Impression Management, Social Media, And Self Perception

Since the Bulletin Board System there has been hundreds, and counting, of social networks created: most notably Twitter, Facebook, Kik, Snapchat, and Instagram. Today there are just over 3 billion active Internet users (45% of the world’s internet users), 2.1 billion of those people have social media accounts (Jeffbullas.com). People use social media for many numerous reasons. Most use social media to stay close to relatives and maintain social ties. Some of people’s most essential daily needs are accounted for by social media: whether it be interacting with friends or coworkers, following politics, or following the latest fashion trend set by the Kardashian

Social media has become one of the most dominate things in the lives of today’s youth. Millennials use social media for many reasons, to stay connected and as a source of entertainment. Among all the social media sites, one that is particularly popular is Snap chat. Most college and high school students check this app before twitter, Instagram, Facebook. Instagram noticed this trend early and tried to buy out snapchat, but their attempt failed and now snapchat has not only influenced its opens to copy its stories idea but also almost copy the format exactly. In my paper I will discuss two different articles that both focus on the topic of snap chat usage. I will also contrast these two articles and reveal how they have similar findings but different approaches.

In today's generation, most young, female, teenagers have problems with the way they look, their appearance, or their bodies. Females have a lower self esteem already without society and social medias pressure to conform. Self esteem is a realistic respect for or favorable impression of oneself; self-respect. Males generally have higher self esteem level than females, therefore, more adolescent females struggle with eating disorders, self esteem issues, and often thoughts of suicide. Research and evidence suggests that a majority of young females lack of self esteem comes from social media and society's pressure to have a perfect body, or appearance and if females do not then we should conform to the standards placed before females by social media and society. In my opinion being a teenage girl in today's generation is so hard because so much is expected from adolescent females. Young females are expected to achieve beauty, intelligence, and social standards in a world that is constantly tearing down every movement women make toward independence. Social media and society does put pressure on young women to look a certain way, and if they do not achieve this look like the world portrays as beauty then their self esteem begins to drop in young females.

“People can take their time when posting information about themselves, carefully selecting what aspects they would like to emphasize (Gonzales 80).” By controlling what information and self-attributes to share with the online world, an individual may present an idealized version of self that would not align with societal perceptions in the face-to-face interactions. Furthermore, Gonzales notes that recent research in computer-mediated communications suggests that online self-presentations can alter self-perceptions (80). As Orenstein says, “I tweet, therefore I am.” The online presentations of self can become the reality, or idealized reality, of the

In this day and age it is not uncommon to see a family at dinner with their heads in their phones instead of submersing themselves in conversation with one another. Friends and family alike know more about each other by looking at ones Facebook wall rather than by holding a simple conversation. Ones life is no longer played out by communicating face to face or even through a landline, but rather by Facebook statuses and Instagram posts. It is no secret that social media has become

Nowadays it is not uncommon that almost everyone has at least one profile on some sort of social networking site. The reason? To not feel left out. We post online to share what we are doing and how we are feeling. However, social media has influenced us in ways that were not initially planned. Our identities, the concept of what makes you, yourself. Identities are constantly evolving due to social media. We are posting online to make good impressions on the people who follow us. We snap photos and add filters to make ourselves look and feel better. Maybe someone will comment! What if nobody does? Do I delete it? These are constant questions and concerns that go through peoples’ minds during the time they post content. I know those questions run through my head each time I click the share button. It’s almost like we need validation from others for us to be ourselves. When I post, I wait to see the reaction of others, will they like it? When others post, I am constantly comparing myself to them. We are constantly comparing and evolving. Exactly like our identity. Our lives are increasingly more public now more than ever.

People are naturally appealed to novel ideas and things that they can relate to in some way. Snapchat is something almost everyone is familiar with. Users of the app are able to connect more with those who use it to speak out. Yusuf Omar, a journalist from Hindustan Times, uses Snapchat to allow young girls who were sexually assaulted to tell the world in their own words their story. Filters on the app allow the girls to do so in confidence by hiding their identity and keeping their privacy. As people watch and listen to these raw and genuine words, people remember how the portrayals of victims of sexual assault in social media are real human beings who have had their lives greatly impacted by terrible events. Hearing the story first hand from the victim reveals that sexual assault is really way worse than how social media portrays. As a consumer of social media,

For years and years, the internet has progressed so much. So much that communication and our lifestyles have reached a whole new level. One of the many revolutionary inventions is called social networking sites or social media. Social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and many more, are where people gather on the internet, create a personalized profile about themselves, and interact with other people around the world. Social media can help contact friends, family, and other people long distance. However, our priorities have completely changed to “life isn’t measured by the number of breaths you take, but by how many likes you get on Instagram.” With social media, people seem to lose touch from reality. This whole “me, me , me”

Most people are uptight about the likes and comments they receive on social media websites, Carr formally proclaims. All of the popular websites use this method to receive more people active on them. Doing this urges people to share personal details about their life. “...people share four times as much information about themselves when they converse through computers as when they talk in person” (Carr 3). It is not necessary for people to share an extreme amount of details about their lives, but they still do.

With evolving technology comes new types of social media, people have begin to question the internet’s effect on our mentality. It is a bit difficult to compare the pros and cons of social media, it has more to do with an individual’s experience.  Some could be having a horrible time due to social media, but others could be thriving off of it.  The more negative implications of using social media could be the way that we share our personal lives and how much of it we give to the public, regardless of social relationships, to consume.  Along with this, we are deeply impacted by what we see from others based on our viewing of what they share because of the ability to create falsified identities and unrealistic interpretations of who we are

When Did Lives on Social Media Become More Time-Consuming than Our Social Lives by Jessica Remo argues that what people post social media is not portraying the truth to their daily lives. Social media allows the individual to post a picture, video, status, and edit these to make it seem like their lives are better than others. “Social media allows the user to create their own TV channel and make their lives seem better than they really are,” (Remo). In addition to portraying a fake live, these posts have negative impacts on the viewers. With 92 percent of those between 18 and 29, and 73 percent of people in their 30’s and 40’s using social media, this gives each individual the ability to control their image, and people’s impression of them.

Social media is described, by the Merriam-Webster dictionary (2015), as “forms of electronic communication (as Web sites for social networking and microblogging) through which users create online communities to share information, ideas, personal messages, and other content (as videos)”. As few as 10 years ago the term social media was yet to be coined, but within that decade the use of these blogs, websites and sharing platforms has increased exponentially with no plateau in sight. From creating Instagram accounts for household pets, to sharing Halloween themed baking ideas over Pinterest, people today have access to social media outlets for almost everything. Today about 74% of people ages 18-65 use some form of a social networking site (Pew, 2014). Facebook takes the lead in social media usage with about 71% of those adults. LinkedIn and Pinterest are tied for second at 28% of users, 26% use Instagram, and Twitter falls last in the top 5 most used social medias with 23% of users (Pew, 2014). In September of 2013 the Pew Research Center measured that 90% of adults ages 18-29 used these social media outlets on a daily basis, which is an astonishing increase from the 9% that was measured in February 2005 (Pew, 2014). Due to the fact that young adults are increasingly involving themselves in these online platforms, it is very important to understand the long term and psychological effects (such as depression, social anxiety,

Online social networks have become increasingly populated arenas for much of today’s population, especially with regards to high school and college students. Networks such as Facebook, Tumblr, Instagram, Vine, Twitter, etc., enable users to create an identity and present it to others by allowing them to share various aspects of their lives. Because individuals select their own content, the resulting representation can be either a true or imaginative reflection of the user. The attitudes, perspectives, behaviours and actions each individual chooses to present, shape their identity within the social media universe. Like most other web-based content, the pursuit of authenticity is assumed to be at the heart of these social media networks, playing an important role in our online interactions and our decisions about what web content we believe to be reliable. But, what about when the network structure allows users to create, post, and interact with anonymous identities? Anonymity eliminates the need decipher authenticity, however, it creates an issue by protecting the negative actions of empowered users.

In today’s technologically-driven world, you would be hard-pressed to find an individual who was not apart of social media. Facebook bolsters 1.4 billion users, roughly one-fifth of the entire world’s population. Instagram has 500 million daily active users. And according to data collected from a security app, which monitors how many times users activate or unlock their smartphones, average users check their phones 110 times a day. This equates to once every six or seven seconds. It’s easy to say that social media has become an integral part of our everyday lives. And although it has brought about many benefits, allowing us to easily connect with friends and family across the globe, has let us mobilize for a cause, and really communicate in

Technology as a whole has changed the way we live our everyday lives in numerous ways. We now have the opportunity to do many things with a touch of a button, to name a few, starting our cars, tying our shoes, or accessing the world of social media. The single piece of technology that has impacted most of us today is the cellular phone, which leads us to the wonders of the Internet. In today’s society there is a plethora of troubles we face, what comforts most of us and makes our lives a little easier is the world of social media. Social media sites like Facebook, Snapchat, Tinder, Twitter, and countless other websites can help us feel connected with the world and/or our surroundings. To most people social media might