Social media ostracism : "Ghosting "

A new psychological crisis has begun to emerge in recent years (since the emergence of social networks): Ghosting (popular name) and Social media ostracism (scientific name). These terms refer to the termination of a relationship (often an emotional relationship or a close friendship) by a sudden cessation of all communication from a party without any clear warning or justification, as well as avoiding, ignoring and refusing to respond in any way to attempts to communicate from the former partner. In the research done to examine the effect of sudden ostracism in social networks, it was found that the psychological impact on the person who has been expressed may be severe, because it threatens four basic human needs: belonging, self-esteem, sense of control and meaning.

The psychological response of the person who has been identified differs from the short term to the long term. For the short term, feelings of anger and desire for revenge appear, as the nature of the virtual world enables secret actions such as cyber-stalking, spamming, and cyber-bullying. In the long term, feelings of depression, loss of self-confidence, self-worth, loss of trust in the other and relationships in general may appear. On this subject, most research focuses on psychological impact on those who have been excluded, but it does not focus on what happens in the same person who has ostracized, the personality traits he carries, the reasons behind the act, and if the action has a psychological effect on him too.

Research on the psychological effects of communication networks has become numerous and numerous (for example, there is a search for the psychological effect of removing friendship -funfriending-on Facebook). However, this research is still in its infancy. The changes we are witnessing in our lifestyles, ways of spending time and building relationships, also have psychological effects and changes, we will understand more in the coming years.