Social Media Membership, Browsing, and Profile Updating in a Representative U.S. Sample: Independent and Interdependent Effects of Big Five Traits and Aging and Social Factors

Guided by cybernetic perspectives on personality, the present work used a representative sample of U.S. adults (N = 992) to examine Big Five personality traits and social and aging factors as predictors of social media network membership and past-month browsing/searching and profile updating among members. The results showed adults who were less extraverted and less neurotic and who reported greater physical limitations were less likely to be members. Moreover, extraverted adults without partners were more likely to be members than introverted adults without partners. Among members, the results showed extraverted and emotionally stable younger and older adults reported a similar frequency of profile updating. In contrast, older adults with all other combinations of extraversion and neuroticism showed a reduced frequency of profile updating compared to younger adults. The findings are discussed in terms of social media involvement as a response of a self-regulatory system of personality adaptation.