Researchers link social media postings to possible mental illness

Researchers claim to have uncovered a link between what people post on social networks like Facebook and mental illnesses.

Researchers at the University of Missouri found a link between social anhedonia and decrease in Facebook activity, according to a report in CNET.

Social anhedonia is a diminishing of positive emotions for social stimuli.

CNET quoted Elizabeth Martin, study leader and a doctoral student in MU's psychological science department, as saying that the beauty of social-media as a tool in psychological diagnosis was that it removed some of the problems associated with the patients' self-reporting.

She noted questionnaires often depended on a person's memory, whose accuracy was never certain.

She added, by asking patients to share their Facebook activity, the researchers were able to see how they expressed themselves naturally. She added, even the parts of their Facebook activities that they chose to conceal exposed information about their psychological state.