Blog Post #4: Robin Dunbar and Modern Social Media - Jake McMorran

    Within our course, one of the highlighting themes in relation to social media is how scholars such as Standage contribute to the argument of how many friends one can really have as Robin Dunbar's social theories conclude the defining magic number, Dunbar's Number, is 150. Of these 150 however, not all are of the same magnitude when it comes to interaction however. Of those 150, you'll have five close friends, 15 good friends including your close friends, 50 friends including your good friends, and 150 acquaintances including your 50 friends with most of your mental dedication place towards the 50 or less.

    With 150 being the approximate number of maximum relationships the human can handle, I want to touch on a discussion from my last blog post on Instagram's influences on mental health and anxieties. While I discussed the correlation and connection between such mental health issues in teenage girls brought on my social media influencers, from my understanding of talking to female friends in similar positions and with males including myself that anxieties additionally are rooted in the branding and audience reach. It's almost as though it is engrained from early usages growing up that the likes and audience attention have significance on our likability, and how likeable we are based on our number of followers too. While I myself have 650+ followers on Instagram, I question how many really care? Is the anxiety surrounding how likeable I am even relevant when studies show that people only care to acknowledge at most around 150 people based on the relationships they have developed with them. While I have so many followers, the reality is that my social circle at the end of the day are gonna be the ones that care about my content. Those within that 150. Looking at most of my likes and interactions demonstrates this, as majority of likes come from acquaintances who just happen to scroll by and like my post, compared to my good friends who interact through comments and more. 

    While modern social medias such as facebook and Instagram allow you to have well more than 150 friends or followers/following bringing into question the credibility of Dunbar's number, the reality of human social interaction indicates that while it is easier to keep track of well more than 150 individuals, we are primarily concerned with the 50 friends at the end of the day. Just because you don't get hundreds of likes on a post doesn't inherently mean something is wrong with you, and in the end brings no need for worry regarding how many likes you get. End of the day, you're likely putting major efforts into 50 people anyways, and at max that magic 150, and so is everyone else. Its not a you problem, or necessarily that people don't care about you, its the mental capacity of social interaction and the reality of that if you havent built the relationship of being within an individuals 50 friends, they likely wont care too much to interact with your content unless they happen to pass by and give that like.