My criticism of this article is that it does not mention the wider implications of adolescents pretending to be someone else online; instead it focuses on the reasons in terms of identity formation. Whilst I would agree that creating an alter-ego for yourself online can help to facilitate social relationships, to overcome shyness and to see others reactions, if we are lied to online what does this mean for our trust levels in terms of our internet use? Will the amount of adolescents taking part in this type of identity exploration mean that no one is who they say they are online and lead to an even greater lack of trust in the Internet?
Therefore, the message of this article, that the Internet is the ideal place for identity play, to the extent of pretending to be someone completely different to who you actually are, not just in terms of personality (confident when you are really shy) but in terms of the fundamentals of who you are (man when you’re a woman, adult when you’re a child) is in contrast to ideas by Rheingold, that the internet is an ideal place for the exchange of opinions, ideas and support.
In this way the article paints a picture of the internet in a cyber-utopian manner, that there cannot possibly be any problem with identity experimentation if it helps adolescents discover “who they really are”, when this opinion lacks an acknowledgement of the problems which this could result in.
Article: Valkenburg P.M. et al. (2005) “Adolescents’ identity experiments on the internet” New Media & Society, Vol. 7 (Issue. 3) P383-402
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Forthright opinions well expressed.
ReplyDeleteIf the play goes on in say 2ndLife -it's Ok though isn't it? What might be the problem there?