The study demonstrates that users who are focused on close friends tend to experience an increase in self-esteem while browsing their social networks, but afterwards these users display less self-control.
Greater social network use among this category of users with strong ties to their friends is also associated with individuals having higher body-mass indexes and higher levels of credit-card debt, according to the study.
"To our knowledge, this is the first research to show that using online social networks can affect self-control," said researcher Andrew T Stephen from the University of Pittsburgh.
"We have demonstrated that using today's most popular social network, Facebook, may have a detrimental affect on people's self-control," Stephen said in a statement.
The study includes the results of five separate studies conducted with a total of more than 1,000 US Facebook users.
In the researchers' initial study, participants completed surveys about how closely they're connected to friends on Facebook.
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They were then split into two groups: one group that wrote about the experience of browsing Facebook and another group that actually browsed Facebook. Both groups then completed a self-esteem survey.
The participants with weak ties to Facebook friends did not experience an increase in self-esteem, but those with strong ties to friends had an enhanced sense of self-esteem.
Second study evaluated why Facebook users with strong ties to friends were more likely to experience an increase in self-esteem.
The researchers concluded that browsing Facebook only increased participants' self-esteem when they were focused on the information they were presenting to others.
"We find that people experience greater self-esteem when they focus on the image they are presenting to strong ties in their social networks," said Keith Wilcox from the Columbia Business School.