Observatorio (OBS*) Journal (2022, Vol 16, nº4), 83-100 1646-5954/ERC123483/2022 83 Copyright © 2022 (Santana, Arriagada, Rodriguez-Hidalgo, Cancino). Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution- NonCommercial Generic (cc by-nc). Available at http://obs.obercom.pt. “I always share content to be seen”: Unpacking sociability affordances in youth motivations and strategies for sharing content on Facebook Luis E. Santana*, Arturo Arriagada**, Carmina Rodriguez-Hidalgo ***, Fernanda Cancino **** * Universidad Adolfo Ibáñez, School of Communications & Journalism (luis.santana@uai.cl) ** Universidad Adolfo Ibáñez, School of Communications & Journalism (arturo.arriagada@uai.cl) *** Universidad Adolfo Ibáñez, School of Communications & Journalism (carmina.rodriguez@uai.cl) **** Universidad Diego Portales, Sociology department (efe.cancino@gmail.com) Abstract Even though, in social media, the term “sharing” is a multifaceted construct – influenced by user motivations, expectations, and social benefits to be gained – there are few definitions that approach it around these terms. We analyze these benefits in terms of what we call sociability affordances - i.e., social network site (SNS) affordances that arise outside either the merely material or imagined affordances - which enable individuals to take social actions toward social integration and interaction. Semi-structured interviews with young Chileans from three representative social media use typologies showed that each were closely linked with the performance of sharing actions for intrinsic and extrinsic social integration and interaction gains. Coding of interviews found four main sociability affordances from sharing practices: social visibility; audience engagement; social strengthening and enduring intra- personal communication. This study finds that online sharing behaviors are carefully weighed upon to achieve either factual or imagined social gains. Keywords: Sharing, Sociability Affordances, Facebook, Social media, Motivations. Introduction A popular concept both in scholarship and everyday life, “sharing” involves a series of activities around social media, be this in reference to sharing personal resources, such as with cars or homes (John, 2016); or in the sharing of intimate daily-life moments, as occurs on Social networking sites (SNS) (Papacharizzi, 2011). This definition of sharing, however, is too broad for useful applications, meaning “too many things at once” (Lampinen, 2015). Indeed, even if we look only to sharing on SNS, the term continues to encompass a myriad of actions, motivations and gratifications. Here scholars have paid much attention to why users share personal content on Facebook and what they obtain from it (e.g., Johnson, 2008; April, Phua, Jin & Kim, 2017; Quan-Haase & Young, 2010); or to identifying the technological and material affordances of SNS which allow users to perform specific sharing actions (boyd, 2008; Valkenburg & Peter, 2007). Though several technological affordances have been identified – e.g., how visibility is amplified through social media (boyd, 2014), or how content shared on these sites persists, and is nearly impossible to erase (Peter & Valkenburg, 2013) – their technological focus ignores any particular social gains leveraged by these affordances, gains which may be simultaneously due to user perceptions, material results from sharing, and/or user imaginations. The present study seeks to build a bridge between user sharing practices and the social gains that they leverage by the mere act of sharing on social media. While we recognize that these gains are propitiated by SNSs´ technological affordances, we posit that there may be further affordances to be identified at the intersection of the material and perceptual.