A cry for help? How the revival of online quizzes speaks to a lonely society.
As I scrolled through Twitter [now X] and TikTok over the past year, one thing became glaringly obvious to me — there was a rise in personality tests and filters. Thanks to the algorithm, I was made aware of this fact because of the surge in results being shared on my Twitter timeline and TikTok ‘for you’ page. On the former, people would tweet the results from their Attachment Style quiz, What Human Emotion Am I? quiz, Your Trauma Score quiz and I’ve even seen results from a quiz titled Wife Rating Scale Test. On the latter, depending on your ‘for you’ page, it is not an exaggeration to state that TikTok is flooded with personality filters (e.g. What is My Ex Doing Right Now, My 2024 Predictions, My Red Flags, Which Gossip Girl Character Am I) that allow people to get the results from these tests simply from scanning their face (seriously, all you need to do is turn your camera on and the filter will generate before stopping on a result influenced by your facial recognition). Granted, if you are not happy with the results of the filter on TikTok, you can always retake it and sometimes, even end up with a different result. God bless technology.
In my observation on the increasing numbers of results surfacing social media, I started questioning why people share their results online. Of course, for the most part, it is just mindless fun that people participate in, and it can be entertaining when your followers interact with your posts about your results. However, to take this one step further, I would argue that the influx of shared results on social media is a symptom of a lack of community, affordability due to inaccessible mental health services in the UK and loneliness. Before you say this is a reach, walk with me — or rather, keep reading.
Whether they are manifested in digital form (think: Myers-Briggs’ 16Personalities test) or physical form (referencing the pop-culture magazines we grew up on, think: Seventeen, Pop Girl, Cosmo Girl and such), personality tests are nothing new. Millennials and 90s born Gen-Zers have grown up taking at least one of these tests as an adolescent. The digitalisation of magazines, much like everything else, might have meant that we outgrew the physical act of putting pen to paper and completing these tests, but it did not necessarily mean that we stopped taking them now and again. And why would we stop? Though not all credible, personality tests can help individuals learn more about themselves; their strengths, weaknesses and blind spots. When we then go on to share the links to the tests or TikTok filter we have completed, in our group chats with friends and/or families, this can snowball into them taking the quiz too and sharing their results with us. Why? Because we want to learn more about the company we keep and how they would like to be understood. Though easily casted off as ‘mindless fun’, this simple act of sharing your results with your loved ones is intentional and the result of someone who is ambitious about their friendships and relationships. As we should all be!
The key thing to note here is that I focused on sharing results within a private space — group chats and private 1-to-1 chats. So, why are more and more people opting to share their results on social media instead of sharing them privately, with their friends and family?
Communities can be incredibly resilient after traumas. Just this week, a video of neighbours supporting one of their own after undergoing an emergency surgery for a ruptured ectopic pregnancy surfaced the internet and went viral. Unfortunately, not everyone can relate to this lived sense of community. In lieu of this reality, social media can be a vehicle for the lack of community. Sometimes, the strangers or acquaintances we come across online are more relatable and supportive than the people in our lives. Moreover, some people simply want to be liked. And there is no shame in admitting this. We should also stray away from shaming society’s ‘people pleasers’ — those who are more inclined to care about the opinions of others and disrupt society’s blasé attitude towards rejection. These individuals are likely to be victims of the ‘liking gap’ theory [which circulated TikTok last year]. The ‘liking gap’ theory acknowledges that “in nearly all of our social interactions, we tend to systematically underestimate how much others like us.”, a point which is supported by a 2018 academic study. What if I told you that people took personality tests and shared their results online to not only gain a better understanding of themselves, but to help others understand them and their needs. What if I told you that they shared their results online simply because they yearn for acceptance and attention — even if this came from a stranger online.
And so what if that is the case?
The copious amounts of quiz results being shared online is almost inevitable when the majority of people desiderate the warmth, stability and acceptance that comes from having a community. Whilst reading Tomorrow, and Tomorrow and Tomorrow, I was introduced to the German word Zweisamkeit. Which is the feeling of being alone even when you are with other people. A feeling I am sure many relate or have related to at some point in their lives. So, even if, on the surface, it may seem like one has a support system, the reality of this — at least, the desired aim is to have a safe space where you can speak freely when you are going through life’s turmoil — is far from true. Loneliness engulfs the shy, the confident and ambiverts. It doesn’t matter who you are, what your profession is, or your class, this is a feeling that does not discriminate. Loneliness is a product of the lack of community in people’s lives and a salient feature of the pandemic — which forced many of us into isolation. Why wouldn’t your friend seek acceptance elsewhere if they felt neglected in their real life?
From career goals, relationship goals, and personal goals, at one point or another, many of us (myself included) have taken the time to intentionally outline how we would like at least one of these aspects of our lives to improve. But not enough of us apply this ambition to friendships. Though often overlooked, sustaining friendships (real, genuine friendships) is an ambitious act and this perception should not be deemed as, or feel transnational. Though it may seem like mindless fun and the credibility of some of the quizzes and filters may be questionable, what harm could come from taking the time to listen more to your personality-tests-obsessed friend who shares their results? After all, they are quite literally giving you the answers on how to show up for them. We can all take steps to closing the loneliness gap by basking in the intimacy that’s invited when we make an effort with our loved ones.
Alongside the current cost of living crisis, we are faced with what feels like a perpetual cost of mental health crisis — meaning that now more than ever, it is imperative to close this gap. There is no doubt that therapy is a privilege, and I stress this regardless of whether you seek therapy through the NHS or privately. Those who cannot afford to go private, are subjected to a 3+ months long waiting list. Even if your income does allow room for a therapist, the increasing costs (because therapists are also affected by the cost of living crisis!) can still be painful, despite the fact that it is an investment. I say all this to say, for those who need to rely on the NHS and its arms length waiting list, personality tests and any activity that can invite intimacy and some degree of clarity, can somewhat fill the void during the months they are on the list.
When we interrogate the reasons behind people taking more credible tests like the Attachment Style quiz or the 16Personalities tests, they are not dissimilar to why people seek therapy. Which is to: unpack any unhealed trauma, understand themselves better (ultimately gaining more insight into why they are the way they are and how their individual experiences have shaped them) and to better themselves. Aside from the cost of therapy, another obvious contrast between these two forms of self care is that speaking to a therapist has the potential to make the journey to healing, learning and unlearning smoother because you have professional psychological assistance. Whilst there is only so much online tests can do, are we supposed to expect individuals to just deal with the inaccessibility of mental health services?
Yes, people could buy self-help books but guess what — books are costly too and to assume that everyone can afford to include this cost in their monthly budget during this cost of living crisis is privileged. Additionally, self-help books tend to hold a bad reputation with some people finding the jargon used in them to be pretentious and unnecessarily complex (it’s almost as though the authors aren’t aware that their audience might be regular people!?). Sometimes, we literally want experts to “explain it to me like I’m five”. Equally, it is vital to consider the possibility that some people do not seek professional psychological assistance out of choice for a multitude of reasons. Between the shame attached to therapy and 13% (UKCP, 2021) of people simply not knowing where to start or how to talk about their issues, it comes as no surprise that the general assumption is that therapy would make no difference. Likewise, there are individuals who have had therapy before, be it through the NHS or privately, and have found it did not improve their situation. Whether this observation from their experience is because NHS mental health services in particular tend to focus mostly on short term solutions (CBT — Cognitive Behavioural Therapy), is to be explored at a later date.
As I close this article, I think back to how the pandemic has shifted the ways in which we ask for support from our loved ones. You would think that during a time when everyone was practically in the same boat, this would ignite open conversations and a larger sense of community, rather than isolation. Rather, I fear that over time, many of us have adopted a loner mentality, believing that we burden those that should compound our support system. This is all to say that the rising personality test results on social media is reflective of a lonely society. I find myself noticing that I, too, like to hold on to new ways of getting to know the people around me. Whether this be from playing card games such as We’re Not Really Strangers or asking my friends/family to share the result of a personality test or TikTok filter, there is a type of intimacy that comes with the opportunity to learn more about your people. Equally, I can imagine that seeing the results of these tests floating on social media and seeing similar personality types to yours can provide some form of comfort. It serves as a reminder that you are not alone. During a time when you might be experiencing Zweisamkeit, there is some comfort in knowing that there are people who can relate.
