Could you be an accidental online decieiver?

There is no doubt that online communication has completely transformed the way our identity is portrayed. I explored this within a chapter of my dissertation on 'Identity Online' and it has really interested me. It's now made me more conscious of whether my online identity portrays my real life, face to face identity or just the identity that I wish people to perceive me as.

In face to face interaction we communicate with our physical appearance as well as our language and behaviour. To some level we can control certain physical qualities of what others know of us by the different choices we make in life. However, particular qualities are beyond our control and are predetermined for us for example our gender and race. However, these cues are not visible online (unless you want them to be of course)!

Therefore, online communication has created the opportunity for us to redefine how we are to be perceived online and I think this is really empowering! I mean personally I thought my online identity was the same as my real life identity, but after researching this topic for my dissertation I realised my online identity is how I WISH to be perceived but not necessarily how I am perceived and this is really interesting. Therefore, I am myself probably an accidental deceiver! When talking about this to friends they agreed that they probably try to make themselves more 'professional' or more 'glamorous' looking online  for example, than they are perceived by their peers face to face. This is empowering for some people as it stops them being judged by their age, race etc, but there is a thin line between portraying how we think our identity is perceived when it is really perceived differently, to point blank deceiving others online. The use of language to misrepresent ourselves online is not uncommon and becoming more popular. This type of deception is now making us doubt whether people are really how they describe themselves.

So the thought I want to leave you with is; are you deceiving others with your online identity purposely and if so could this lead to disappointment if they met you in real life? If your not purposely deceiving, do you think after reading this post that your online identity is a clear representation of your real life identity? or could you be an accidental online deceiver?


Jade X