables the parties in a relationship to regulate their private activities. As long there is a stable exchange between the parties in a Facebook relationship, it will exist. Facebook, therefore, prolong the effective exchange period hence long-term relationship (Burke & Kraut, 2014, April).
Facebook change in the Stable Exchange stage of a relationship
At this stage, the parties of a relationship can engage themselves in a comfortable and honest conversation. It is uncommon for relationships built on face to face communication to reach this level. Only a few relationships reach this level because it requires a lot of commitment and dedications.
In some cases, the parties in a relationship can develop negative feelings towards each other and honestly speak their minds. When a relationship can endure such situations and remain intact, then it has reached its final stage. It is only possible to have an honest conversation on a face-to-face platform (Hollenbaugh &a...