You are just like me!

Love of the Same
Basic human needs, such as affection, belonging, and love, can nowadays be seen in social media as well as offline. People who have a hard time finding these fundamental needs in their environment turn to social media to fulfill their human desires (Harris & Aboujaoude, 2016). The ability to express one’s personal beliefs on social media can be gratifying as you are able to connect with a much larger audience. Social psychologists explain that people prefer an environment that is familiar, as it is predictable and provides less effort to “fit in” (Mazur, & Richards, 2011).

I want to be your friend!
Homophily is the desire to seek out likeminded people, or groups. The person perceives a sense of connection to the group or persons they want to interact with. By identifying oneself to a group one will feel a sense of belonging, which further inspires you to promote the group’s visions and behaviors that align with your own. People who have a minimized real-life connection to identify with, will use social media as a type of Escapism, an emotional diversion from their everyday life. This allows the relief they are looking for (Hall-Phillips, Park, Chung, Anaza, & Rathod, 2016).

How did I find You?
Social media platforms use algorithms to find out what someone likes, such as news, ads, or groups one may interact with, as well as links you may have clicked. The intention of algorithms is to feed you information that correlates to your interests. By analyzing your activity on the platform, they can customize information, news, and links to your timeline, all in an effort to keep you engaged (Koukoutsaki-Monnier, 2016), (Siapera, 2016). Platforms, such as Facebook, use system-provided data (algorithms), and user-provided content to connect profiles/people with similar interests, developing homophily relationships (Alhabash & Ma, 2017).
Social media provides flexibility to interact with others, no matter your physical location or time. I socialize on Facebook with friends and family in Sweden. It is a convenient way to communicate with them, compared to calling them on the phone. With Facebook, I have successfully located many friends from my childhood, who I thought I may never see again. It is also how I reconnected with my two half-siblings.
References
Alhabash, S., & Ma, M. (2017). A tale of four platforms: Motivations and uses of facebook, twitter, instagram, and snapchat among college students? Social Media + Society, 3(1), 205630511769154. doi:10.1177/2056305117691544
Hall-Phillips, A., Park, J., Chung, T., Anaza, N. A., & Rathod, S. R. (2016). I (heart) social ventures: Identification and social media engagement. Journal of Business Research, 69(2), 484–491. doi:10.1016/j.jbusres.2015.05.005
Eugenia Siapera, Institute for Future Media and Journalism, School of Communications, Dublin City University retrieved from Http://peq.hypotheses.org/849
Harris, K. M., & Aboujaoude, E. (2016). Online friendship, romance, and sex: Properties and associations of the online relationship initiation scale. Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, 19(8), 487–493. doi:10.1089/cyber.2016.0164
Mazur, E., & Richards, L. (2011). Adolescents’ and emerging adults’ social networking online: Homophily or diversity? Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, 32(4), 180–188. doi:10.1016/j.appdev.2011.03.001
