According to the 302 most significant quantitative research studies on the relationships between social media use and mental health (most of them produced since 2013), the psychological process that most defines the Facebook experience is what psychologists call "social comparison." It is usually considered a natural and virtually automatic process that operates outside of awareness, "effectively forced upon the individual by his social environment" as we apply evaluative criteria tacitly internalized from our society, community, group, family, and friends. As one research review summarizes, "Almost at the moment of exposure, an initial holistic assessment of the similarity between the target and the self is made." As we go through life being exposed to other people, we naturally compare ourselves along the lines of similarity and contrast—I am like you. I am different from you—subliminal perceptions that translate into judgments—I am better than you. You are better than I.

Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Cap…, loc. 1470