The motivations and personality traits that influence Irish Facebook usage

Abstract

The present study investigated the motivations and personality traits that influence Irish peoples' Facebook usage. An online survey of n = 155 participants found that 'keeping in contact with existing friends' was the most common cited motive for using Facebook. However, boredom was not rated significantly different from this social connectivity motive. It was found that different demographic groups use Facebook for different purposes: social connectivity (Females) and boredom (Males) both motivated the younger users more than the older users. Investigating personality traits, Conscientiousness was found to significantly reduce the amount of friends on a Facebook profile; but overall, personality factors were not found to be as influential on Facebook usage as previous literature would suggest.