Scientists confirm keeping your ex on Facebook is a bad idea

You’ve had your heart ripped out and stamped on by another human being, or you’ve been the one to do the ripping and stamping yourself, and although there might be serious things to think about like who gets the Xbox, how do you tell your parents you’re an emotional failure and how do you split up your friendship group between you both, one of the questions on everyone’s lips is should you stay Facebook friends?

To show how mature you are, or to just keep tabs on them now they’re back on the market, many newly broken up couples choose to stay friends on the social network. However, according to researchers at Brunel University, staying connected online could bring about all kinds of nasty side affects, like distress and an inability to move on from the past relationship.

More than 450 people were surveyed for the study, which is published in Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, in an attempt to explore how we respond to still being connected to old flames online. Unsurprisingly, consistent Facebook stalking has been proven to exacerbate feelings of distress, increase feelings of sexual longing and makes people feel more negative about life generally in comparison to those who cut the cord long before.

Although the study is interesting and raises issues about how our relationships transpire online, what always surprises us is the assumption that our online and offline identities are any different, most people would agree keeping constant tabs on an ex in the real world is unhealthy, so it makes sense that it’s now been proved (kinda) to be the same in the realm of likes, timelines and updates too. Maybe we should become top science, researchy types?

[Via iO9]