Likes. 'Likes' have been a measurement in social media since the beginning of social media. As a society, we value 'likes.' And sometimes, we will do anything to get them.

'Likes' started from what seemed to be out of nowhere. After the reign of MySpace, Facebook took over, only allowing the option to 'comment' at the beginning of its program in 2004. A few years in and updates later, Facebook added the 'like' button, a thumbs-up to anything and everything, in 2009. In these months, Facebook users became obsessed with the idea of 'likes' leading them to take advantage of posting pictures and statuses they would never normally post. Soon enough, a 'like' became a measurement and changed social media. A few years later at the release of Twitter and Instagram, 'likes' became an addiction of young people; an addiction that has overtaken America's form of connectivity.

Before the introduction of the 'like,' Facebook users measured popularity by the numbers of friends of you obtained. In 2009, I was a freshmen in high school, and I remember sitting on my laptop unable to understand what a 'like' meant. But soon enough, it seemed like everyone (including myself) were posting things for the 'like.' As a 14-year-old girl, I was Facebooking lyrics like, "With lust in my eyes, I'll be undressing you with every word." I was 14. But why did I do it? For the 'likes.'

In our society, we've been obsessed with getting 'likes.' More times than not, we've heard our friends say, "Can you like my picture? It's only gotten 11 'likes' in 20 minutes." Hell, we've even said that ourselves. We've made it a game; a game that we hate to love. Why have we become completely fixated on 'likes?' What does this measure? Why is it so significant to us?

First, I want to play numbers game with ya'll. Currently, my Instagram (olivia_farkas) has 885 followers. My most current selfie was a silhouette of me in a frat (naturally), and this picture got 109 'likes.' Doing simple mathematics, if we divide 109 by 885, we get .123. Now let's take Kylie Jenner. She currently has 35.2 million followers so for the sake of my argument, we'll round down to 35 million. Her most recent selfie, in a white get-up, received 1.1 million likes (rounded down). If we take 1.1 million divided by 35 million we get .0314. Carry the decimals over by 2, we're looking at strict numbers. Twelve percent of my followers have liked my most recent selfie, whereas only about 3 percent of Kylie Jenner's followers liked her picture. We can factor in that probably a good 2 to 3 percent of her 'likes' on this picture are probably spam accounts, whereas none of mine are (bye Felicia). This all means that when talking numbers, I actually have received double the likes on my picture than Kylie Jenner in relation to my followers.

Now, why am I saying this? One big reason why we place such a huge importance on 'likes' is because we look at celebrities who are coined 'beautiful,' and 'photogenic' and compare them to our pictures. We say to ourselves, "Kylie Jenner did this and got 900,000 likes... let me do this too and see how many I get" (a la, 'The Kylie Jenner Challenge'). We do this unconsciously all of the time, and we have no idea that it's actually happening. Look at your Instagram pictures. Now compare them to your favorite peoples' Instagram pictures. Do you see resemblances in your facial expressions, the way your pictures are edited, or even the content of the pictures in general? Yup, I see your guilty smile all the way from here.

When Instagram first started, users used the filter Valencia to make themselves look tanner and gave pictures the "perfect lighting." It became a fast trend and I remember my friends would say to me, "Always use Valencia, we always use Valencia." And it was true. Using Valencia boosted my 'likes,' much like my friend's who used this filter, too. But to be honest, the percentage doesn't change much. Kylie Jenner averages about 1 million or less on each photo she posts, meaning that no matter how 'photogenic' or edited, she is still receiving the same amount of 'likes' on each picture. And as we try things to boost our 'likes,' ours stay relatively the same as well, even if one or two pictures has a spike in them. But aside from filters, we compare ourselves to these 'likes,' constantly trying to attain more of them. But this begs the question: why do we constantly feel like we need more 'likes?'

If you wanna talk science, this idea taps in our brain's "reward system," or more formally, our nucleus accumbens. This area of our brain regulates pleasure from food, sex, addiction, and yup, you guessed it, social acceptance. According to a blog post written by Courtney Seiter, called "The Secret Psychology of Facebook: Why We Like, Share, Comment, and Keep Coming Back," Seiter examines why we 'like.' The suggestions ranges to "we'll get something in return" to "to express virtual empathy," however, two points stood out to me; "to affirm something about ourselves" and "posting makes us feel more connected."

Now, at least one of you reading this just thought in your mind, "wait, what? I'm already so confident in myself, I don't need social media to show people who I am, and I do not need social media to feel happy. This clearly does not apply to me."

Well...it does, at least for the majority of us. In a study called "Does Posting Facebook Status Updates Increase or Decrease Loneliness? An Online Social Networking Experiment," researchers studied a group of students at the University of Arizona and found that when students updated their statuses more often, they reported lower levels of loneliness; this was even true when no one commented or liked their statuses. What this study showed is that social media makes us feel connected, in turn making us feel happy when we're just simply on social media.

However, though social media can make us feel like we're in better company, studies have shown that 'likes' actually hurt our self-worth. Social media, where 'likes' are in abundance, serve as a way of proving ourselves to others. This happens through a phenomena called "Facebook envy." Writer of the article, "Facebook Envy: How the Social Network Affects Our Self Esteem," Andrea Shea, interviewed psychologist and instructor at Harvard Medical School Craig Malkin, and he had some interesting insight: “This is something that keeps showing up in the research. Some people out there wind up negatively comparing themselves to what’s portrayed on Facebook by their friends.” He also states in this article, "...there are some themes that are emerging, and one of the clearest themes is when people go on to Facebook they’re often crafting a persona — they’re portraying themselves at their happiest. They’re often choosing events that feel best to them and they’re leaving out other things.”

My sister, currently 15 years old, is obsessed with 'likes,' probably like most teenagers who grew up in wake of the world filled with technology and apps and filters. She measures herself through 'likes,' and physical attributes mean everything. If she's not candidly laughing underneath an artsy filter, she believes there is no hope for people to think she is always candidly laughing and being happy. It's an odd idea; needing to prove to people that we're happier than everyone else. But does that prove that we're happy? Does the happier we try and look actually show how unhappy we really are?

'Likes' divide us as a society. They mean so much to us, but they mean absolutely nothing. Our brain retains a 'like' for a picture we see for seconds, but we don't remember that selfie hours later. I can't tell you how many times I mindlessly 'like' a day, but this mindlessness only allows us to care about ourselves. 'Likes' allow us to set a norm, placing others either at the norm or far below, determining who's worthy of following and who's not. 'Likes' determine beauty, success, and popularity but fail to acknowledge true qualities like intellect and kindness, creating a brand of ourselves featuring the superficial. The want for 'likes' says "tell I'm pretty, even if you don't mean it," "tell me you're jealous of me, even if you don't mean it," and "tell me I mean something to you, even if you don't mean it." That emptiness though, leaves us always insecure, always needing more. We never have a set number in our heads of when enough is enough, but that's because more is never more. But 'likes' are also a way for society to create their own fantasies, selfishly and unapologetically, while simultaneously not understanding that we're all living in fake online worlds, disconnected from reality and all of its true joys.

You know, I always have to question Instagram pictures that always look flawless; that looks like someone just-so-happened to capture a sorority girl blowing glitter or just-so-happened to look perfectly airbrushed and pimple-free when a picture was taken, clothing glowing from the settings of saturation and contrast. I always think to myself, this is too perfect; what are they hiding? And the saddest part is, we're all guilty of it, we're all trying to hid something by showing something else. But Malkin says, "The self is, to some extent, a story we tell. When people are choosing to leave out the normal chinks in human armor, the normal vulnerabilities, how can they again not feel like there’s something wrong with that?”