Have people become more self-centered/narcissistic since the advent of myspace, facebook, twitter, etc?

[Tina]

There's this person I know on facebook who feels the need to update everybody on all aspects of her life. She writes paragraph-long (sometimes longer) status updates usually around five times a day, covering everything from her Crohn's Disease treatment to the fact that she just got home from the grocery store, to what she's thinking of making for dinner, to the crazy antics of her three young children, to long lists of everything big that's happened in her life in that particular month, etc. She has a million facebook photo albums that, once again, detail every aspect of her life that she feels her friends must know. On top of that she's relatively young to have three kids (27 or so) so she's still in that phase of pointing the camera/cell phone at herself and photographing herself every two steps she takes. Several of her albums are devoted just to her, the majority of the pictures within having been taken by herself.

In contrast, I usually update my status several times a week, if even that often, and usually it's just some amusing little tidbit that happened in school, or on the train ride home. I honestly don't think that people care enough about every little thing that's going on in my life at the moment to read paragraphs upon paragraphs of my life's escapades in a facebook status update.

To be honest, I don't even know why I'm friends with that woman. She sent me a friend request years ago because she agreed with many of the things I wrote on a facebook group. She seemed nice, so I accepted. Little did I know, my homepage would forever be inundated with her status updates from then on.

So, is this a growing trend? Are people (Americans in particular) becoming more and more self-absorbed thanks to sites like myspace, facebook, and twitter?

[MacG]

I find it strange that you devote so much energy to her if you don't care for her.

[Bee Gone]

These type of people were always with us, however they stayed home in their darkened basement and became serial killer and pedophiles. Now they hang out on dumb sites like "Fasebonk" and annoy people. Losers all.

[freefalling_00]

American has always been self-absorbed and egocentric. That's the consequence of living in a democratic, overwhelmingly consumerist superpower. We live in the digital/information age. There is huge potential to share ideas all over the world. That is a HUGE achievement. Facebook is just an outlet for people to express their feelings and stay connected to friends, but has evolved into a symbol of popularity and social stature. It preys on our insecurities of being left out and not being known, and in a world where ideas flow so easily, its not that hard to be caught up. People who update too frequently are either too self-absorbed with their lives, or are too insecure with their lives to keep to themselves. This trend will only get worse. Facebook is growing ever more popular, and there's just too many wanting to share something not worth mentioning.

I suggest you delete her...