Marriage is an old, old convention.  Social media is relatively new—around 10 years old.  Both are dominant in our current culture, so how do they affect each other?  The truth is the effects of social media on society is significant and has changed how people interact.

The Effects of Social Media on Marriage

Social media is changing the way we’re informed about the world around us.  It’s changing the way we connect with one another.  It changes how and why we get, keep, or lose our jobs.  It also changes the way we see ourselves and our spouses.  Most of the changes observed by psychologists, mental health professionals, and sociologists suggest that they are almost uniformly negative.  They have seen an increase in narcissistic qualities and self-gratification—both of which are problems on their own, but bigger problems when found in a married individual.

Read the negative effects of social media on marriage below, and if you think they apply to your marriage, you may want to cut back on social media and spend your time in other ways.

Increased Insecurity

Insecurity doesn’t end when you get married.  It would be nice if it did, but life isn’t like that.  Even the most self-assured person has lingering doubts about their partner’s fidelity.  Social media has made some married couples less secure.  After all, it brings everyone together and may provide married people with more temptations than ever before in the past.

Increased Jealousy

Insecurity often leads to jealousy.  Some married couples will follow each other’s activity on Facebook and get jealous about what their spouse likes, looks at, and who they talk to.  In the past, married couples had only to worry about what their spouses did in the real world.  It was much easier to keep track of their whereabouts and much more obvious if they were doing something inappropriate.

Now that relationships are digitized, so is jealousy.

Difficulty Breaking Contact With Exes

Hopefully you and your partner cut off contact with your exes when you get married.  Besides putting your partner at ease, it also relieves you of a possible temptation.

With social media, it’s more difficult to have your exes out of sight and out of mind.  If you’re still friends with them, you see what they’re doing, who they’re with, and you have access to them pretty much 24/7.

In the past, people never had to deal with this.  If they wanted to contact an ex, they had to pick up a phone and call them or go and see them, If they wanted to see them, they actually had to go out and meet them.  Now, exes are rarely more than a click or two away.  Even if you unfriend them, you still see their face popping up on friends’ profiles.

Though you and your spouse probably aren’t planning on getting back together with your exes, the fact that it could happen is enough to cause jealousy and conflict.

Too much Talking on Social Media

Have you ever felt like by the time you actually see your friends or spouse in person, you have nothing to talk about?  It’s probably because you spend too much time talking to them on social media!  By the time you get home, you’ve already shared everything worth sharing via chat—which is a much, much less interesting and arousing way to connect.

If you and your spouse both have jobs where you’re on the computer all day, it may be difficult to not say hello.  Hello turns into an entire conversation and before you know it you’re spending your whole workday with your spouse.

It’s sucking all the juice out of your relationship!  Spend your work-time at work and your home-time at home!

Personal Interaction Builds Empathy, Digital Interaction Does not

This goes along with what we just talked about:  too much contact via social media.  The more you talk with your spouse on social media, the less you have to talk with them about in real life.  Face-to-face interaction builds love and empathy in a way digital interaction never can.

Wait until you’re together to share your news.  Avoid the instant gratification of the chat box and hold out for real connection.  The effects of social media on marriage is significant and should not be ignored.  Don’t let your marriage suffer by ignoring these factors.