College students find ways of staying in contact with their contacts whether with email, phone, or instant messaging. How these students choose what media to use is an example of the Media Richness Theory. Based on communication patterns between the parent and child, the nature of the conversation, and other various situations along with media capabilities decide the type of technology used to bridge the distance.
Instance #1:
My mom and I communicate through email. It's quick. It gets to the point. I can bullet my words. No arguments about who said what when and how, question-answer. In this sense, the media richness theory applies because the lines of communication between my mother and I are unequivocal. Email is a form of "Leaner channel" as O'Sullivan states. In this case, I have "greater control over when and how to respond." My mom is more of a frequent contacter, with questions and concerns. Instead of getting 10 missed calls on my cell phone and an onslaught of questions, I can take my time and answer calmly. I am able to present myself to my mother on a more organized, calmer tone. I can also avoid showing my short temper. My mom chooses to email as well because she feels it is more direct, as opposed to when she talks. She can control the exact words she uses.
Instance #2:
With my father, however, I always call him. My father's English is not great. It's easier to express myself to him over the phone. Plus, the topics we discuss are just momentary thoughts and feelings. Talking over the phone is more expressive. This form of channel selection allows me to reveal much more thought and feeling to my father than simply with email or instant messaging. Most of all, speaking to my father over the phone satisfies my interaction strategy and impression management goals: to let my Dad know I miss him and that I'm doing fine. This form of media is a "richer channel" that is more credible, more effective in damage control, and give more feedback in terms of reactions. In this way, my Dad gets a better idea of what I'm truly feeling in how I respond, laugh, sigh, or talk.
For two similar interactions, I choose different channels to communicate based on the nature of my parents and equivocality of the situation (answering questions/tasks vs checkup/status report). This form of "ambiguity-clarity" dialectic that O'Sullivan refers to is very apparent between my Mom and Dad. With my Mom, I am more ambiguous in terms of my own situation, but the situation is clear. With my Dad, I attempt to clarify my own self and create openness, whereas the topic discussed is more ambiguous.
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Assignment #3: tournament media choices
For this assignment I decided to analyze a few interactions I had with teammates at an away tournament for my club sports team. Despite the fact that all 30 or so girls who travelled with the team all get along, there are a few cliques that inevitably form among the group. When I heard the assignment would be to analyze some social interactions I thought a travelling weekend with my teammates would be the perfect opportunity to pick out some interesting examples, because on the field, the 30 of us are one conhesive unit, while off the field this union does not necessarily hold true.
As teammates on the field together, all preheld judgements of looks, personality, or social status are ignored. This social atmosphere allows for very different interactions to be considered appropriate. A specific example that I was able to pinpoint was a moment where one of my teammates who I don't get along with at all in a social atmosphere scored for our team to tie the game. Despite my negative sentiments towards her personality, I ran across the field and jumped on her in congratulation. Obviously, I chose face-to-face, even body-to-body interaction to praise her positive effect on the team. However, later in the night, after the game had finished, we had changed into our evening clothes, and were getting ready to go out in a social situation, my feelings and social interactions with the very same person were entirely different. Among the team, my few close friends and I made plans to go out to specific bars. As a group, none of us can get along in a social setting with the tie-scoring teammate who we had so graciously congratulated only hours before. The question of how to avoid bringing her along became a debate among us. "Who's going to tell her?" "How are we going to say it?" In the end, I took the responsibility for the job, and decided that the best way to break it to her would be to tell a little white lie through a very lean channel (aka text message) that would not allow her to see my expression, distaste, or true feeing on the matter. Although this may be seen as immature, we concluded that it was simply the best way to handle the situation without affecting the team atmosphere.
Upon further analysis of these two interactions with the same individual I believe that both interactions strongly supported O'Sullivan's Media Richness Theory. In the first situation, I chose a very rich medium to communicate with a teammate. The situation was extremely emotionally charged (high valence) and despite the locus being outside myself, it had a direct effect on me personally so I had a desire to express my sentiments in a strong and clear manner. Running half way across the field when I was exhausted was not necessarily the most efficient social interaction I could have chosen, but according to O'Sullivan's theory the efficiency isn't the only factor taken into account when choosing a medium of interaction. In this instance I chose excitement and clarity over efficiency. The latter of my two interactions, despite being exactly opposite to the on-the-field example, also clearly supports the Media Richness Theory. The valence of the situation was quite strong- my close friends and I had strong feelings of wanting avoid the individual in a social situation. However it was a stronly negative feeling, and the locus was outside myself. Following O'Sullivan's hypothesis 1, I greatly prefered a mediated method of communication as it created a buffer that allowed me to avoid any hurtful or awkward situations. The choice of debating the issue with my friends, and carefully crafting the perfect little white lie certainly wasn't the most efficient medium to express our thought. However, it did allow us to hind behind the ambiguity of the method of communication to avoid an uncomfortable situation.
As teammates on the field together, all preheld judgements of looks, personality, or social status are ignored. This social atmosphere allows for very different interactions to be considered appropriate. A specific example that I was able to pinpoint was a moment where one of my teammates who I don't get along with at all in a social atmosphere scored for our team to tie the game. Despite my negative sentiments towards her personality, I ran across the field and jumped on her in congratulation. Obviously, I chose face-to-face, even body-to-body interaction to praise her positive effect on the team. However, later in the night, after the game had finished, we had changed into our evening clothes, and were getting ready to go out in a social situation, my feelings and social interactions with the very same person were entirely different. Among the team, my few close friends and I made plans to go out to specific bars. As a group, none of us can get along in a social setting with the tie-scoring teammate who we had so graciously congratulated only hours before. The question of how to avoid bringing her along became a debate among us. "Who's going to tell her?" "How are we going to say it?" In the end, I took the responsibility for the job, and decided that the best way to break it to her would be to tell a little white lie through a very lean channel (aka text message) that would not allow her to see my expression, distaste, or true feeing on the matter. Although this may be seen as immature, we concluded that it was simply the best way to handle the situation without affecting the team atmosphere.
Upon further analysis of these two interactions with the same individual I believe that both interactions strongly supported O'Sullivan's Media Richness Theory. In the first situation, I chose a very rich medium to communicate with a teammate. The situation was extremely emotionally charged (high valence) and despite the locus being outside myself, it had a direct effect on me personally so I had a desire to express my sentiments in a strong and clear manner. Running half way across the field when I was exhausted was not necessarily the most efficient social interaction I could have chosen, but according to O'Sullivan's theory the efficiency isn't the only factor taken into account when choosing a medium of interaction. In this instance I chose excitement and clarity over efficiency. The latter of my two interactions, despite being exactly opposite to the on-the-field example, also clearly supports the Media Richness Theory. The valence of the situation was quite strong- my close friends and I had strong feelings of wanting avoid the individual in a social situation. However it was a stronly negative feeling, and the locus was outside myself. Following O'Sullivan's hypothesis 1, I greatly prefered a mediated method of communication as it created a buffer that allowed me to avoid any hurtful or awkward situations. The choice of debating the issue with my friends, and carefully crafting the perfect little white lie certainly wasn't the most efficient medium to express our thought. However, it did allow us to hind behind the ambiguity of the method of communication to avoid an uncomfortable situation.
Singles Chat - Welcoming all genders
Entering a chat room as a woman brought a whole new target audience. When I signed up for a singles chat as “missnicegurl,” attention was automatically received. In real life, I am a 20 year old male but in the chat room I was a 20 year old female. Having the ratio of guys to girls now in my favor, the amount of individual chat sessions was alarming. Within the first 2 minutes of sitting idle in the chat room, I had 7 invitations for private conversations. After I dropped a simple hello, another 5 conversations popped up on my browser. I chose to pursue a conversation with a presumably male named “Cool guy.” He was trying to play the nice guy role but I could have been wrong and he actually was a nice guy. As we proceeded to chat, I kept my identity as hidden as possible with vague answers. He seemed pretty interested in getting to know each other, even after this being our first conversation.
With this being my first time doing the gender switch, I was on edge about how well I was playing the female role. As a male, I am completely unaware of the context and responses that a real woman would give, so I thought I had the possibility of being caught. As the conversation grew longer, I became more comfortable with the way I was responding and began to believe he didn’t suspect my identity switch. At the beginning, I thought keeping my responses brief and simple would keep him from knowing the truth but I am assuming that he was under the impression of my gender because of my screen name.
With the ability of changing my gender, I also had to change information about myself. I chose to reside in Manhattan, NY. I had recently moved here from Dallas, Texas because of a crazy ex boyfriend. Since being in NYC for the past 3 weeks, I was working for a local diner. Since I was trying to become someone that was new to the city and lonely, using key self descriptors was necessary. I began to say that since my recent break-up, I became lonely and was interested in meeting someone in the area. The attitude that I began to give off was that of loneliness. I portrayed myself to be a single woman living in Manhattan looking for someone to share my time with. This lonely little girl was reaching out to the world through online single’s chat rooms.
Revealing part of my personal identity and situation, I began to tell “Cool Guy” that he was apart of a class study. After informing him that he was really talking to a male pretending to be female and not a person from NYC, he began to accept the fact that he had been involved with a study and handled the situation well. With the lack of ability of seeing his (or her) real face, I am certain that they probably began to be more aware of the situation they put themselves in within the online chatting community.
With this being my first time doing the gender switch, I was on edge about how well I was playing the female role. As a male, I am completely unaware of the context and responses that a real woman would give, so I thought I had the possibility of being caught. As the conversation grew longer, I became more comfortable with the way I was responding and began to believe he didn’t suspect my identity switch. At the beginning, I thought keeping my responses brief and simple would keep him from knowing the truth but I am assuming that he was under the impression of my gender because of my screen name.
With the ability of changing my gender, I also had to change information about myself. I chose to reside in Manhattan, NY. I had recently moved here from Dallas, Texas because of a crazy ex boyfriend. Since being in NYC for the past 3 weeks, I was working for a local diner. Since I was trying to become someone that was new to the city and lonely, using key self descriptors was necessary. I began to say that since my recent break-up, I became lonely and was interested in meeting someone in the area. The attitude that I began to give off was that of loneliness. I portrayed myself to be a single woman living in Manhattan looking for someone to share my time with. This lonely little girl was reaching out to the world through online single’s chat rooms.
Revealing part of my personal identity and situation, I began to tell “Cool Guy” that he was apart of a class study. After informing him that he was really talking to a male pretending to be female and not a person from NYC, he began to accept the fact that he had been involved with a study and handled the situation well. With the lack of ability of seeing his (or her) real face, I am certain that they probably began to be more aware of the situation they put themselves in within the online chatting community.
Monday, September 10, 2007
Assignment # 3
My first interaction took place among the girls living in my apartment. Being that living in an apartment was a first for everyone of us, there was a lot for us to learn about communicating with each other. True, we had all been friends before moving in, but people tend to learn a lot more about others when living in the same apartment. For example, I was shocked to hear singing coming from the bathroom one day, but have now come to accept that this is a normal habit for one of my roommates to sing rather loudly in the shower. In one specific instance, one of the girls was upset because she felt like the other girls in the apartment had been eating all of her food. Instead of confronting us about it, she chose an alternative method of communication: email. I believe this decision was made because she wanted to express her feelings without having to speak to us face to face in order to avoid immediate confrontation. My roommate’s media selection fits well with O’Sullivan’s Impression Management Model. She was accusing others so the locus of control was directed towards others in a negative way. Therefore, her use of email showed her preference for more mediated interaction.
Another example involved me expressing my apology to a faculty member. Although the situation was a misunderstanding, I felt that it was necessary to apologize and explain myself because I would hate for others to have a bad impression of me as a person. Being that the circumstances were rather complex and ambiguous, I felt that a face to face interaction would be the best way in order to effectively communicate a true and heartfelt apology. In this instance, the Media Richness Theory applies to my choice of face to face interaction. Since the task of apologizing was not very clear cut and rather equivocal, I felt that it was important to utilize a rich media source. This type of interaction was rich because not only was I able to verbalize an apology, I was also able to convey it through facial expressions and through the tone of my voice, which are cues that cannot be conveyed in mediated interactions. In the end, I feel that my decision helped me to successfully communicate with the member of staff and change his negative view of me.
Another example involved me expressing my apology to a faculty member. Although the situation was a misunderstanding, I felt that it was necessary to apologize and explain myself because I would hate for others to have a bad impression of me as a person. Being that the circumstances were rather complex and ambiguous, I felt that a face to face interaction would be the best way in order to effectively communicate a true and heartfelt apology. In this instance, the Media Richness Theory applies to my choice of face to face interaction. Since the task of apologizing was not very clear cut and rather equivocal, I felt that it was important to utilize a rich media source. This type of interaction was rich because not only was I able to verbalize an apology, I was also able to convey it through facial expressions and through the tone of my voice, which are cues that cannot be conveyed in mediated interactions. In the end, I feel that my decision helped me to successfully communicate with the member of staff and change his negative view of me.
Assignment 3: Weirdos, Landlords and favors
Initially I opted for the first option, in which I would try to switch identities. I assumed the nickname 'vaulterchic' because I am a pole vaulter, and I am around pole vaulting girls and know a bunch very well, so I figured I would be the most believable that way. It worked just fine, people would ask for personal chats and the quick and dirty asl interaction would happen, then quite quickly, they would ask if I wanted to role play. I told the person that I was actually a guy and wasn't interested, they cussed me out, called me weird and just left. The second individual just signed off, and the third said 'weirdo' and signed off. I got fed up with it, and moved onto the second option.
For my second option, I had two great examples in the last 24 hours. I am in a very weird situation with my housing, which has led to an uncomfortable situation with our somewhat-former landlord. Essentially, we are no longer living in our leased house, someone else that our landlord found and signed in is, and we wanted to get back our last months rent and security deposits, because we do not trust him. In the past, we have done a mix of emails and some uncomfortable phone calls. This weekend, because it was not urgent, and because we do not like the message personalization of the phone medium, we chose email to address this. If like he has in the past, chooses to ignore this, we will be forced to call him and get an answer. This seems to follow both theories Media Richness and the Impression Management Model. As of now, it is moderately less equivocal of a task, and we don't need a personalized answer, so we choose a leaner medium, if however, he chooses not to answer, it will become more equivocal, and we will be forced to move to the medium with more availability of feedback, more personalization of the message, and more cues. It follows the Impression Management Model though because the valence of the interaction is going to be negative, and we want to avoid a rich medium because of it.
The other choice of medium that I had this weekend were for favors. I just booked a ticket to go home with my girlfriend (to Hawaii!) this winter. I was going to buy the ticket myself for over $800, a semester of groceries, but found out her father had a bunch of old northwest miles he does not want, because his company flies United now. I opted, while asking this favor of him to donate some miles to the surfing-on-xmas fund, to do a mix of a much richer and leaner medium. I used, because it was such an equivocal task, a very rich task, a phone call, because I wanted to be able to use all of the elements of richness to my favor. But at the same time, because it was about me, the self, I opted to have my girlfriend make the call, essentially choosing the lean medium for the locus because I preferred the mediated form when it was about me.
For my second option, I had two great examples in the last 24 hours. I am in a very weird situation with my housing, which has led to an uncomfortable situation with our somewhat-former landlord. Essentially, we are no longer living in our leased house, someone else that our landlord found and signed in is, and we wanted to get back our last months rent and security deposits, because we do not trust him. In the past, we have done a mix of emails and some uncomfortable phone calls. This weekend, because it was not urgent, and because we do not like the message personalization of the phone medium, we chose email to address this. If like he has in the past, chooses to ignore this, we will be forced to call him and get an answer. This seems to follow both theories Media Richness and the Impression Management Model. As of now, it is moderately less equivocal of a task, and we don't need a personalized answer, so we choose a leaner medium, if however, he chooses not to answer, it will become more equivocal, and we will be forced to move to the medium with more availability of feedback, more personalization of the message, and more cues. It follows the Impression Management Model though because the valence of the interaction is going to be negative, and we want to avoid a rich medium because of it.
The other choice of medium that I had this weekend were for favors. I just booked a ticket to go home with my girlfriend (to Hawaii!) this winter. I was going to buy the ticket myself for over $800, a semester of groceries, but found out her father had a bunch of old northwest miles he does not want, because his company flies United now. I opted, while asking this favor of him to donate some miles to the surfing-on-xmas fund, to do a mix of a much richer and leaner medium. I used, because it was such an equivocal task, a very rich task, a phone call, because I wanted to be able to use all of the elements of richness to my favor. But at the same time, because it was about me, the self, I opted to have my girlfriend make the call, essentially choosing the lean medium for the locus because I preferred the mediated form when it was about me.
Assignment 3: Channel Surfing - Choosing the Right Media
This past weekend, I paid more attention to how my friends and I were communicating with people to see what types of media channels we chose to use in different situations.
For instance, on Friday night, my mom asked me to call her after dinner. By the time my friends and I had finished dinner, we were already starting to get ready to go out. I didn’t want to have the 15-20 minute minimum phone conversation – I just wanted to get dressed and get ready with my friends. I saw my mom was online, so instead of calling her, I IMed her and was able to speak and get ready at the same time. I did not have to focus on the one conversation but was able to accomplish different things at once.
A second example of media selection was between my friend and her boyfriend. My friend got upset over text messages that her boyfriend sent her Sunday morning and didn’t understand the purpose or reasoning behind them. Later that day, he texted her and the message refuted what he had texted earlier that day. She texted him that she was upset and didn’t understand what he meant and wanted to actually speak to him. Over the phone, he heard how upset he was and offered to come over. They then spoke face-to-face and were able to talk about what happened and resolved the issue.
I think that my first example relates to The Media Richness Theory. Rather than calling my mom, I IMed her and I chose this media because of its efficiency. I didn’t want or need to have a lengthy conversation. It was fast and easy to IM her and saved me time because I was able to get ready to go out while talking to her. This example can also fit with Sullivan’s model - I was able to IM my mom rather than call her because I was just calling to talk – we did not have anything important to discuss. The locus was about me and it was positive so a mediated channel worked. I could get my message across just as easily through IM rather than the phone since there was no ambiguity or anything that needed clarification. Overall, with this example, efficiency was definitely my first priority, but I also see how I chose my media in terms of Sullivan’s model.
The second example definitely fits better with Sullivan’s model. My friend’s boyfriend used a lean channel (text) for a self locus and negative valence message. He used text messaging to buffer what he was saying. Then, my friend got upset because of the ambiguity of the message and chose a richer channel (the telephone) to try to understand what was going on. Hearing how upset my friend was on the phone, her boyfriend finally decided to make things clear and resolve the issue by choosing FTF communication. They were able to see each other, understand each other’s reactions, and have an open and honest discussion. In this case, in addition to efficiency, ambiguity and clarity played a major role in their choosing a media channel.
For instance, on Friday night, my mom asked me to call her after dinner. By the time my friends and I had finished dinner, we were already starting to get ready to go out. I didn’t want to have the 15-20 minute minimum phone conversation – I just wanted to get dressed and get ready with my friends. I saw my mom was online, so instead of calling her, I IMed her and was able to speak and get ready at the same time. I did not have to focus on the one conversation but was able to accomplish different things at once.
A second example of media selection was between my friend and her boyfriend. My friend got upset over text messages that her boyfriend sent her Sunday morning and didn’t understand the purpose or reasoning behind them. Later that day, he texted her and the message refuted what he had texted earlier that day. She texted him that she was upset and didn’t understand what he meant and wanted to actually speak to him. Over the phone, he heard how upset he was and offered to come over. They then spoke face-to-face and were able to talk about what happened and resolved the issue.
I think that my first example relates to The Media Richness Theory. Rather than calling my mom, I IMed her and I chose this media because of its efficiency. I didn’t want or need to have a lengthy conversation. It was fast and easy to IM her and saved me time because I was able to get ready to go out while talking to her. This example can also fit with Sullivan’s model - I was able to IM my mom rather than call her because I was just calling to talk – we did not have anything important to discuss. The locus was about me and it was positive so a mediated channel worked. I could get my message across just as easily through IM rather than the phone since there was no ambiguity or anything that needed clarification. Overall, with this example, efficiency was definitely my first priority, but I also see how I chose my media in terms of Sullivan’s model.
The second example definitely fits better with Sullivan’s model. My friend’s boyfriend used a lean channel (text) for a self locus and negative valence message. He used text messaging to buffer what he was saying. Then, my friend got upset because of the ambiguity of the message and chose a richer channel (the telephone) to try to understand what was going on. Hearing how upset my friend was on the phone, her boyfriend finally decided to make things clear and resolve the issue by choosing FTF communication. They were able to see each other, understand each other’s reactions, and have an open and honest discussion. In this case, in addition to efficiency, ambiguity and clarity played a major role in their choosing a media channel.
#3--My Attempt at Being Older, Wiser, Wittier etc.
I decided for this assignment that I wanted to be who I thought I would be at age 37 if my mom had her way: a high school teacher. My mom's whole side of the family is high school teachers: my mom, her sisters, her mom and dad, her cousins, her mom's sister, and her dad's brothers. It was a perfect answer for me to give, especially since I know what kind of work being a high school teacher entails, having graduated recently from high school.
I entered a synchronous chatroom at chat-avenue.com, under the chatroom category of "Adult Chat". I hoped my experience would contain grown-up, mature, and non-lewd discourse--a conversation in which I would be able to get to know my target well and hopefully see how well my impressions of a 37 year old would go by.
When I entered the chatroom, it was cluttered by the same sexually explicit comments, so I wrote "Is anyone 30 +?" so I wouldn't waste my time with people who would stop chatting with me once they knew my fake "a/s/l". (From previous experience earlier in the night, I found out the 30+ women category is largly discriminated against in internet chat.) Soon enough, JerseyGuy35 private messaged me and through conversing with him, I found what seemed to be a very polite and nice man. His name was Kevin. He was 35, from New Jersey, and self-proclaimed "shy" man.
In order to keep up the facade to Kevin, I asked him first about his job. This is what I assumed adults did. As students, we want to know what university and what major a person is in, and the older equivalent would be a job. When Kevin told me about his job as a UPS guy, I told him witty and completely fake teaching stories. I made up how I had one troublemaker named Joey who cheated during every test, and how I had dated the P.E teacher. Then, when he asked what I had done that afternoon, I said I went with some of the other teachers to a restaurant and ordered martinis, and then went home to grade papers. This is what I assumed people would think of teachers of doing on a stressful Monday night (although real-life experience with my family was completely different).
In general, I most clearly expressed my "ought self." I thought that being older would have qualities most closely related with my ought self--older people are more kind, compassionate, mature and moral. In turn, I was extra kind to Kevin. I also correlated being professional with being older, so I was sure to not put many exclamation points after sentences. I tried not to mispell many words, and made an effort to use correct grammer and punctuations. I even corrected Kevin's grammer when we used "your" incorrectly. I didn't use many emoticons, and made sure to sound a little distant and unsure of how how MSN messanger worked when asked if I had a MSN screenname. I also managed my impressions by telling Kevin actual truths about myself so I wouldn't slip up and get confused when he questioned me on a detail. For instance, I told Kevin that I was originally from Long Island (which I am) but I now live and teach in Western Upstate New York.
By the time our almost hour-long conversation had ended, I could not manage my impressions any longer. Poor Kevin was telling me sob stories about his loneliness at age 35, and how he wished he could talk to women, and how he felt so weak at his job at UPS delivering packages when he weighed only 130 pounds. I felt guilty at decieving him, and told him that I really was 20, and his allusions to a romantic relationship just weren't going to happen. He seemed genuinely hurt, saying "wow....wow...thats mean." Me, in my "actual self" tried to dispense to him words of wisdom that would give him the courage to talk to women. I truly did pity the man, and wished he would have more self confidence.
Since our chat conversation was one-on-one, it was easier to manage my impression. In a chatroom with many users, I might have been subjected to more scrutiny and more detailed questions that might have spiraled me deeper and deeper into more lies. The ideal self, the self that contains qualities we wish we had is easier to convey in this one-on-one settings for this reason. In this experience I also tried to use the "ought self" and I found it easier to act this way in this online space. Many people in chatrooms seemed pre-occupied with either fighting or exchanging pictures, so it was easy to act moral and posess values that many others weren't expressing at the time, especially since I already was "older" than almost everyone in the chatroom. The "ought self" I expressed contained many attributes of the "ideal self"--for instance I felt that since I was older, I should be more knowledgable, witty, and experienced. However, since the chat was pretty fast paced and near synchronous, many "actual self" qualities masked behind the fabrications I told. It was hard to keep up the facade of being 37 years old when a rapid response was demanded of me. However, Kevin didn't seem to notice or question the details I told him before revealing my actual self.
I entered a synchronous chatroom at chat-avenue.com, under the chatroom category of "Adult Chat". I hoped my experience would contain grown-up, mature, and non-lewd discourse--a conversation in which I would be able to get to know my target well and hopefully see how well my impressions of a 37 year old would go by.
When I entered the chatroom, it was cluttered by the same sexually explicit comments, so I wrote "Is anyone 30 +?" so I wouldn't waste my time with people who would stop chatting with me once they knew my fake "a/s/l". (From previous experience earlier in the night, I found out the 30+ women category is largly discriminated against in internet chat.) Soon enough, JerseyGuy35 private messaged me and through conversing with him, I found what seemed to be a very polite and nice man. His name was Kevin. He was 35, from New Jersey, and self-proclaimed "shy" man.
In order to keep up the facade to Kevin, I asked him first about his job. This is what I assumed adults did. As students, we want to know what university and what major a person is in, and the older equivalent would be a job. When Kevin told me about his job as a UPS guy, I told him witty and completely fake teaching stories. I made up how I had one troublemaker named Joey who cheated during every test, and how I had dated the P.E teacher. Then, when he asked what I had done that afternoon, I said I went with some of the other teachers to a restaurant and ordered martinis, and then went home to grade papers. This is what I assumed people would think of teachers of doing on a stressful Monday night (although real-life experience with my family was completely different).
In general, I most clearly expressed my "ought self." I thought that being older would have qualities most closely related with my ought self--older people are more kind, compassionate, mature and moral. In turn, I was extra kind to Kevin. I also correlated being professional with being older, so I was sure to not put many exclamation points after sentences. I tried not to mispell many words, and made an effort to use correct grammer and punctuations. I even corrected Kevin's grammer when we used "your" incorrectly. I didn't use many emoticons, and made sure to sound a little distant and unsure of how how MSN messanger worked when asked if I had a MSN screenname. I also managed my impressions by telling Kevin actual truths about myself so I wouldn't slip up and get confused when he questioned me on a detail. For instance, I told Kevin that I was originally from Long Island (which I am) but I now live and teach in Western Upstate New York.
By the time our almost hour-long conversation had ended, I could not manage my impressions any longer. Poor Kevin was telling me sob stories about his loneliness at age 35, and how he wished he could talk to women, and how he felt so weak at his job at UPS delivering packages when he weighed only 130 pounds. I felt guilty at decieving him, and told him that I really was 20, and his allusions to a romantic relationship just weren't going to happen. He seemed genuinely hurt, saying "wow....wow...thats mean." Me, in my "actual self" tried to dispense to him words of wisdom that would give him the courage to talk to women. I truly did pity the man, and wished he would have more self confidence.
Since our chat conversation was one-on-one, it was easier to manage my impression. In a chatroom with many users, I might have been subjected to more scrutiny and more detailed questions that might have spiraled me deeper and deeper into more lies. The ideal self, the self that contains qualities we wish we had is easier to convey in this one-on-one settings for this reason. In this experience I also tried to use the "ought self" and I found it easier to act this way in this online space. Many people in chatrooms seemed pre-occupied with either fighting or exchanging pictures, so it was easy to act moral and posess values that many others weren't expressing at the time, especially since I already was "older" than almost everyone in the chatroom. The "ought self" I expressed contained many attributes of the "ideal self"--for instance I felt that since I was older, I should be more knowledgable, witty, and experienced. However, since the chat was pretty fast paced and near synchronous, many "actual self" qualities masked behind the fabrications I told. It was hard to keep up the facade of being 37 years old when a rapid response was demanded of me. However, Kevin didn't seem to notice or question the details I told him before revealing my actual self.
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