DECONSTRUCTING THE USER: INFORMATION SHARING AND MANAGING IDENTITY

I203 Social and Organizational Issues of Information

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Agenda

Reminder about last part of Assn 2 (your comments on group members’ papers)

Brief Review; Putting Course Topics in Context

Deconstructing the User: Issues of Identity

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Recap: Course Topics in Parts I and II

Part I The Social Side of Information Broad Issues in Socio-Technical Systems Large Social Implications of Current Information

Technologies

Part II Information and Technology Adoption/Use

Case studies of Information in Networks Diffusion Processes Values and Practices of Users Role of Social Networks in Information Sharing

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Theoretical Perspectives So Far…

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Looking Ahead: Parts III and IV

Part III Deconstructing the User Focus on micro-level issues

Identity, Trust Users and Information Technology: Perspectives on

Technological Change Challenges for Designing Information Technology with the

‘Social’ in Mind

Part IV Community and Online Organization Focus on meso and macro-level issues

Community Structures Information Sharing, User-generated Information Content

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Issues of Identity…

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Social and Psychological Theories of Identity

Identity Theory (i.e., Stryker 1980)

Individuals have “role identities”: character and the role an individual devises as an occupant of a particular social position. ‘Self’ is hierarchical ordering of identities by salience. The greater the commitment on an identity, the greater the salience of the identity. Salience of identity influences behavioral choices in a situation.

Social Identity Theory (i.e., Tajfel, et al 1981; Turner 1985)

How group membership and “belongingness” have consequences for interpersonal and intergroup relations. As one looks for a positive sense of self, they compare their group with other groups and tend to create a favorable distinction for their own group

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Identity and Deception: Information Signaling

Deception and Identity

(Donath 1999) argues that in some cases, deception is very difficult because we have assessment signals

Assessment signals: cost is directly related to the ‘advertised trait’

Conventional signals, however, are open to deception

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Identity in online conversations

Posted messages carry “signals” about who is sending the message, and the entire message may give clues to figuring out the truthfulness of the poster.

Email address is particularly informative, though now this is less of an issue as many are fake (either to pretend to be from another address or to thwart spam)

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Voice and Language

Donath (1999) ties the both voice and language to Erving Goffman’s concepts of “expressions given” and “expressions given off”:

Thinking more broadly, how do these concepts relate to our earlier discussions of personal information and control (notions of privacy, identity, etc) in the offline world?

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A Different take on Identity: Considering the Perceptions of Identity among IT Users

Turkle (1995)

First, considers two types of users in the 1970’s computer culture, “hackers” and “hobbyists”

Differences attributed to “computational aesthetics”

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But more to the point…

A central theme of Turkle’s work, and perhaps her primary argument, is that the use of the computer has profound effects on our psychological lives and how we relate to machines.

Identity is both “de-centered” and “multiple”

“ We construct our technologies, and our technologies construct us and our times. Our times make us, we make our machines, our machines make our times. We become the objects we look upon but they become what we make of them.”

-Turkle p. 46