The Cornell Class of 2010 website was my gateway into forming online relationships. I used this social networking tool to look up friends of friends that were going to Cornell. Once Cornell distributed Net IDs, facebook became my network of choice. Facebook quickly transforms into a breeding ground of pseudo-relationships for pre-fosh, and yes, I was quick to indulge in the countless Cornell groups such as “Sarcastic People are fun” and “CU Jewish camp goers”. Still, I avoided the more intimate “I’m so excited to go to Cornell!” wall posts and private messages until I received my roommate assignment.
I remember analyzing Sara’s pictures and trying to deduce her personality from her interests list. She had many diverse other-directed identity claims ranging from her interests in naps and rain boots to her activities of track and Amnesty International. I interpreted this information to mean that she was well-rounded and social. When we started instant messaging, she was seemed fairly affable. I though it was cute how she would always insert “~*” at the end of her sentences, even though I initiated most of the conversation. When we arranged to meet up in
Little did I know that our greeting hug would be the only hug Sara and I would ever share. Although sharing a frozen hot chocolate at a crowded Serendipity’s provided a social buffer, conversation with Sara was contrived and awkward. She would respond with one word answers to my questions and avoid eye-contact. I do have experience dealing with introverted people, but Sara would barely crack a smile and I suspect that she sensed my disappointment.
Shifting from CMC interaction to FtF interaction with Sara clearly supports Hyperpersonal Model. I committed the overattribution error when I decided that her “~*” symbol at the end of sentences meant that she was friendly. I developed an exaggerated impression of her personality based on limited information from her facebook profile. Perhaps I should have considered that Sara was utilizing selective self-presentation in her interests and hobby lists. Also, Sara clearly benefited from the reallocation of cognitive resources in CMC. She could present herself in a better light because the focus was only on the topic of conversation whereas face to face, her body language came into play and significantly tainted my impression of her.
Although the CMC to FtF transition of our relationship was far from ideal, it made wary of the deceptive powers of facebook and my tendency to idealize people based on conventional signals. After this experience, I was careful not to engage in the ever-popular activity of messaging my classmates before I actually met them.
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1 comment:
I'm very sorry to hear that your meeting with Sara did not work out, although as you pointed out, over-attribution can make it very difficult to make relationships successfully take off outside the confines of the Internet. People with low extroversion can use CMC to do a very good job of altering their outward presentation and thus of overcoming their difficulties with socialization. Once you meet a person like this online, seeing how different they are in person is often disappointing. The reverse – that is, meeting someone in person and then taking the relationship online – however, seems to work much better. This is perhaps because FtF provides a better basis on which to establish an evaluation of the other person.
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