From time to time Facebook show the public some interesting numbers about users tendencies and habits. The latest release shows us how we behave differently as single people compared to when we’re in a relationship.
The company’s team of data scientists announced that statistical evidence hints at budding relationships before the relationships start.
In his blog post, Carlos Diuk of Facebook data science uses numbers to show how two people, while being still single, will enter a courtship period which shows an increase in posts on each other’s timelines. But once they enter what is officially called a relationship, those posts drop significantly.
During the 100 days before the relationship starts, we observe a slow but steady increase in the number of timeline posts shared between the future couple. When the relationship starts (“day 0”), posts begin to decrease. We observe a peak of 1.67 posts per day 12 days before the relationship begins, and a lowest point of 1.53 posts per day 85 days into the relationship. Presumably, couples decide to spend more time together, courtship is off, and online interactions give way to more interactions in the physical world.
Another interesting thing Diuk referenced in his post was that even though the number of posts on timelines decrease, they become significantly happier and more optimistic. Even though measuring love and sentiment isn’t exactly a perfect science, it’s quite interesting to see the raw data and numbers trying to capture what loves looks like on Facebook.
To weed out Facebook faux-relationships, it only looked at couples who “declared an anniversary date” between April 2010 and October 2013, not just those who changed their relationship status. The research was focused only on English speaking users.
Via Robinson Meyer; Images from Facebook
For a bit more on other plans Facebook have, check out their intentions to launch a Mobile ad network.
