Interpersonal Communication- A Mindful Approach to Relationships, 2020a

and wanted to share a meme, but realized that many people you’re friends with on Facebook wouldn’t
find the meme humorous, so you didn’t share the meme. When you do this, you are negotiating your
identity on stage. You are determining and influencing how others will view you through the types of
posts you make, the shares you make, and even the likes you give to others’ posts.
In a study examining identity in blogging and the online 3D multiverse SecondLife, Liam Bullingham
and Ana C. Vasconcelos found that most people who blog and those who participated on SecondLife
(in their study) “were keen to re-create their offline self online. This was achieved by creating a blogging
voice that is true to the offline one, and by publishing personal details about the offline self online,
or designing the avatar to resemble the offline self in SL, and in disclosing offline identity in SL.” 47 In
“Goffman-speak,” people online attempt to mimic their onstage performances across different mediums.
Now clearly, not everyone who blogs and hangs out in SecondLife will do this, but the majority of the
individuals in Bullingham and Vasconcelos’ study did. The authors noted differences between bloggers
and SL users. Specifically, SL users have:
more obvious options to deviate from the offline self and adopt personae in terms of the appearance
of the 3D avatar. In blogging, it is perhaps expected that persona adoption does not occur, unless a
detachment from the offline self is obvious, such as in the case of pseudonymous blogging. Also, the
nature of interaction is different, with blogging resembling more closely platform performances and the SL
environment offering more opportunities for contacts and encounters. 48
Unlike traditional
FtF interactions,
online interactions
can blur identities
as people act in
ways impossible
in FtF interaction.
Andrew F. Wood
and Matthew J.
Smith discussed
three different ways
that people express
Figure 12.9 Types of Online Identities
their identities online:
anonymous, pseudonymous, and real life (Figure 12.9). 49
Anonymous Identity
Anonymous Pseudonymous Real Life
Identity
First, people in a CMC context can behave in a way that is completely . In this case, people
in CMC interactions can communicate in a manner that conceals their actual identity. Now, it may be
possible for some people to figure out who an anonymous person is (e.g., the NSA, the CIA), but if
someone wants to maintain her or his anonymity, it’s usually possible to do so. Think about how many
fake Facebook, Twitter, Tinder, and Grindr accounts exist. Some exist to try to persuade you to go to a
website (often for illicit purposes like hacking your computer), while others may be “catfishing” for the
fun of it.
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Interpersonal Communication