Social Media Redefines Friend Perceptions

The past two days I've been thinking about how social media has been changing perceptions. Inspired by the post from the Social Media Explorer, Jason Falls, "Determining Your Friends," I'm thinking about the term friends, both as it once was defined and as it stands today.

Friend was a word that I think we can all agree on, once defined a close, personal confidant that we shared our personal thoughts, ideas, and life events with. In an Interpersonal Communication course I took a few years ago I remember learning that we typically have only five true friends in our lives. Our social interactions are limited by work, responsibilities, sleep, and other needs that keep us confined to tasks. As such, we only have time to devote mental, emotional, physical and spiritual energy to five people, but that is just an average.


So what has social media done to change this perception? For starters, it's taken the adjective and made it a verb. Nowadays we're "friending" people online or reading posts on how to "friend" someone. So now the word's become an action, but more than that, we use it to define a much larger network than just the handful of five.

So has social media devauled the word "friend" or redefined it? Are we now considering friends globally rather than locally? It's something that I'd like to hear your opinion on. No doubt social media is effecting all facets of life not just in marketing or advertising, but sociology, human psychology, communication, politics, etc.

What's your take on the perceived changes in our language?

Photo Credit _Olga_[FR]