People may form inaccurate impressions about us from our social media posts, finds new Cornell University research that is the first to examine perceptions (认知) of our personalities based on online posts.
An analysis of online status updates found great difference between how viewers saw the authors across a range of personality traits, and the authors' self-perceptions.
Viewers rated the Internet users on average as having lower self-esteem and being more self-revealing, for example, than the users rated themselves, Status updates containing photos, videos or links in addition to text facilitated more accurate assessments than those with just text the researchers found.
Overall, they said, the study sheds light on the dynamic process by which a cyber audience tries to make sense of who we are from isolated fragments(碎片) of shared information, jointly constructing our digital identity.
"The impression people form about us on social media based on what we post can differ from the way we view ourselves." said Qi Wang, professor of psychology and director of the Culture &. Cognition Lab. "A mismatch between who we are and how people perceive us could influence our ability to feel connected online and the benefits of engaging in social media interaction."
The Cornell researchers believe their study is the first to investigate audience perceptions of social media users through their posts, On platforms, users often share fragmentary personal narratives while interacting with "friends" they may know only a little or sometimes not at all.
Interestingly, the study found that online status updates generated perceptions of users that were consistent with cultural standards in offline contexts concerning gender and ethnicity—even though viewers were blind to their identities.
Wang said the findings could help developers design interfaces that allow people to express themselves most authentically.
"If people's view of us is very different from who we actually are, or how we would like to be perceived." Wang said, "it could harm our social life and well-being."