Is your online identity different from your offline identity? – A study on the college students’ online identities in China

Abstract

This study took innovative perspectives in studying the college students’ online identities in China. Three modes of online identities were found to satisfy the participants’ different needs, which indicate the principle of what is lacking tends to appear online. The logic of ‘imagination–reflection circle’ explains these online behaviours and show the ‘rationality’ in choosing among different identities to fulfill the users’ different needs according to different online settings. The college students showed a better control of themselves compared with their period of adolescences. Under this situation, most of the online experiments are beneficial to these college students, except when the transition between different identities is difficult.

Situational selves of online identity and rationality in choosing – More examples of the college students’ online identity in China

“…Yue Qin  https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2160-0227 Notes 1. This paper is another report of the same study of Qin and Lowe (2019) with the aim to explain the concept of 'situational self'. 2.…”

“…Secondly, a learning process helped the choosing. SN.4 has been chosen an online boy QQ to fulfill her need to experience being a boy (see more details on paper Qin & Lowe, 2019). She has chosen to be a boy by using QQ since junior middle school.…”

“…Group identity refers to a person taking the group identity as his/her part of identity when identifying with a group and willing to experience things from the group's perspective. In the present paper, no specific identity or specific aspect of identity have been settled at the beginning of the study, meaning any kind of aspects will be accepted/studied as a part of the online identity as long as the participants suggested it as a way to express their online identities (Qin & Lowe, 2019). 3.…”

Exploring Facebook Identity Construction of Vietnamese Netizens

“…The dis-inhibition of virtual work gives opportunities for individuals to express their "true self" better online than face-to-face, e.g., confession practice of "sinful" or "melodramatic hardship endurance" tales (Ridley, 2012). In a complementary study, Qin and Lowe (2021) compared and contrasted the online identity of Chinese college students with their offline selves. They posited that the online self is seen as a better version of oneself by students.…”

“…Most reported disclosing many personal details at the start, then abstaining due to uncontrollable public perception and privacy risk. As a result, they became more conscious on Facebook (Qin and Lowe, 2021) or migrated to a different network.…”