A Cornell University study recently reported that birds of a feather actually do flock together on the social media website Twitter.

After studying 102,000 Twitter users over six months, the study reported that happy Twitter users associate with other happy users, and the same goes for unhappy users.

The study followed these users’ “subjective well-being,” which is a measure of the person’s happiness based on the words used in their tweets. The SWB of Twitter users matched the SWB of those they tweeted with in an overwhelming number of incidences.

UNA student Claire Swindle, known on Twitter as @ClaireSwindle, said that she uses Twitter to connect with friends and to follow bands, not to air her grievances.

“I try not to tweet negative things,” Swindle said. “Nobody cares [about the negative comments].”

If you are a student who only knows Twitter as “shorter Facebook statuses,” UNA webmaster and operator of UNA’s social media outlets Jeremy Britten, Twitter username @abstractrandom, has provided some advice on Twitter and its possibilities.

“I would say there are a lot of people that misuse Twitter: those people who just use it to say, ‘I’m going to the bathroom,’ or ‘I just ate a piece of cake,'” Britten said.

Britten said that while Twitter got a bad reputation for just being used for useless Tweets like the aforementioned, it is actually a great resource.

“Twitter is a great way to communicate with other people and to find out what’s going on in the community,” Britten said. He said that he connects on Twitter to people at other universities who hold the same position he holds at UNA. He views Twitter as a way to gather and share information quickly.

Before he tweets something, Britten said that he asks himself, “Is this something my followers need to know?”

Britten said that Twitter and other social media outlets are not the only ways to stay connected to other people, but they are a way for employers to screen potential employees.

Britten said that if he were an employer, he would absolutely Google potential employees to view their social media accounts including Twitter, Facebook and blogs.

Britten said that anything your name is linked to can be found with a simple Google search, and social media outlets are one of the first things employers check when screening potential employees.

To follow happenings at UNA, Britten advises students to check out the Twitter account, @north_alabama, as well as checking the UNA page on Facebook.