Persuasion psychologist Professor B J Fogg has created a course called The Psychology of Facebook. Students at Stanford University in Silicon Valley can take the course, which ‘blends popular culture with the more time-worn principles of psychology’.
In terms of his reasoning behind starting the course, he says: “When Facebook came along I was one of the developers at the launch and what struck me was how there was this new form of persuasion. This mass interpersonal persuasion.” He said that a pivotal moment for him came when watching an application on the site go from “literally zero to more than a million users in a week”.
The class dissects a certain aspect of Facebook each lesson, from status updates, to news feeds, poking and writing comments. They study the way the feature works, the psychology behind it and what impression users are trying to convey.
It sounds like an interesting course, but surely by taking this course you are limiting your options a bit?! Apparently though, the course isn’t just relevant to Facebook, as “the psychology that drives Facebook relates to other online success stories, including those blockbusters yet to be invented.”
Read more about the course at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7357934.stm
Tags BBC course digital marketing Facebook persuasion Professor B J Fogg psychology Silicon Valley Stanford University students