Social Media “Teleco-presence” Theory of Identity (original) (raw)

The Psychology of Social Networking. Volume 2: Identity and Relationships in Online Communities

Using a novel approach to consider the available literature and research, this book focused on the psychology of social media based on the assumption that the experience of being in a social media has an impact on both our identity and social relationships. In order to ‘be online’, an individual has to create an online presence – they have to share information about themselves online. This online self is presented in different ways, with diverse goals and aims in order to engage in different social media activities and to achieve desired outcomes. Whilst this may not be a real physical presence, that physicality is becoming increasingly replicated through photos, video, and ever-evolving ways of defining and describing the self online. Moreover, individuals are using both PC-based and mobile-based social media as well as increasingly making use of photo and video editing tools to carefully craft and manipulate their online self. This book therefore explored current debates in Cyberpsychology, drawing on the most up-to-date theories and research to explore four main aspects of the social media experience (communication, identity, presence and relationships). In doing so, it considered the interplay of different areas of psychological research with current technological and security insight into how individuals create, manipulate and maintain their online identity and relationships. The social media were therefore at the core of every chapter, with the common thread throughout being the very unique approach to considering diverse and varied online behaviours that may not have been thus far considered from this perspective. It covered a broad range of both positive and negative behaviours that have now become integrated into the daily lives of many westernised country’s Internet users, giving it an appeal to both scholarly and industry readers alike.

Social Media Me: A Phenomenological Study on Identity when using Social Media Identity

The aim of this study was to understand how two Participants, one Female and one Male, viewed their Identity when using Social Media Websites. Various aspects of Self and Identity were explored during the research phase, along with Embodiment (a feature of the Participant’s Lifeworld), Social Media as a Cultural Tool, Identity Construction, Self-Presentation, and Avatar creation. Social Identity Theory also helped to inform the online Social Groups people affiliate with. The Methodology used was an Interpretive Analysis of two semi-structured interviews, to elicit the participant’s personal view of their Identity when they were online. The two participants were known to the interviewer to utilise existing rapport and help with the interview process. The main themes to emerge from their interviews were: That their Identity was informed by using a Cultural Tool, more specifically Receiving Information and Communication and Expression, and that their Identity/Personality informed the way they used Social Media. The conclusions drawn from this are that although there are several areas where the participant’s identities were reflected in their use of social media, through their posts and the information they gathered from different news sources, there was a disparity between the Online and Offline Self that is bound into the way Social Media is constructed and used.

The Effect of Social Media on Identity Construction

The social media platforms have a growing importance in our lives since they are the places where we "showcase" our living experiences. They also reflect a variety of dimensions regarding our position in the virtual and physical social life. Both of these factors make people to play certain characters in the social arena. The Social Network is gaining more and more importance in today's world and has a deeper impact on the society as to the traditional media. Social media enables identity expression, exploration, and experimentation; something natural for the human experience. It is the agencies in real life, which provide a source of names for different sectors, that inspire the internet communities and the interactions they make within themselves. It is essential to comprehend the motives of agencies to have an understanding of the group interactions on social platforms. The enable individuals present themselves to others and determine the way they would like to be perceives in addition to helping them connect and interact with people, and participate in the activities they wish. Communicating online offers many ways to connect with others: individuals may or may not use their real names, and they can open as many accounts as they want to. This study explores practical aspects of identity construction, relating to issues virtual communities and social media. It also analyzes the probable reasons that individuals feel the need to create a virtual identity for themselves as well as "the spiral of transformation", that is, the creation period goes ahead of the internet to reach the real life. This study also aims at concentrating on the virtual communities appearing in the social networks while questioning their social and cultural qualities and values.

Social Media and the Problem of Identity Construction

For centuries, humans have used their interaction with one another to help shape outsiders' perceptions of them. Often communication experts refer to this as constructing one's "social identity." For many years, this projection of self came through interpersonal communication --face-to-face communication --or other forms of personal interaction. In the progress of technology, this development of one's personal attributes has come to include photographs, letters, published and unpublished writings, hearsay, and physical attributes. Many aspects of a person's "identity" as others see it are difficult and almost impossible to define. In the modern age, such vague characteristics are both helped and hindered by using social media and the internet to "construct" our identities. Social media such as Facebook, Twitter, Fotolog, Photobucket and LinkedIn help contemporary users develop profiles to project images and facts they would like the public to see. Identity can be constructed with the use of social media; however, it can also be falsely projected, thus causing misconceptions about oneself or misconceptions about others. Therefore, the invention and widespread use of new technologies such as social media has created a new definition of "personal identity" that accepts both realistic and facaded characteristics, but can ultimately destroy one's true "self" and reputation.

Formation and Control of Identity: In a Social Media World

2018

This chapter explores the construction of identity in online communities and websites for social purposes, and its consequences in terms of how one’s online identity may be utilized to such an extent that one’s real-world identity is either enforced or eroded. It does so by investigating the very nature of identity, coming predominantly from a cultural studies research and philosophical view, although it also cites some related findings and advances in computing and information systems (IS) research. The central argument across the chapter is two-fold: firstly, in promoting an initial shift in focus from the management of online identity to the nature and significance of identity itself whose construction may be conceptualized as a process of sense making and strengthening; and only then, armed with a better understanding of identity, one can focus back upon the management of it more effectively, with a view to the individual taking more control of their own identity within cyberspa...

Digital identity formation: Socially being real and present on digital networks

Educational Media International, 2016

Social networks have become popular communication and interaction environments recently. As digital environments, so as ecosystems, they have potential in terms of networked learning as they fulfill some roles such as mediating an environment for digital identity formation and providing social and emotional presence. Based on this phenomenon, the importance of identity formation as a sociological and psychological process was explained throughout this study. Following that, social networks as digital social ecosystems and learning environments in which self-actualization, self-presentation, and self-disclosure of the individuals were discussed and their necessity as well as their potential for social and emotional presence was explained to better understand social networks. Besides, social networks and “Facebook” as a case were examined. Within this perspective, the purpose of this study was to explore online social networks with an emphasis on learning; to put forward its educational premises; and to analyze digital identity formation, social presence, and emotional presence in social networks.

THE HOLLOW USER: THE PRESENCE OF IDENTITY CONSTRUCTED ON FACEBOOK

During the last ten years the use of social media has greatly increased: social networks, especially, are widespread among a large amount of people, of different ages and gender, and from all over the world. Our presence online involves a great part of our time, and this kind of instant communication has been integrated in our lives: from the accomplishment of tasks, passing through the sharing of contents, news, information from every field, until interactive discussions and exchange of opinions, sending messages. The first necessary function, though, to be a part of this particular cyberspace, is the construction (or re-construction?) of our identities through the building of the "user profile", which is supposed to be our mirror online, and the public presentation of it. This new presentation of self in everyday life, to say with Goffman's words, has become a new dimension of the Self, a (social) presence in the cyberspace achieved through the presentation of our self, and through the interaction of it with the cyber-world of the others. This paper investigates specifically the case of Facebook, the network where the phenomenon of identity is clearly in evidence.

The Renegotiated Self: Social Media's Effects on Identity

Stacey Koosel’s PhD thesis is a collection of articles that explore the effects of social media on personal identity. The communication of identity narratives online has become abundant with the increasing popularity of social media. Social media enables users to build profiles based on their personal identities, making identity play a primary source of entertainment in the information age. Topics such as privacy, ethical use of information, authenticity, social control, self-expression, self-censorship and other media affordances have all, subsequently, become important issues. The topic of ‘identity’ is used as a framework through which social media use can be analysed. The cultural phenomenon of digital identity is explored in a collection of seven articles using different approaches, including media ecology, the philosophy of technology, virtual ethnography and artistic research. The articles raise questions about the ideology of identity creation in social media, by interviewing artists on how they use Facebook, pointing out paradigm shifts and paradoxes in contemporary culture and the discussion of other research in the field of digital culture.

Cover, Rob (2012). ' Performing and Undoing Identity Online: Social Networking, Identity Theories and the Incompatibility of Online Profiles and Friendship Regimes.' Convergence 18(2): 177-193.

This article aims to expand the critical frameworks by which online social networking can be contextualised and understood within the broader cultural practices of identity and selfhood. Utilising Judith Butler's theories of performative identity, it is argued that the use of social networking sites are performative acts in and of themselves. Two facets of social networking are examined from theoretical and critical perspectives: (1) the use of social networking profiles (Info pages, taste selections, biographies) as a tool for performing, developing and stabilising identity as a narrative in line with cultural demands for coherence, intelligibility and recognition; (2) identity performances that occur through relationality among online friends through list maintenance and communication (wall posts, tagging, commentary), and how identity is reconfigured within a network morphology. Finally, the article aims to open discussion around the broad cultural practices and implications of online social networking by developing some theoretical approaches to understanding the incompatibilities between these two facets which compete and risk the 'undoing' of online identity coherence. Within the framework of the growing use of social networking sites as one area in which our selfhood and subjectivity are performed, this incompatibility and undoing has both risks and benefits for future the cultural production of identity.

Constructing identity on social networks. An analysis of competences of communication constituted on Facebook.com

Central European journal of communication, 2012

Tendencies of mediatization, globalization, commercialization etc. in modern societies cause a loss of relevance of traditional agencies of socialization. Individuals are increasingly challenged to enfold their socialization on their own. Media products become highly relevant for an individual's socialization. To be able to manage the demands of socialization, the individual needs to develop sophisticated competences of communication. The competences of communication enable the individual to identify and reflect his/her personal needs. Identity is conceived as the realization of an individual's competence of construction of communication in interactive situations. Online social networks such as Facebook.com provide spaces of communication, in which individuals can work on their identity in processes of interaction. By methods of network analysis this research explores the impact of structures of social networks on the individual's competences of communication and, hence, the impact on identity constructed on social networks.