Hyperpersonal communication

Sender

• Selective self-presentation: online life is about premeditation 

• Self presentation as interpersonal performance 

• revise/abandon messages 

• people express things they are unable to say FtF

• social networking sites, dating sites 

The receiver

• Idealized impressions

• likely to believe info 

• Over-attributions

• People develop unrealistic impressions of partners without NVs

The channel

CMC is capable of rich interaction

 Cognitive Reallocation

• Redirect cognitive resources

 Buffer effect

• When you care about self-presentation

• Channel entertainment

• Often tied to synchronicity and richness

Feedback loop

Self-fulfilling prophecy

 People treat partners consistent w/ interpretations

• Partner’s behavior aligns w/ perceptions

 More intense online than FtF

• Similarities are magnified; differences ignored

When does Hyperpersonal occur

Theory never specifies

Motivation to engage in hyperpersonal processes

Without motivation, people might want to conserve rather than reallocate cognitive resources

Unmotivated people might not succeed online

Hyper negative effect

CMC isn’t uniformly beneficial

• Opposite of hyperpersonal

Relationships endure hardships online

People who are successful FtF

Selective self-presentation

Depends on goals

• Serious daters act differently

People seeking long-term relationships disclose more

• People whose friends have seen the profile act differently  

 Online daters are worried about deception

• But everyone says their own profile is accurate

Warranting in online dating profiles

Worst combination:

• High SSP & High warranting  social attraction  desire to date & contact

Similarly, high warranting produces beneficial outcomes at low but not high levels of SSP

Why?

• Content matters

What do people look for on dating profiles? What do people post? What is selectively self-presented? What is effective for liking and creating a desire to date or contact someone?

Less attractive people misrepresent their physical appearance more than attractive people

Women

• More pictures

• More photographic enhancement

• Older photos