In today’s digital world, many married couples or even those not yet married are sharing an account on their favorite social networking site such as Facebook and email services. Some people frown upon this while some women find it a need to ensure that their partners don’t flirt with other women including their ex’s online.
This sharing of online profile has been confirmed by the latest survey of Pew Research Center. The study which surveyed more than 2,000 American adults revealed that indeed shared passwords, a joint email address and social media profile have become a trend among couples nowadays. Of the total respondents, 67 percent of couples shared a password, 27 percent shared an email account while 11 percent shared an online calendar and social medial profile.
Survey Says
What the Pew report found was that those in a longer committed relationships were more likely to create a single email account and social media profile. For instance, 14 percent of those who have been together for more than 10 years have a shared profile while only eight percent of partners in a relationship for less than 10 years shared a social networking account. With regards to email, 38 percent of couples together for more than a decade use a single email account, 24 percent of those together six to 10 years did so and only 10 percent of tosoe together for five years or less did so.
According to Pew, couples sharing digital space can mean a lot of things. They do it for practical reasons such as to save on cost for a Netflix or Amazon account, to spy on each other’s activities and emails or to let the whole world know that they’re a romantic couple.
But is it really necessary for a couple to create a joint social media or email account? And how can you possibly do this while at the same time maintaining your individual privacy online?
Useful Tips
When it comes to email, you and your partner can actually maintain your individual accounts. What you can do then is to create a joint account which you can use for correspondence related to things that both of you are interested in such as in buying books on Amazon or apps from the App Store. You can do this both on your personal computer and mobile phones.
If you use Gmail, you can also set up your joint Google calendar using your joint email account. This way, you can organize your activities and schedule appointments whenever necessary.
On social networking sites, you can do the same thing. You can choose to maintain your personal account and then just create a third account for your joint profile. But if both of you really don’t mind and you have nothing to hide from each other, you can just open a single Facebook account which you two can use any time you want to connect with friends.
There should be no issue, however, with sharing online accounts if you live in a transparent and healthy relationship said divorce lawyer Sandy Meade of Sevens Legal. Couples should not use it to pry on each other’s friends and activities as this could only lead to fights and an unhappy marriage later on. Sharing digital space does not also mean you’re giving up on your friends because you can still maintain your own circle of friends and even add more to that through your partner’s friends.
Overall, it’s a matter of choice. Sharing an online account has its benefits but on the other hand, it also has its disadvantages depending on how couples look at it. It’s best to determine your real purpose before creating a joint account.