Would you believe it ..Your digital footprint says a lot more about you than you think ! - research


Would you believe it ….Your digital footprint says a lot more about you than you think !

Researchers at Cambridge University (study press release ) published at http://www.pnas.org/ distilled Facebook data to predict some personality traits or behaviours such as “sexual orientation, ethnicity, religious and political views, personality traits, intelligence, happiness, use of addictive substances, parental separation, age and gender.”  Well if you give off the signals (links, likes, pages) it is quite easy to determine….

The analysis is based on 58,000 volunteers who offered to share their Facebook “likes.” Using the information gleaned from Facebook, the researchers were able to accurately tell a man’s sexual orientation 88 percent of the time, whether they were white or African-American 95 percent of the time, and whether they were a Democrat or Republican 85 percent of the time. Even religious affiliation, specifically determining if a person was Christian or Muslim, was predicted accurately 82 percent of the time.

Intelligence was another trait researchers were able to accurately measure, and Facebook “likes” associated with intelligence included “thunderstorms,” “The Colbert Report,” a popular comedy show in the United States, “science” and “curly fries.”

Clues to lower intelligence were liking “Sephora,” a chain of perfume stores, “I love being a mom,” “Harley Davidson,” a popular manufacturer of motorcycles and “Lady Antebellum,” a popular country music group.

Before you ask, yes this can be used by corporations to better target potential consumers.