Facebook page can reveal your personality

Washington, July 16 (ANI): You have already revealed some of your secrets when you use Facebook.

It's not just what you post on the social networking site, but how you post it that tells what kind of person you are.

That's according to researchers at the University of Missouri who have developed a new scale that judges people's personality based on how they use the popular social media site.

The scale reveals that those who like high-risk activity tend to update their status, upload photos and interact with friends frequently. On the contrary, those who are more reserved tend to merely scroll through Facebook's "news feed," and don't upload photos or actively engage with their friends.

Missouri doctoral student Heather Shoenberger developed the scale after surveying people about their use of Facebook and having them take a personality test.

Those who leaned toward high-risk activities were labelled as "appetitive," with those who were more reserved in their activities labelled as "aversive."

While both personality types use Facebook frequently, Shoenberger found significant differences in how each uses the social media site.

"If you're highly ' appetitive ' or lean toward high-risk activities, you're more likely to want to engage with media that are more exciting, whereas those who are higher in the 'aversive' trait tend to enjoy safer and more predictable media experiences," Live Science quoted Shoenberger as saying.

The scale could help advertisers target online audiences easier, according to Shoenberger.

"I believe this could really help advertisers and certain types of media groups target potential customers with particular ads on social media sites," Shoenberger noted.

"Identifying these individuals using the motivation activation measure can give advertisers an advantage over their competitors and bring some order to online advertising," he explained.

The study was recently presented at the International Communication Association Conference in Phoenix. (ANI)