From social networking to just plain old social

Josh Chiles is shy. In a gathering of unfamiliar people, he oftenwaits for someone, anyone, to ask him a question or make small talk.

At a party, bar or restaurant, "I just sit there, hoping someonewill talk to me," he said. "I wait."

But on Facebook, the 32-year-old Woodbridge resident is Mr.Personality. He constantly refreshes his status, comments on others'updates, posts pictures, makes jokes and registers his likes. Moreimportant, when he sees his digital connections in person, he said,his shyness often disappears.

"There is no doubt that Facebook has improved my life in buildingrelationships with other people," Chiles said.

Chiles is, in many ways, the face of a counterintuitive newstream of research examining whether social networks, particularlyFacebook, are for shy people what water is for the thirsty. Thestudies, with such titles as "The Influence of Shyness on the Use ofFacebook" and "Shyness and Online Social Networking Services,"grapple with an important question: Can the Age of Oversharing bringthe shy and lonely out of their cocoons?

The findings have been tantalizing. Recent studies have shownthat shy people are spending more time on Facebook than moresocially confident people are and that the shy report highersatisfaction with the service than do others. Shy people reportfeeling closer to friends on the network than the non-shy say theydo. One study, published in the journal CyberPsychology, Behaviorand Social Networking, showed that the Internet and social networkshelped lonely children fill "critical needs of social interactions,self-disclosure, and identity exploration."

Although some experts consider Facebook just a crutch for shypeople to avoid human contact, many therapists are embracing thetechnology as a tool that can open social avenues for shy clients."What we are seeing is that for a lot of shy or socially anxiouspeople, Facebook seems to be getting the ball rolling," saidJonathan Dalton, a therapist at the Behavior Therapy Center ofGreater Washington who counsels such people. "Facebook can be usedmore as a bridge."

Even in the slow-connection days of dial-up Internet, the shy andlonely gravitated toward online communication. Hiding behind screennames, they communicated in chat rooms with other screen names,typing back and forth for hours. Early iterations of AOL boastedthousands of chat rooms, and use at night - after the shy and lonelycame home from work - spiked. Dalton said he had clients who wouldtell him that their best friend was someone in some distant place,someone they had never met.

Facebook, with its 600 million members, is different. Built by aknown shy person - Mark Zuckerberg, who sometimes sweats profuselyin TV interviews - the site encourages people to broadcast intimatedetails of their lives: where they are from, hobbies, favorite TVshows, relationship status, pictures of family, favorite books,jokes, views on religion and politics.

These details are the fabric of everyday conversations and thekindling for relationships. But for shy people, divulging orlearning such intimate information is stress-inducing. Some mightnot try at all, while others might try but blush or sweat, then pullback.

"Shy people have difficulty finding topics to talk about," Daltonsaid. "Facebook gives you a starting point."

Social networks such as Facebook make such information availablein non-threatening ways, allowing shy people to learn and sharewithout fear of being judged on looks or whether they sweat or blushwhile they talk. In a study published in the Journal of Social andPersonal Relationships, Levi Baker of the University of Tennesseenoted: "Given that learning about others and disclosing personalinformation often leads to greater intimacy, using social networkingservices that allow personal information exchanges may facilitaterelational development."

"If you avoid people, you isolate, and if you isolate, you arelonely," said Mary Alvord, a Montgomery County psychologist with aninterest in social networking. "I am all for anything that can helppromote interaction, to start the process."

That was the attraction to Facebook for Ian Luria, a 27-year-oldstudent in Arlington County. He had gotten to the point of avoidingmost interactions. "My shyness really prevents me from approachingpeople," he said.

He feels less inhibited on Facebook, where he has more than 230friends and posts almost every day - funny videos, interesting newsstories. He even used the site to ask out a girl. He wasn'tsuccessful, but still, he asked, and that was progress.

"I think Facebook has really enhanced my life," Luria said. "Itallows me to connect with people I wouldn't connect with otherwise."

Other shy Facebook users and some therapists are not as convincedof the site's benefits, pointing to the downside of relying too muchon social networks.

A 33-year-old woman who works in social services in the District -she asked that her name not be published for fear of beingembarrassed - said Facebook has made it easier to have conversationsaround the office with people whose pages she has studied on thenetwork.

"You can see what they like, and that helps you approach them,"she said. "It facilitates a conversation."

But although she's up to 180 friends on Facebook, "I still feellonely," she said. "I don't feel like I have 180 friends. It's notlike I have 180 friends that I can go hang out with. I don't think Ihave this great social life because I have 180 friends."

Indeed, Baker's study found that even though Facebook deepenedrelationships, many shy users still reported feeling lonely. Expertssuggest that this could be because some shy people are usingFacebook as a crutch, feeling more comfortable with digital friendsthan personal ones.

Facebook may be better at easing shy people's discomfort withpeople they know than making them at ease with people generally.

"Someone who uses Facebook might be less anxious with that personface-to-face, but they may not be learning to feel less anxious whenmeeting other people at a party or church or an athletic game," saidLarry Cohen, a District social worker who counsels shy and sociallyanxious people. "In fact, anxiety might increase in those cases"because the people don't have the information they glean fromFacebook to fall back on.

Cohen said he has seen anxiety increase among some clients whouse Facebook because they focus too much on how many friends theyhave, worry that others aren't posting enough items on their wallsor fret about what to write in their status updates, just as theyagonize over what to say in person.

Cohen suggests to clients that beyond using Facebook, they shouldsign up for services such as Meetup.com, which arranges in-personmeetings for strangers with common interests. In the District, thereis a Meetup group for the shy or socially anxious.

"Overall, I think Facebook is a mixed bag," Cohen said. "Thebenefits are more obvious, apparent and immediate. But thedownsides, at least at first, tend to be less obvious and deeper inthe long run. We are really just beginning to understand all ofthis."

rosenwaldm@washpost.com