500 Word Summary - No.2

As my research is developing I am gaining more of an insight into my subject matter and starting to be able to narrow down what exactly it is that I want to look at. I’ve been reading about the psychological impact that over use of social media can have and how this affects our ability to develop interpersonal relationships. I’ve also done further research on the idea of ‘self’ and discovered the idea of multiple versions of ‘self’ and how we create fictitious identities online in order to put across an image that is more socially appealing online. I have also established the idea of social networking sites as ‘networked publics’ a term coined by Danah Boyd. ‘Networked Publics’ explore the idea of social networking sites as spaces in their own right, and spaces that have taken over real-life social meeting points. I feel that from the research done I can start to develop some structure to my essay, knowing that networked publics and the idea of self combine and have a direct impact on how we develop interpersonal relationships. These will be the three areas I specifically focus in on when writing my essay: Networked Publics and Online Spaces, Presentation of the Self and Self Disclosure, and finally, Development of Interpersonal Relationships.

In terms of case studies, I have done some research into practitioners that convey emotion through their work and also different examples of how social media has ben explored via illustration. I’m particularly interested in Victoria Vincents work, finding that her practice encompasses online culture and the conveying of emotion in an authentic and honest way. This aligns to my own interests, and allows room to examine how a practitioner is responding to the problems with social media on a level that delves more into the personal experience of being online rather than looking at the impact of online culture on society as a whole.

When considering my own practical work, I feel that at the minute the idea of self-presentation is something that intrigues me, as well as self-disclosure. I find it interesting that people can be so open and honest online when hiding behind a mask and yet struggle disclosing information in their real life relationships. From the questionnaire I put out, I’m hoping to get enough responses to create a small zine type publication in order to explore my themes. I have also been doing some general visual responses in order to explore my subject area more, and feel that some of these could become images that are made to be posted online in order to get people thinking about how they behave around social networking sites.

Research into Practitioners

Whilst researching into practitioners I've been trying to avoid the usual editorial type of illustration that this topic is usually covered by. It's not to my taste and I feel that it's a bit over done. Instead, I've tried finding imagery that contains some kind of emotion, humour or is executed in an aesthetically pleasing way.

Christopher Delorenzo

Eduardo Salles

Brian Rea

Natalie Foss

Brecht Vandenbroucke

Victoria Vincent

Victoria Vincent 

After looking into different examples of illustrative practice that examine my topic, I am particularly drawn to the work of Victoria Vincent. Her work has a very personal, authentic quality, and a strong sense of anrrative that runs throughout the majority of her work. As well as Illustration, she also animates her narratives and I have found two so far that align perfectly with the contexts and themes behind my essay. Her animation 'Find True Love' examines communcation and online dating, whilst her other animation 'kittykat96' explores presentation of the self online and the idea of multiple versions of self.

IPC - Richard West, Lynn H.Turner

- self-disclosure allows relationships to develop and contributes to strengthening self-concept
- greater disclosure = greater emotional involvement in a relationship
- relationships are closer when something personal is shared
- interpersonal - relating to relationships or communication between people
- acquaintence, build-up stage, continuation, deterioration, termination
- intimacy - self-disclosure, love and affection, personal validation, trust
- online communication - laziness, ease of use, privay, ability to have multiple conversations, multi-task, substitute for face-to-face
- some studies found that internet interactions were viewed as inferior to face-to-face
- verbal cues - words that are spoken or typed - non-verbal cues - tone of voice, body language
- conversation fluency may be more difficult to maintain online - slower than speaking
- internet allows for deception but anonyminity allows for self-disclosure
- true self is more accessible after an online interaction
- emoticons make up for lack of non verbal cues - clarification of ambiguous statements - mitigate negative messages - flirt -avatars also replace non-verbal cues
- some people who feel shyness in face-to-face interactions are more comfortable in online interaction due to anonyminity - increased intimacy in internet socializing
- high social phobia scores correlate with the use of the internet to regulate social fears - extrovert vs introvert

Carl R. Rogers - A Therapists View On Psychotherapy - On Becoming A Person

"Real communication occurs and this evaluative tendency is avoided, when we listen with understanding" - pg 331 - Empathy

"It means to see the expressed ideas from the other persons point of view, to sense how it feels to him, to achieve his frame of reference in regard to the thing he is talking about" - pg 332

The Existential Choice

"Do I dare to communicate myself as I am or must my communication be somewhat less than or different from this?" pg 345

"The sharpness of this issue lies in the often vividly forseen possibility of threat or rejection. To communicate ones full awareness of the relevant experience is a risk to interpersonal relationships." pg 345

In his book "On Becoming A Person" Carl Rogers argues that real communication can only be achieve when we listen from an empathetic viewpoint, that we cannot truly communicate until we begin to 'see the expressed ideas from the other persons point of view, to sense how it feels to him, to achieve his frame of reference in regard to the thing he is talking about' (Rogers, 2004, pg 332).
Continue this excert with reference to evidence of social networking making us less empathic and thus less likely to be communicating effectivley and efficiently

Correlating to previous discussion on the 'real' self, Rogers also brings about the idea of the 'existential choice', the choice we all have to communicate ourselves as we are or to filter what we allow others to see of ourselves. The very real fear of threat and rejection that encourages us to communicate from behind screens is a result of not wanting to show our 'real selves' in case the 'real self' is met with an unempathetic, judging point of view as a pose to an understanding, empathic listener.
Links with real/true self exploration, pyschological asymmetry

Questionnaire - Anonymous Confessions

A lot of my research into my chosen area has looked at the idea of anonymity, different versions of self and self-disclosure. I think it could be quite interesting to try take my practical work in this direction. People are more likely to disclose personal infomation online about themselves as they have a different kind of identity to hide behind, this leaves them feeling less at risk of rejection/embarassment when they disclose highly personal infomation about themselves. I ahve devised a simple questionnaire to explore this topic. The two questions will be as follows:

1. Confess something anonymously
2. Would you have made the same confession if the questionnaire wasn't anonymous. Explain your answer.

I will be posting the link to the questionnaire to a variety of social netowrking sites as this is what my dissertation is focused around. I will collate the results once I feel I have enough responses and begin to make work in result of that. At the moment I feel that some kind of publication format would work best, possibly a zine. This will be decided later on once the results have been collected.

Further Revised Research Question

I previously wrote a list of potential questions to explore and investigate for my research project, most were broad and quite vague but I've narrowed my list down to a selection of 4 questions. I think my question is still a while away from being finalised in terms of wording and figuring out how exactly I'm going to phrase things but the four options I've narrowed it down to all have the same underlying theme, they are as follows:

- Why are we comfortable expressing human emotion online but struggle with face-to-face interactions?
- To what extent does social media impact the way we interact with each other?
- What effect does social media have on day-to-day social skills/social interactions
- How does social media impact how we develop interpersonal relationships?

I know these are still vague and not well structured but I feel like they're all similar in a way and with further research I'll be able to further narrow down my options and begin expanding and forming my final proposed research question.