EVERY year since 2009, Facebook head honcho Mark Zuckerberg has been posting his yearlong goal, which he calls a “personal challenge,” to “learn something new.” The trend started with wearing a tie every day.
The following years saw him learn Mandarin and turn vegetarian. In 2013 he wanted to meet a new person every day who was not a Facebook employee. The year after that, the goal was to write at least one thank-you note every day. In the next, it was to read a new book every other week.
All of his resolutions were geared toward personal improvement, but the one he has set for 2018 is rather different.
Zuckerberg wrote in a January 4 post that he wants to focus on fixing important issues today, as the world feels “anxious and divided.” He likened the general mood to that of 2009, when the United States figured in a Deep Recession and, also, Facebook was not yet profitable. (He wrote: “It was a serious year, and I wore a tie every day as a reminder.”)
The 33-year-old philanthropist said Facebook has a lot of work to do. There’s the call to protect the community from abuse and hate, the mission to defend against interference by nation states, and, as he elaborated in another post late last week, the need to make sure that time on Facebook is time well spent. He announced a restructure.
“I’m changing the goal I give our product teams from focusing on helping you find relevant content to helping you have more meaningful social interactions,” Zuckerberg wrote.
“More meaningful social interactions” means less public content from brands, media and businesses on your Newsfeed—which more or less foster what he coined as “passive experiences”—and more “personal connections.”
The seemingly admirable goal, however, didn’t bode well financially for Zuckerberg. Following the announcement, the social-media giant’s share value dropped nearly 4 percent before US markets opened last Friday. Forbes calculated that the
Facebook cofounder, chairman and chief executive lost $3.3 billion, allowing Spanish retail billonaire Amancio Ortega to take his place as the world’s fourth richest person.
There are a scroll’s worth of speculation of what truly caused the change. Some say it was Facebook’s much-awaited response to its supposed inaction over the spread of misinformation and fake news that contributed to the outcome of the presidential races not only in the US, but in these parts, too. Meanwhile, others suggest that the modification stems from the company’s fear for what it internally calls as “context collapse,” or the decline in the sharing of users’ personal information, the data of which advertisers use. But if we take it purely from Zuckerberg’s post, the naysayers couldn’t possibly be more off the mark.
His reason is simple: Regain social media’s true essence, which is to “bring us closer together with the people that matter to us.”
The key, therefore, is important relationships.
“At its best, Facebook has always been about personal connections,” Zuckerberg wrote. “By focusing on bringing people closer together—whether it’s with family and friends, or around important moments in the world—we can help make sure that Facebook is time well spent.”
He referenced the findings of research on the role of relationships in the improvement of well-being and happiness. “[Research] shows that when we use social media to connect with people we care about, it can be good for our well-being. We can feel more connected and less lonely, and that correlates with long-term measures of happiness and health. On the other hand, passively reading articles or watching videos—even if they’re entertaining or informative—may not be as good.”
The call to value human connections is not new. In fact, a research that turns 80 years old this year posits that what makes a good life isn’t money, fame or whatnot, but strong relationships.
In November 2015 psychiatrist Robert Waldinger presented at Ted Talks the “Harvard Study of Adult Development,” one of the most comprehensive longitudinal studies in the history of mankind. It was designed to determine what makes a happy life.
The study tracked since 1938 the lives of 724 men divided into two groups. The first cluster was composed of Harvard sophomores during the time of Great Depression, while the second featured a group of boys from Boston’s poorest neighborhoods.
The researchers conducted interviews with the subjects every two years. They got their medical records, drew their blood, scanned their brains and talked to their families.
Waldinger, the fourth director of the study, which he tagged as the longest one ever on the subject of adult life, said the teenagers eventually entered all walks of life. Some became factory workers, others lawyers, one president of the United States.
“So what have we learned? What are the lessons that come from the tens of thousands of pages of information that we’ve generated on these lives?” he said in his presentation. “Well, the lessons aren’t about wealth or fame or working harder and harder. The clearest message that we get from this 75-year study is this: Good relationships keep us happier and healthier. Period.”
Along with the verdict came the “three big lessons about relationships.”
The first one, Waldinger said, is that social connections are really good for us—and that loneliness kills. People who are more socially connected, whether it’s with family, friends or community, are happier and physically healthier, he added. Next is quality over quantity. Waldinger explained that it’s the quality of close relationships that matters.
The final takeaway is that good relationships don’t just protect our bodies, they protect our brains. The memories of those who are in relationships where they feel they can count on the other person in times of need stayed sharp, while those who don’t have the same level of relationships experience earlier memory decline.
“So this message—that good, close relationships are good for our health and well-being. This is wisdom that’s as old as the hills,” Waldinger said, before posing an interesting question with a quick answer. “Why is this so hard to get and so easy to ignore? Well, we’re human.”
He pointed out our penchant for instant fixes, for things that we can get to improve our lives and keep it that way. But relationships are different. They’re messy and complicated and hard work, he said.
“It’s also lifelong; it never ends,” Waldinger added, possibly pertaining to the time one needs to invest to keep relationships healthy, or to the eternity on which its wonders last.