Friendships, intimacy and digital intermediation in adolescence

This article examines how young people regulate intimacy and friendships through their use of social media. Based on two surveys conducted on 12- to 18-year-olds, we show how they appropriate the technical features of these platforms to set the norms of their friendships and manage their private lives. We then show that this modelling is frequently challenged by issues related to preventing the dissemination of personal details, the quest for social prestige, and peer pressure. Finally, the tensions and controversies running through their digital lives sometimes give rise to ambivalent forms of mediation by certain young people who take on the role of intermediary. These relational dynamics hint at the outline of an emerging regime of socio-digital diplomacy between peers, which this article explores.