The Psychology of Facebook is Professor B J Fogg’s brainchild

A group of students at Stanford University right in the heart of Silicon Valley have now turned their attention and energies towards a unique and novel course, which blends the more time-worn principles of psychology with popular culture. The Psychology of Facebook is Professor B J Fogg’s brainchild.

He is a pioneering persuasion psychologist known for having founded the Stanford based Persuasive Technology Lab. He states:

When Facebook came along, I happened to be one of the developers at the launch. What struck me most was how there was this new form of persuasion - this mass interpersonal persuasion.

Professor Fogg states the defining moment came along when he saw an application on the web site move from ‘literally zero to over a million users in just a week”. He remembers that it was something to do with music sharing and buying tickets.

Where on earth could you draw a million customers in just a week? That was when I told myself ‘I must learn more about this’ and then I thought the best way was to teaching a class and looking at how persuasion happens.

1 Comment

1. Tara:

   Thanks for posting a link to the BBC article.

   If you or your readers are interested you can request to join the Facebook group for the class: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=22841903424.

   BJ Fogg
   Persuasive Technology Lab

   CommentbyBJ Fogg April 29, 2008 @ 5:53 pm

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