I find Facebook’s terminology a little ambiguous – it seems “friend request” can be one sent TO me or one sent FROM me. I’m trying to find with certainty which these are:
The column is titled “Respond to Your [number] Friend Requests.” The options to click on for each one are “Confirm” and “Delete Request.” Are these definitely requests sent to me from the individuals listed, and not in any way related to my making a request?
They’re friend requests to you, yes.
Presumably you’re a new facebook user? When you signed up, if you uploaded a profile photo Facebook did facial recognition on you, and if it finds a match on other people’s photos then it might prompt them to send you a friend request. “blah blah is a new user, help them find their friends”. Of course it also looks for matches in names and email addresses and mobile numbers in gmail, your contacts list etc etc if you let it.
When people you know/like send friend requests to you you can “confirm” (accept) them, and you’ll be friends.
Some friend requests will be from people you do not know or do not want to know. Some will be spam. If you choose not to be friends with these people you “delete” their request and it will disappear from your list.
The friend requests you made will not show up in the confirm/delete list.