Social media make people feel inadequate, jealous: Survey

Facebook, an online social networking site, and Twitter, a microblogging site, are two of the most popular social media sites with a whopping record of 1.23 billion and 241 million monthly active users respectively. According to Scope, a disability charity, 62% of the interviewed users of these popular sites felt inadequate after comparing other users' post with their own personal achievements. Furthermore, 60% of these users had expressed that these sites made them feel envious of other people's posts.

"Social media at its best is a great way to stay in touch with friends, have a chuckle and learn new things - as well as being the world's leading source of amusing cat pictures,"  said scope's project head, Debbie Bines. "But when things get out of balance and we start comparing ourselves to others, or feeling irritated, jealous or even ugly, it's got to be time to take a break."

Out of the 1,500 surveyed users, half of them talked about fully abandoning social media. However, they also realized that doing so would mean that keeping in touch with friends would become more difficult. This group of users are said to fall between the 18 to 34 age bracket.