Identity in a digital age

Much of my understanding of digital identity was founded in my studies into personal identity, whilst a student of social psychology. The work of William James and George Herbert Mead influenced my thinking, as did the study of sociologist Charles Cooley into 'the Looking Glass Self.' Essentially, in this hybrid early school of social psychology, known as symbolic interactionism, theorists tried to explain the influence of audiences/other people on the behaviour of individuals. It was a fluid theory that allowed for behavioural adjustments on the fly, as people saw themselves 'reflected in the eyes of the other' - the impact of what they were saying - as they conversed. Therefore, 'in order to develop and shape behavior, interactions with others must exist. People gain their identity and form their habits by looking at themselves through the perception of society and other people they interact with.' (New World Encyclopedia)

I did some research of my own back in the 90s based on the presentation of self in everyday life. Those who are familiar with the work of the social anthropologist Erving Goffman will recognise this as the title of one of his seminal works. Goffman saw social interaction as a drama performance, in which the actor's behaviour was framed by front stage and back stage roles, scripts, props and costumes. One of the most important, but often ignored features of Goffman's Dramaturgical Model is the presence of an audience, to which the actor consciously (or unconsciously) performs. This has great import in our understanding of how we perform to audiences in social media (of which more later in this post).

The research I conducted in 1994 involved a small team of psychology students and one of my friends, the actor and TV personality Matthew Kelly. Now a successful actor of stage and film, during the 1990s Matthew appeared on everyone's TV screens several times a week and was instantly recognisable. He was ideal for the study and when invited, he agreed to take part. We wanted to test out our ideas on the 'celebrity effect' in which people change their behaviour when they meet face to face with a famous person. In today's celebrity soaked society, where in Andy Warhol's terms 'anyone can be famous for 15 minutes', we are perhaps living in what Malcolm MacLaren dubbed 'the Karoake culture.' This means that just about anywhere, at any time, without warning, anyone can bump into a celebrity - there are enough of them about. Although it's possible, it's not probable, but there are occasions when this happens with no warning and no preparation, and you find yourself looking at a well known face. In such situations, people behave differently. They stare. Or they deliberately avoid staring. Either way, they know that they are sharing a space with a famous person, and can't help behaving differently. I was intrigued as to why this should be.

So we set up and conducted a naturalistic series of experiments in the high street of an English City. We wanted to know if, as Isen and Levin (1972) predicted, people would be more likely to help others if they felt good themselves. There was also research to suggest that helping behaviour increased depending on the status and influence of those present (Latane & Harkins, 1976). My study went something like this: In the experimental condition, two of us walked into a shop and posed as customers. A minute later, one of our team, an unknown person, walked into the shop accompanied by Matthew Kelly, and made straight for the counter. The unknown person showed the shop assistant a £10 note and asked if s/he could help by giving him some change from the till so he could make an urgent call home (this was in the days before mobile phones). We observed the interactions and timed the conversation. In a control condition, we also performed the same situation where two unknown people walked into similar matched stores and acted out the same scene. This same scenario was acted out 11 times for each of the conditions. We analysed the data from the 22 shops and saw immediately that there was a marked difference between the experimental (famous) and control (unknown) conditions.

In the control condition, our team was refused help (told they could not have change unless they purchased something) on 6 out of 11 occasions, and minimal interaction was observed between the unknown people and the shop assistant. In the experimental condition, on every occasion, the famous person and his partner were helped. If the shop assistants couldn't open the till, they found the change from their own pockets/purses or those of their colleagues'. Another interesting effect was that on each occasion, although the only speaking person was the unknown person, the shop assistants were observed answering Matthew Kelly, and maintained eye contact with him rather than the speaker. The unknown person was virtually ignored, even though he had initiated the conversation and was doing all the talking. Non verbal interactions such as smiling and nodding were also more numerous in the experimental condition than in the control condition, where minimal or no eye contact was observed between the shop assistant and the two unknown people.

From these statistically significant results (p<.005), I theorised that (in Goffman's terms) shop assistants who were in their rule bound front stage roles (e.g. I must not open my till to give change unless someone has made a purchase, because the note may be a forgery), were forced into back stage (relaxed and informal) roles prompted by a pleasant surprise. They broke their own rules, because they recognised the famous person (someone who perhaps they had seen often in their back stage informal roles in their own living rooms) and behaved in a way that was incompatible with the rules they would follow in their front stage, official and formal roles.

In my conclusions I noted: "The celebrity effect has obvious consequences for the promotion of pro-social behaviour. Front stage roles (rules) are subjugated by the desire of the actor (shop assistant) to appear helpful and pleasant to the well-known person. However, this helping behaviour occurs at the expense of anyone else who happens to be nearby. Attention is focused on the famous person, while the requests from others, although not ignored, become marginalised".

Applying this research in today's digital world, I wonder what the presentation of self in a social media world would entail. Applying Goffman's theory to the performance spaces of social media, we could cast a spotlight on videosharing services such as Youtube and text based performace spaces such as traditional blogs. Do bloggers see themselves as interacting with their audiences in a front stage context? If they do, then they will possibly be more guarded and less personable, avoiding as much self-disclosure as they can? On the other hand, if bloggers see themselves as performing in a less formal space, in a more relaxed style, are they then back-stage? Do they then feel licensed to self-disclose more personal information about themselves, or share their emotions, their beliefs? Perhaps the questions should be framed the other way around? Does self disclosure and informal sharing of personal information push bloggers into a back stage role, and what is it that enables some to do this? Is it the pleasant experience of having a large appreciative audience? One more question springs to mind - are bloggers who disclose information about themselves of a personal nature more readable (and more personable) than those who write whilst remaining in a front stage, formal role? These and other related research questions are of course, up for grabs for someone to investigate.

References

Cooley, C. H. (1918) Social Process. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons.

Goffman, E. (1959) The presentation of self in everyday life. New York: Anchor Books.

Isen, A. M. and Levin, P. F. (1972) Effects of feeling good on helping: Cookies and kindness. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 21(3), 381-8.

Latane, B. and Harkins, S. G. (1976) A multiplicative power function of audience size and status. In R. L. Atkinson, R. C. Atkinson, Smith, E. E., Bem, D. J. and Hilgard, E. R. (1990) Introduction to Psychology, 10th Edition. San Fransciso, CA: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich.

Image source by Ocadotony

Identity in a digital age by Steve Wheeler is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.