See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.

net/publication/266083186

Triangulating the Self: Identity Processes in a Connected Era

Article in Symbolic Interaction · September 2014

DOI: 10.1002/symb.123

CITATIONS READS
39 1,034

1 author:

Jenny L. Davis
Australian National University
54 PUBLICATIONS 1,459 CITATIONS

SEE PROFILE

Some of the authors of this publication are also working on these related projects:

Role-taking, Race, and Status View project

All content following this page was uploaded by Jenny L. Davis on 16 December 2017.

The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.

Triangulating the Self: Identity Processes
in a Connected Era

Jenny L. Davis
James Madison University

The increasing prevalence of digital social technologies in everyday

life affects processes of self and identity in theoretically and empiri-
cally interesting ways. Based on face-to-face interviews (N = 17) and
synchronous text-based exchanges (N = 32) from a Facebook-based
population, I examine the conditions of identity negotiation in a
networked era, and explore how social actors strike a presentational
balance between ideal and authentic. I identify three key interaction
conditions: fluidity between digital and physical, expectations of
accuracy, and overlapping social networks. I argue that social actors
accomplish the ideal-authentic balance through self-triangulation,
presenting a coherent image in multiple arenas and through multiple
media. I differentiate between two degrees of triangulation: networked
logic and preemptive action.
Keywords: self, identity, authenticity, social media, triangulation

The self is made up of multiple identities, and social actors experience social life and
social relationships through the lenses of the identities that they hold. One comes
to know and define the self in two related ways: first, by examining their own roles
and how they behave in these roles, and second, by observing others’ reactions to
them (Cooley 1902; Mead 1934). Self-definitions, though predominately stable, can
shift over time, across situations, and amid new experiences (Stryker 1980). Identity
meanings and their performative accomplishment are always historically, culturally,
and structurally contingent.
The contemporary era is characterized by network connectivity (Castells 1996)
and an increasing corpus of communication media. danah boyd (2010) refers to
this as a networked era, and the interaction structure as networked publics. In this
vein, Rainie and Wellman (2012) refer to those who occupy networked publics
as networked individuals. Within a networked era, part (perhaps a large part) of
how one comes to know the self is by looking at online reflections (Gonzales 2008;
Gonzales and Hancock 2011; Walther 1996). In the present work, I examine the

Direct all correspondence to Jenny L. Davis, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, James
Madison University, Sheldon Hall, MSC 7501, Harrisonburg, VA 22807; e-mail: Davis5jl@jmu.edu.

Symbolic Interaction, Vol. 37, Issue 4, pp. 500–523, ISSN: 0195-6086 print/1533-8665 online.
© 2014 Society for the Study of Symbolic Interaction. All rights reserved.
DOI: 10.1002/SYMB.123
Triangulating the Self 501

mutually influential relationship between profiled data and the selves who produce
and consume it. Specifically, I look to answer the following questions:

1. What unique conditions do networked individuals face as they negotiate self and
identity in a networked era?
2. How do networked individuals respond to the unique conditions of self and iden-
tity negotiation in a networked era?
3. What are the strengths and weaknesses of particular methodological techniques
for understanding selfing processes of networked individuals?

Using a combination of face-to-face (FtF) interviews (N = 17) and synchronous

text-based exchanges (N = 32) with social media users, I argue that social actors tri-
angulate the self , connecting online and offline performances.
My focus here is on one particular type of media: social network sites (SNSs).
Over 70% of U.S. adults maintain at least one account, with Facebook the most pop-
ular brand (Brenner 2012). Certainly, how people use SNSs is not representative of
how they use all digital social technologies. However, the pervasiveness of SNSs in
everyday life and the popularity of Facebook in particular make this a useful site
for understanding the conditions of networked publics and particular practices of
networked individuals.
To be sure, having an account does not necessarily indicate active usage, and rates
and types of use vary dramatically (Madden and Zickuhr 2011). As such, what follows
is not a ubiquitous story of identity processes in the contemporary era. Rather, it is
descriptive of the situation for some, and predictive of an increasingly digitally and
socially connected future.

METHODS
The present work is part of a larger qualitative study of social media practices,
rooted in Facebook. Data collection began on March 14, 2011, and continues into
the present. This article relies directly on synchronous text-based exchanges (N = 32)
and FtF interactional interviews (N = 17), while the larger project also entails ongo-
ing content analysis of News Feed data from a larger population of Facebook users
(N = 232).
Guiding my methodological decisions is an aim toward “quality research”
(Markham 2013) or that which resonates with the context, the participants, and
the audience. Others refer to this as validity (Hesse-Biber and Griffin 2013), or
user-centered methodologies (Beneito-Montagut 2011). Quality research produces
robust data, capturing participant voices and experiences at the most local level, in
ways that facilitate theoretical abstraction (Markham 2009).

Sample
The sample originates from my direct Facebook network, expanding snowball
style out into indirect (and in-indirect) networks. I began by creating a separate
502 Symbolic Interaction Volume 37, Number 4, 2014

“researcher” Facebook page. This page includes professional biographical informa-

tion and an overview of the study. I then posted several status updates, an announce-
ment, and a note on my personal Facebook page, inviting participation. I included
in these postings a link to the researcher page and instructions for interested parties
to send a “Friend request.” That is, I used an “opt-in” recruiting model. I also asked
those in my direct network to distribute the call widely among their own networks
and for members of their networks to distribute the message further. After the first
call, I also posted all calls to the researcher page. After three calls, I moved away from
my personal page entirely, and recruited only from the researcher page. I posted calls
at one-week intervals, posting six calls in total. I stopped actively recruiting once the
sample reached 200. This allowed the sample room to grow while remaining man-
ageable, and closely approximating the 229 Friend average for Facebook users at the
time of recruitment (Hampton et al. 2011). The larger study currently maintains 232
participants.
Along with the practical benefit of access, snowballing out from my direct network
is another way in which the design adheres to “quality” research. People typically use
social media (and SNSs in particular) to interact with existing networks (boyd and
Ellison 2007). These networks expand snowball style, much in the same way that
I accumulate Friends for my researcher page (Ellison, Steinfield, and Lampe 2007).
The use of a familiar sample therefore places me within a symmetrical position within
the setting (Miller and Slater 2000). As a researcher, I can experience the field site as
it is experienced by its inhabitants and collect data in a way that embeds me within
the structure and culture of the site.
To be sure, a familiar sample affects the depth, type, and interpretation of data, as
well as the makeup of the sample itself. Indeed, the prevalence of network homophily
(McPherson, Smith-Lovin, and Cook 2001) means that participants, snowballing out
from a single network, will likely share several social characteristics. This effect is
clear in the disproportionately high education levels of participants in the present
study (see demographics). With that said, each iteration of the snowball removes new
participants from existing ones, facilitating diversity. Further, I intentionally engage
in interviews and text-based exchanges with participants from diverse social posi-
tions, reflexively countering in-network biases.
For the purpose of anonymity, all participants are referred to by pseudonyms and
I reveal no identifying information. The sample is 74% women, 70% white, 16%
Latino/Hispanic, 5% black, 2% Asian, and 3% of mixed race. Participants’ ages range
from 18 to 65, with a mean of about 30 years. Participants’ have between 2 and 1400
Friends, with a mean of 425. About 80% have at least a college degree. To contextual-
ize this, a study by the Pew Internet and American Life Project shows users to be 56%
women, 78% white, have an average age of 38 years, and, as mentioned, an average
of 229 Friends. About 35% of the users hold at least a college degree (Hampton et al.
2011). The present sample therefore over-represents women and people of color, is
slightly younger and more highly educated, and maintains larger networks than the
general Facebook population. Although a small number of participants come from
Triangulating the Self 503

or currently reside outside of the United States—including China, Russia, Thailand,

and the United Kingdom—the vast majority currently live within U.S. borders. Par-
ticipants are also, most likely, relatively heavy users—or at least active users. In order
to volunteer, participants had to see calls for participation, precluding those with
abandoned accounts or those without accounts entirely. With that said, I did conduct
interviews and text-based exchanges with people who rarely engage with the site, and
with those who, since the time of recruitment, deactivated their accounts.
The data for the present work come from two kinds of interactions: FtF inter-
actional interviews and synchronous text-based exchanges (i.e., conversations over
instant messenger—IM), each constituting its own data set. Participation in these
research interactions is voluntary on the part of participants. I begin with text-based
exchanges, and when possible, follow with FtF meetings. FtF interviews take place
both individually and in small groups. Thus far, I have conducted forty-nine total
research exchanges (thirty-two text-based and seventeen FtF) ranging in length from
just under two hours to slightly over three hours. Text-based exchanges loosely fol-
low a basic instrument, which includes questions about length and frequency of use,
performative decisions, networks, norms, social challenges, and changes in practice
over time. FtF interactional interviews are more flexible and tailored to the interests
and earlier responses of the interviewee, taking on an ethnographic observational
interview style (Spradley 1979). During FtF interviews, I ask participants to connect
to their Facebook accounts via laptop, desktop, and/or mobile device, and we talk
through their practices as they demonstrate in real time.
FtF interviews are transcribed and all data are coded with evolving categorical
schemes (Glaser 1978). Importantly, all quotes that I use in the analysis are repre-
sentative of larger patterns within the data. More specifically, all included quotes
represent at least five equivalent swaths of text.
The communication medium certainly affects how messages are portrayed
and interpreted (McLuhan 1994; Meyrowitz 1994), and all interview media have
advantages and disadvantages. Such is the case with FtF interviews and text-based
exchanges (Enochsson 2011; Hesse-Biber and Griffin 2013). FtF interviews enable
a relatively spontaneous response, incorporation of body language, and significantly,
observations of participants engaged with the technology of study. However, these
are subject to geographic limitations, may reinforce power relations, and require
relatively fast response times, which can lead to misarticulations and relatedly,
misinterpretations on the part of both interviewer and interviewee (Hesse-Biber
and Griffin 2013). Mediated synchronous communication (i.e., text-based exchange)
gives the respondent more time to craft a reply, grants all parties greater control
over meaning, and provides a buffer between the interviewee and the researcher
(Enochsson 2011). To this latter point, research shows that mediated technologies
facilitate greater openness of voice among vulnerable populations (Dahan and
Sheffer 2001; Hall 2000). Text-based exchanges have, however, been criticized for a
dearth of social cues, stifling rapport, and alienating certain participants due to lack
of access (Stieger and Göritz 2006).
504 Symbolic Interaction Volume 37, Number 4, 2014

Each interaction medium produces different kinds of responses, and different

kinds of data (Hesse-Biber and Griffin 2013). All interactions are collaborative
accomplishments between interaction partners, and this certainly holds true within
a research setting. Research-based exchanges elicit accounts, and participants—like
all interactants—work to appear reasonable, rational, sane, and so on, engaging
in repair work when such presentations appear threatened (Goffman 1983). These
collaborative constructions between researcher and subject necessarily reflect the
researcher–researched relationship. The data are not merely stories that people tell
about themselves, but stories that they tell a researcher about themselves (Dingwall
1997). The cadence of this interaction, the cues exchanged by interactants, and
in turn, the data these exchanges produce may well be affected by the mode of
communication.
Text-based exchanges are clear elicitations. The researcher asks questions that
shape the content and direction of participants’ responses. The researcher’s role
here is relatively heavy handed, and the kinds of data produced are largely confined
by the researcher’s predetermined theoretical interests. In addition, the subject and
researcher cannot observe one another, and the processes by which subjects evaluate
their performances are limited to textual—rather than behavioral—responses from
the researcher.
FtF interviews, ones that include observation, create a broader set of data.
Although the researchers remain active in the construction of the data, they relin-
quish significant control over the direction of the interaction, as participants—and
elements of the setting—show the researchers versions of reality that they may not
have known to look for.
The relatively crafted text-based exchanges therefore create one kind of data set,
while FtF interactional interviews create another. In particular, while text-based
exchanges expose the potentially crafted stories that participants tell about them-
selves, FtF techniques—especially those that include active engagement with the
sites of study—allow for behavioral observations (Markham 2013).
Each form of data is informative in its own right. Indeed, people’s narratives,
no matter how crafted, maintain a tangible pull, as they make up the frames with
which participants make sense of themselves, each other, and the world around them
(Callero 2003). In doing so, these narratives not only pull from but also construct
individual selves and collective cultures (Denszin 1987). FtF interviews, which
rely equally on narrative analysis and ethnographic observation techniques, add a
behavioral component. Both interviewer and interviewee not only listen to what the
other says but also watch closely for what they do (Markham 2013). Taken together,
each method provides fodder for comparison. Data from each medium—online
and FtF—can reinforce, contradict, or complement one another (Hesse-Biber
and Griffin 2013; Salmons 2010). Further, multi-media interview techniques most
closely reflect the multi-media forms of communication used by participants,
who engage one another across multiple platforms, both digital and physical
(Markham 2013).
Triangulating the Self 505

I draw on the unique but connected data from each form of interaction. In doing
so, I capture an optimally robust picture of sociality among networked publics, a
picture that resonates with the context and participants and speaks to relevant the-
oretical questions about selfing processes of networked individuals. Throughout the
analysis, I draw from both FtF interviews and text-based exchanges, demarcating the
data set from which each quote was gleaned.

TRIANGULATING THE SELF

Triangulation, in general, refers to two (or more) separate phenomena pointing to
the same conclusion. One might triangulate research findings by connecting inter-
view data to quantitative analysis, location by connecting two geographic points, or
a story by connecting two separate accounts. Here, the self is the object of trian-
gulation, and self-triangulation is accomplished when online identity performances
and offline identity performances point to, and reflect, the same self. Interactionally,
self-triangulation refers to performative strategies that enhance consistency between
online and offline identity claims. The need for triangulation in the contemporary
era is rooted in both social psychological processes and material conditions of the
historical moment.

Social Psychology of Self and Identity: Balancing the Ideal and Authentic
I start with the assumption that self and identity are collaborative accomplish-
ments, constructed through interaction (Cooley 1902; Goffman 1959; Mead 1934).
A key tension within the selfing process is that between an ideal image and an authen-
tic performance (Goffman 1959; Hochschild 1983). By “ideal” I refer not to a value
judgment but to identity meanings in line with the actor’s self-views (Burke and
Stets 2009). Successful identity verification relies upon the (perceived) acceptance
of the presented identity by others, and more directly, it relies upon identity affirm-
ing interactions. As such, authenticity is of utmost importance. Authenticity refers to
an uncalculated core, an unmediated guide for the actor’s inner thoughts and emo-
tions, such that outward actions are mere reflections of what lies inside (Trilling 1972).
Importantly, this is an impression the actor maintains not only for others but also for
the self (Davis 2012b; Goffman 1959; Hochschild 1983).
Social actors utilize a variety of tools to accomplish authenticity, including props,
settings, and reflexive engagement. In these ways, they work to manage their own
and others behaviors, while gauging and reacting to environmental feedback (Burke
and Stets 2009; Goffman 1955, 1959, 1961; Snow and Anderson 1987; Swann and
Hill 1982). Achieving an ideal-authentic balance entails accomplishing a particular
version of the self, but doing so in a seemingly natural way; it is to engage in identity
work, while hiding the labor of doing so.
Goffman (1959) shows how social actors separate the front stage from the back,
pulling off elaborately coordinated performances, while obscuring their performed
506 Symbolic Interaction Volume 37, Number 4, 2014

nature. But the accomplishment of identity goes deeper than this. As pointed out by
Hochschild (1983), one strives not only to seem authentic but also to be authentic.
In this vein, social actors manage both impressions and emotions, such that perfor-
mative displays are not empty signifiers but true reflections of the self. Hochschild
(1983) captures these performative layers with her conceptual use of “surface” and
“deep” acting. The former refers to the performance itself. The latter is the reflexive
experience of the performance, the felt “realness” of it.
Processes of the self are always complex and laborious on the part of the actor.
They are also, always, contextually contingent. In the following section, I address
the first research question: What unique conditions do networked individuals face as
they negotiate self and identity in a networked era?

Conditions of Self and Identity Processes in a Networked Era

Bernie Hogan (2010) refers to the profiled self as both a performance and an
exhibition—an ongoing interactive achievement and a display of selfhood con-
structed through a curated bricolage of identity artifacts. Content—displayed via
text, video, picture, and sound—reflects and affects online and offline actions and
meanings. Content can be updated by self or other, through desktops, laptops, or
mobile devices. In short, the identity performances of networked individuals are
collaborative, multi-sited, multi-media, and multi-modal (Anderson 2001; Davis
2010; Gonzales and Hancock 2011; Subrahmanyam et al. 2008).
Early computer-mediated communication (CMC) research, based often on
MUDS and MOOs, envisioned “the Internet” as an identity playground. In this
apparently alternate space, actors are free to be whomever they wish, making an
ideal self-presentation easily accomplished and authenticity a problem of the past
(e.g., Turkle 1995). More recent work, however, taking into account the prevalence
of nonanonymous environments (Zhao, Grasmuck, and Martin 2008) finds that
digital technologies are not quite so liberating (Nakamura 2002, 2007; Robinson
2007). Indeed, many argue that constant connectivity makes it more difficult to
maintain authenticity in pursuit of the ideal (Davis 2012b; Gatson 2011; Sessions
2009; Tufekci 2008).
I identify three broad factors that complicate the selfing process for networked
individuals: fluidity between online and offline, expectations of accuracy, and over-
lapping social networks. Underlying these factors, and tying them together, is the
increasing technological capacity and social expectation to document and digitally
share the large and small events that make up one’s life, and to do so in a nuanced way.

Fluid Nature of Online and Offline

Online and offline are distinct yet inextricably intertwined. As Kendall (1998)
argues, cultural meanings of race, class, and gender flow into online identity mean-
ings and offline interactants often privilege information gleaned through online
Triangulating the Self 507

identity performances. Rather than separate spheres, social life moves fluidly within
and between the physical and the digital—neither more “real” than the other. In
this vein, Deuze (2011) argues that networked individuals live not only with but also
through and in media, leading to his designation of social life in the contemporary
era as “media life” (138).
Online interactions act as impetus for future offline activities, an integral part
of present experiences, and a mechanism of nostalgia for events gone by. Digital
platforms are used to announce gatherings, send invitations (formal and informal),
coordinate plans, and build excitement as some event (large or small) approaches.
Similarly, SNS users report spending considerable time looking at, commenting on,
and tagging pictures, ostensibly recounting/rebroadcasting offline engagements (Sub-
rahmanyam et al. 2008).
The prevalence of mobile devices with built-in cameras and social media applica-
tions enable real-time updates, further integrating physical experiences with digital
documentation. These devices, coupled with social media architectures that display
user activity publicly to the user’s networks, make documentation not only increas-
ingly easy but also an increasingly accepted and expected part of social interaction
(McLaughlin and Vitak 2012).
The fluidity between online and offline sociality is cast into particularly sharp
relief through the experiences of those who, for a time, disable their Facebook
accounts. In so doing, they remove themselves from a key hub within the social
realm (Portwood-Stacer 2012). Lawrence (male, 30, text-based exchange) describes
his experience of digital disconnection as follows:

It’s like I was in a little bubble, I had no idea what was going on and I missed a
lot. People didn’t contact me because I wasn’t on Facebook, or they talked about
things I wasn’t familiar with, and to be honest, it was a little awkward when I saw
some of my friends offline, like we had missed a beat or something.

Indeed, the integration of past, present, and future offline interactions within
online spaces—updated both in real time and asynchronically—aid in the negotia-
tion of experiential and relationship meanings. This is supported by research which
shows that interactions through digital media can both strengthen and weaken
emotional bonds. Hancock, Landrigan, and Silver (2007) find that online exchanges
reinforce and improve social bonds between interaction partners. Similarly, Ellison
and colleagues delineate significant social capital benefits gained through SNS par-
ticipation (Ellison 2011; Ellison, Steinfield, and Lampe 2007). On the other hand,
Tokunaga (2011) finds a positive relationship between feelings of jealousy and time
spent checking a romantic partner’s online profile—essentially weakening bonds
through online connection. In this vein, Davis’ (2010) study of MySpace shows that
the demotion out of a Friend’s “Top 8” both reflects and affects negative changes in
participants’ relationships.
During a FtF interview, Candace (female, 27) invites me to observe as she goes
through her Friend list to “clear out” those with whom she no longer wishes to share
508 Symbolic Interaction Volume 37, Number 4, 2014

a connection. Her decisions illustrate the fluid online/offline nature of sociality. She
explains:

I’m from a small nowhere town where people feel obligated to accept Friend
requests … They might be upset that I unfriended them … I still keep a lot of
them around because I have to go home and see them, and I know they’ll just be
like, “oh Candace unfriended me” and it’ll be all kinds of crazy gossip.

She then goes on to unfriend several members of her network due to presumed
disconnection (i.e., they do not communicate regularly) coupled with the assumption
that she will not see the Friend in future FtF settings. This latter criterion, that she can
avoid these Friends offline, reduces the risk that she will suffer social repercussions
for severing the digital tie.
Life takes place through the physical and the digital, often simultaneously. Offline
emotions prompt online actions and online actions influence bodied emotions.
Relationships are established and maintained across digital and physical settings.
Behaviors are planned, recorded, shared, and re-articulated synchronically and
asynchronically, with physically and nonphysically copresent others. Authenticity
depends on the perceived consistency of performances between various platforms
and media. Although users can partially accomplish this through strategic use of
privacy settings and/or selective Friending practices (Marwick and Ellison 2012;
Raynes-Goldie 2010), the norms of openness (Mclaughlin and Vitak 2012) and over-
lapping social networks (discussed later) create significant barriers to performative
segregation.

Accuracy
Within social network sites, the normative expectation is for users to represent
themselves accurately (Davis 2012b; Mclaughlin and Vitak 2012). By accurate, I do
not imply a capital T “True Self.” Rather, like all arenas of identity performance, dig-
itally mediated identity performance represents a particular version of the self. As
Hogan (2010) delineates with his concept of self-exhibitions, networked individuals
curate their performances on social network site platforms, highlighting, omitting,
and strategically framing identity-based content. However, unlike anonymous vir-
tual worlds or the chat rooms of the 1990s, social network site profiles are signifiers
for identifiable bodied beings (Davis 2010). Curatorial practices are normatively and
architecturally limited to the extent that profiled content portrays someone recogniz-
able to the actor’s networks.
Failure to adhere to norms of accuracy can result in varying levels of social
sanction. Toma, Hancock, and Ellison (2008) find that among users of online dating
sites, the revelation of large discrepancies between the profiled presentation and the
bodied being (e.g., vastly different body type, misrepresentation of employment)
become “deal breakers”—leading to immediate romantic rejection of the guilty
party. Similarly, Marwick and boyd (2011) show how Twitter users chide fellow
Triangulating the Self 509

micro-bloggers whose tweets they deem “inauthentic” (i.e., nonrepresentative of

the tweeter).
Participants in the present study often reference truthfulness directly as both
something they strive for and a lack of which they decry in others. Eric (male,
29, text-based exchange), for example, refers to his Facebook profile as a “digital
extension of my physical life,” and wonders “ … if people aren’t being authentic,
what’s the point?” Similarly, discussing network size, Tricia (female, 28, text-based
exchange) says:

… [A]t one time I had almost 2000 friends but some of those people I’d only
met once … and we weren’t really friends so it seemed really inauthentic … For
someone who is really active with a lot of friends, it’s like they are trying to be
popular … an average person with 2000 friends? That seems a little suspect or
desperate … Like you’re back in high school and you’re trying too hard to be
liked.

Many social network sites reinforce norms of accuracy through their architec-
tures. Davis (2010), for example, shows how MySpace guides users by providing
templated categories with which to share biographic and demographic infor-
mation. Similar architectures can be found on Friendster, Facebook, Linkedin,
Academia.edu, and Google+ (among others). More explicitly, platforms enforce
accuracy through their Terms of Service (ToS). Facebook and Google+, for example,
both require users to display “real” names, making users searchable and promoting
“real-world” self-representations. Failure to comply, though an option employed by
some (Lim et al. 2012; Raynes-Goldie 2010), can result in termination of the user’s
account.
The norm of accuracy is accentuated by the increasingly linked nature of social
media—much of which centralizes on Facebook. For example, a Foursquare check
in, news story “Like,” Twitter “Tweet,” or blog post “Share” can become part of
a Facebook News Feed. This content can be updated, checked, and commented
upon through home computers, laptops, desktops, and mobile devices. This means
that actions recorded in one arena can be broadcast in multiple arenas to multiple
audiences. This provides networked individuals with significant opportunities to
display the ideal self. However, performative consistency throughout interaction
platforms—both online and offline—is necessary to maintain authenticity.
The social integration of accurate documentation is perhaps epitomized with
recent developments in frictionless sharing. Frictionless sharing applications auto-
matically share user data across social networks, usually via the Facebook News
Feed and/or Twitter. The music-based platform Spotify, for example, displays user
play lists and current listening practices; the Washington Post Social Readers dis-
plays which news stories the user clicks; and Nike+ shares fitness accomplishments.
Although most of these applications are “opt-in,” their increasing presence works to
integrate frictionless sharing tools into the social repertoires of networked publics.
More generally, this contributes to a form of sociality in which documentation is a key
510 Symbolic Interaction Volume 37, Number 4, 2014

component. Describing the implications of a documentation-infused environment,

Kay (female, 22, FtF interview) says:

With constant ability to connect and share I find people are continuously thinking
about what their next post will be.

And Diane (female, 36, text-based exchange) talks about the disappointing expe-
rience of an accidentally unrecorded workout:

… I use Nike iRun and it syncs to both my Twitter and Facebook … I have been
concerned about annoying people if I ran all the time … but I remember this one
time, it didn’t seem to track me and it really upset me I was like wtf [what the
fuck?] why do I run with this damn thing on my shoe if it doesn’t work?

As the preceding data show, maintaining an ideal-authentic balance in light of

frictionless sharing and pervasive documentation means not only posting identity-
affirming content but also engaging in documentable identity-affirming activities.
At the same time, perceived over documentation poses a problem for both ideal
presentation and authenticity, as audiences may view the actor as “taking up too
much space” or “trying too hard.” Diane hints at this with her concern about running
too much, and Jaclyn (female, 27) articulates the problem of overposting explicitly
during an FtF interview:

[My Facebook Friend] posts every five seconds. EVERY. FIVE. SECONDS [hand
slapping table with each word]. It’s like NO, FUCK NO, stop spamming my wall.
Do you just sit there all day thinking of things to post on Facebook? … I had to
hide him. Seriously, like I HAD to hide him.

Indeed, research shows that perceived overposting can lead to deleted connec-
tions, as abundant individual sharing monopolizes the collective social sharing space
and reflects poorly on the offending individual’s character (Sibona and Walczak
2011).
Documentation practices and accurate representation are therefore delicate
accomplishments in a networked era. Accomplishing the ideal-authentic balance
entails truthful, careful, strategic sharing, but not too much, and without visible
effort.

Overlapping Social Networks

Each social actor plays many roles—mother, father, worker, friend, and so on.
Mead (1934) argues that each role maintains its own Generalized Other, or norma-
tive and moral expectations about who the actor is in the world. Although versions
of the self tend to overlap, different networks likely hold slightly different expecta-
tions for the actor, some of which contradict. One major complication of a networked
era is the bringing together of previously segmented networks—collapsing the net-
work walls (boyd 2008). For instance, my own personal Facebook page connects me
Triangulating the Self 511

with my parents, colleagues, childhood friends, distant relatives, college roommates,

ex-boyfriends, and casual acquaintances, all of whom hold different expectations
about who I am and what lines of action I am likely to take.
Within the Facebook platform, norms of connection dictate that users accept
Friend requests from very loose ties (McLaughlin and Vitak 2012). In light of this,
networks can grow quickly and are often highly diverse. As Damien (male, 31,
text-based exchange) explains:

… I have different groups of friends, some who I would say get along and can
co-mingle, others that would absolutely despise each other. So, that means on
Facebook if you interact with both groups using the same social media there is
bound to be some crossover.

Moreover, SNSs allow these others to publicly contribute to the actor’s profiled
content (boyd and Ellison 2007; McMillan and Morrison 2006; Subrahmanyam et al.
2008). As such, online profiles are collaborations or co-constructions (Donath and
boyd 2004). A key feature of the SNS is a public wall, upon which members of the
actor’s (diverse) network can post. In addition, users can tag one another in pho-
tographs, conversation threads, and videos—all of which become available for public
consumption and comment. Facebook displays these interactions on the profile itself,
and also broadcasts them to an actor’s social network via the News Feed.
Public communications, initiated by others, become an important part of the pro-
filed self. These communications grant insight into otherwise inaccessible relations.
They provide a seemingly natural (and arguably voyeuristic) peek into dyadic or
small group dynamics. They offer an ostensibly more “objective” perspective against
which the actor’s own self-representations can be compared. In line with this lat-
ter point, Walther’s Warranting Principle posits that people give greater credence to
other-generated content (OGC) than self-generated content (Walther et al. 2009). In
Goffmanian terms, OGC becomes part of the impression “given off,” as opposed to
that which is “given” (Goffman 1959). This was troublesome for many participants.
Jake (male, 26, text-based exchange) complains:

One friend of mine posts comic book drawings of female super heroes with big
boobs to my and others’ pages and it’s just stupid and sexually childish … my
family is on there.

Certainly, users can (and at times, do) circumvent context collapse and OGC.
Hogan (2010) suggests the lowest common denominator approach in which users
limit shared content to that which will be appropriate for every member of the
network. Others skillfully navigate the architecture itself through privacy settings
and user-tools (Marwick and Ellison 2012; Stutzman, Capra, and Thompson 2011).
Still others go around the system, creating aliases and Fakebooks—both of which
go against Facebook and Google+ ToS (Lim et al. 2012; Raynes-Goldie 2010).
Hailey (female, 27, FtF interview), for example, makes a series of “block” lists so
512 Symbolic Interaction Volume 37, Number 4, 2014

that she can easily exclude certain portions of her network from posts that she deems
inappropriate:

… I have a “Professor/Teacher/Faculty” list … I also have a list of people that

work with [my husband] and a list of people I work with and a list of family. These
are all “in case” lists that I can use to easily block that group from a post if need be.

And Tricia (female, 28, text-based exchange) posts a “scrubbed” image of herself,
showing only the “outer layer.” She posts and allows only “benign pictures” and
deletes “inflammatory or sexual” OGC out of a reported concern for the opinions of
“friends, family, and employers.”
Context collapse, coupled with OGC, however, is the default state. Each circum-
vention technique comes at a cost. Hogan’s (2010) lowest common denominator
approach limits the information one can share to a relatively superficial level, dimin-
ishing opportunities to perform an ideal self. Deft use of privacy settings and archi-
tecturally available re-segmentation tools require time, skill, and knowledge, not
available to all. Skirting official rules places the actor in the precarious position of
risking expulsion from participation altogether. Finally, the sheer effort entailed in
some of these curatorial techniques may threaten authenticity, as the performance
becomes an explicitly laborious accomplishment (Davis 2012b).
In sum, these three factors (online/offline fluidity, expectations of accuracy, and
collapsed network walls)—exacerbated by increasing and strategic documentation
—present unique challenges for selfing processes within a networked era. Networked
individuals engage social life both physically and digitally and present presumably
accurate depictions to broad and diverse audiences; in turn, these audiences can pub-
licly negotiate and add to each other’s profiled content. In what follows, I argue that
networked individuals manage this environment through self-triangulation.

Self-Triangulation: Two Degrees

Self-triangulation refers to the strategic connection of identity performances
across multiple physical and digitally mediated interaction environments. These
are performative mechanisms through which networked individuals manage the
ideal-authentic balance in light of the interactive conditions of networked publics.
Unlike Hogan’s (2010) curatorial exhibitions, triangulation refers not only to what
users reveal and conceal but also how they actively construct sharable material
both online and offline. Triangulation has two degrees: (1) networked logic and (2)
preemptive action.

Networked Logic
On a recent weekend, several of my family members came for a visit. Moments
before they arrived, I spruced up my appearance with a pair of earrings and dash
of blush. There would, I knew, be pictures. And I would, I knew, post these pictures
Triangulating the Self 513

on Facebook. Within a networked era, the logic of everyday life comes to incorpo-
rate an expanding corpus of media through and on which action and interaction take
place. Networked logic refers to networked individuals’ seamless incorporation of
these multiple media into performative practices. This is largely implicit, affecting
selfing processes in unconscious ways.
Networked logic flows both from digital to physical and physical to digital. I sep-
arate these out for analytic purposes, though in practice, this flow is often simultane-
ous. The following quotes describe the movement from physical to digital, as offline
moments become potentially shared content.

Often, when out or about, I’ll try to come up with the perfect funny status. Or
when someone says something funny, I’ll say, “Oh, I totally need to put that on
FB!” I once had what I considered to be four unbelievably funny things to make
statuses out of, but I didn’t want to dump them all in one day in case people didn’t
see all four. So I wrote them down on post-it notes, and put one up each day for
four days. (Nicole, female, 32, text-based exchange)
I often find myself surprised to be at a social gathering and have somebody say
something and the response is “That’s going on Twitter/Facebook.” I hear it so
much more often when somebody has their picture taken. “New profile pic!”
somebody will proclaim. (Lawrence, male, 30, text-based exchange)
It’s like that whole thing, if you don’t post about it on Facebook, it didn’t happen.
If there isn’t a picture, you weren’t there. So people think about these things, they
bring their phones [pulls out phone and makes a mock nonchalant face and pre-
tends to take a picture of herself] and are like “Oh, Facebook update!!” and then
they just wait for the comments to come in. Like we were at this dance party and
these girls were just like lined up at the bar taking pictures of themselves to put
on Facebook, like that was their big priority [laughs, rolls eyes]. (Fran, female, 22,
FtF interview)

These data show an interesting integration of digital and predigital technologies,

each given purpose through the other. When Nicole writes down potential status
updates on sticky notes, she uses them not only as a reminder but also as a temporal
place holder, reserving present wit for future performances. Similarly, the “girls at the
bar” of whom Fran speaks utilize the physical bar, the brick-and-mortar building, and
dancing bodies as props with which to prove the authenticity of their ideal selves. In
doing so, these girls “give off” (Goffman 1959) the impression of youthfulness and
fun, rather than telling an audience who they are in explicit terms.
Respondents also display an implicit knowledge of both algorithmic architecture
and social structural norms within the Facebook platform. This further facilitates and
indicates networked logic. This is particularly clear in the case of Nicole, who saves
her status updates for strategic distribution. Facebook’s algorithm allows other users
to see only a small percentage of each person’s content (Bucher 2012). To “dump”
a large quantity of valuable content at the same time is to forgo visibility and sti-
fle performative enhancement across the network. Further, largely because of these
elective algorithms, space within the Facebook News Feed is finite, and those who
514 Symbolic Interaction Volume 37, Number 4, 2014

take up too much space (via perceived overposting) are often sanctioned through the
“hide” function or disconnection (i.e., “unfriending”) (Sibona and Walczak 2011).
Networked logic, of course, flows not only from physical to digital but also from
digital to physical. As shown in the quotes below, digitally shared content—both
existing content and potential content—can translate into offline behaviors. This
rests heavily on the technologically facilitated norms of persistent documentation
by self and others.

Well Foursquare [a geolocational application] is more like a competition with the

mayor stuff so I would check in with the deli downstairs in our lobby. I didn’t
always eat there, but I always stopped … because I wanted to be the mayor [pulls
out smartphone and loads the Foursquare app] see, I’m the mayor!! Now on my
way out I always stop in there to maintain my status. (Carla, female, 27, FtF inter-
view)
I sometimes enhance activities to fit into good posts … cooking is an easy example.
I often make [my partner] break down cooking stages so I can take pictures of it
and post them to FB [Facebook]. (Heather, female, 32, text-based exchange)
If I am going somewhere I can pretty much assume someone has a camera, and
it’s like great, but it also means I better put on my makeup and look cute because
these pics are going public!! So I find myself dressing better now because I know
that there will be pictures and that they will spread widely [laughs and shakes head
in resignation]. (Brittany, female, 29, FtF interview)

Referencing accountability, Lawrence (male, 30, text-based exchange) talks about

engaging in exercise to keep up with the fitness progress that he documents on Face-
book:

I have a running app that I started using to log how long I walk—the idea being, if
all of my friends see it, and then see me slack off on that walking, they will shame
and judge me until I pick it back up.

Temporality plays a key role here, as past performances inform present ones, and
present performances act as both potential futures and potential pasts (Jurgenson
2011). For Lawrence, tracking his present fitness behaviors produces a past record
that facilitates the future identity claim of physical fitness, enhancing the likelihood of
behavior in accordance with this identity claim (i.e., engagement in physical activity).
Similarly, Brittany decides how to look when going out with the understanding that
her present appearance will, in the future, become a documented past. This latter
example highlights the co-constructed nature of identity in a networked era. Brittany
recognizes that even if she does not post photos of an event, others may very well put
images of her online, and these images will become part of her profiled referent.
Finally, despite the prevalence of discourses that paint mediated communication
as necessarily less real than FtF interaction (e.g., Marche 2012; Turkle 2011), par-
ticipants in many ways seem to shift in the opposite direction. In particular, many
participants express the notion that if one does not post something online, it does
not “count,” making digital documentation a key criterion of verifiability. This makes
Triangulating the Self 515

sense social psychologically, as the requirements of identity construction and mainte-

nance include identity-affirming interaction (Burke and Stets 2009). In a networked
era, the social network site becomes a key interactional arena through which social
actors elicit feedback on identity performances, collaboratively bringing selves into
being (Davis 2012a).
Overall, these examples illuminate the ways in which social actors remain cog-
nizant of the physical-digital connection as they engage everyday life. Existing dig-
ital content, current actions and interactions, and potential future content play into
experiences of a multi-sited, networked social world. Engaging social life through
networked logic—representing one prong of the triangulated self—is key in main-
taining a cohesive performance and relatedly, an ideal-authentic balance.

Preemptive Action
Broadly, preemptive action is defined as the purposive performative decision to
engage in some act within one arena primarily as a means to support performances
in other arenas. It is a proactive practice of identity construction and maintenance.
Certainly, this predates the Internet. For example, one might be motivated to attend
a concert in order to obtain and publicly wear a band T-shirt. A networked era is
unique, however, in the actor’s opportunity to perform more purposefully, coupled
with the challenge of gearing performances toward vast, overlapping, largely invisible
audiences. Far from fleeting, these performances produce permanent artifacts with
the capacity to linger and spread. These artifacts, consisting of text, images, tagged
connections, and geo-locational check-ins, show audiences a great deal about users’
tastes, networks, and personalities (Zhao, Grasmuck, and Martin 2008).
As such, preemptive action in the present work refers specifically to offline enact-
ments for the purpose of digital documentation and digitally mediated exhibitions
(Hogan 2010) that facilitate future offline identity performances. Preemptive action
is an important performative tool in maintaining the ideal-authentic balance, as it
locates networked individuals in a position to document, and be documented, in ways
that “gives off” (Goffman 1959) impressions through curating behavior, rather than
curating content. And yet, due to the purposiveness of it, the revelation of preemp-
tive action bears significant authenticity threats.
Early in the study, I developed a “hunch” that people engaged in preemptive
action. This stemmed from participants’ insights about others, and from my own
social media practices. For instance, I am admittedly motivated to seek out inter-
esting popular media articles because I want to share them on Twitter. And yet,
through self-report, participants did not articulate such purposive performance tac-
tics in themselves.
Self-report is an important tool in identifying and analyzing experiential narra-
tives. Methodologically, however, self-report exhibits two related weaknesses. First,
participants may not wish to share certain information about themselves, especially
when doing so may cast them in a negative light (Edwards 1957; Hyman 1994;
516 Symbolic Interaction Volume 37, Number 4, 2014

Tourangeau and Yan 2007). Second, participants may be unaware of their own
attitudes or motivations. A wealth of research shows that despite significant holes in
self-knowledge, people readily construct narratives as though their self-knowledge
were complete (see Nisbett and Wilson 1977). Participants in the present study are
particularly susceptible to both of these methodological weaknesses. Selfing pro-
cesses are often taken for granted (Goffman 1959), and may be unavailable for easy
cognitive retrieval. Moreover, the articulation of selfing processes—especially those
as effortful as preemptive action—threaten deeply embedded values of authenticity
(Davis 2012b; Erickson 1995; Goffman 1959; Marwick and boyd 2011).
Projective techniques are one means by which researchers can circumvent the
weaknesses of self-report. Projection, as classically described by Freudian psycho-
analytic theory, is a defense mechanism by which people reduce anxiety and guilt
surrounding undesirable, usually unconscious, impulses and desires (Freud [1918]
1998). In an effort to elicit responses that participants may be unwilling or unable
to share, researchers can ask questions in a way that allows participants to project
their troublesome attitudes or desires onto an external stimuli (Kassarjian 1974).
A particularly useful variant of projective techniques is known as Most People
Projective Questioning (MPPQ) (Ostapczuk and Musch 2011). These ask respon-
dents about “most people’s” attitudes/desires/behaviors and so on, reducing both
participants’ anxiety about undesirable impulses and efforts to appear in a positive
light.
I therefore engaged in MPPQ techniques along with direct self-report questioning.
I found that although people do not (for the most part) report that they are pur-
poseful in their self-presentations, they believe that others are. In short, they show
a discrepancy between what they do and what everyone else does. This gap between
what I do and what others do is theoretically rich. It shows not only that preemptive
action is likely going on but also that this is a practice that social actors hide from
themselves.
Unsurprisingly, when asked directly about themselves and the extent to which
they, if at all, engage in preemptive action, participants responded with emphatic and
ubiquitous denial. More specifically, I received the following representative (often
quite succinct) replies:

I know I don’t. Facebook doesn’t control that much of my life to the extent that
I would actually revolve my life around what may or may not end up online …
(Alison, female, 29, text-based exchange)
Oh GOD no!! [wrinkles face, shakes head, moves backwards] That is just sad.
(Katrina, female, 22, FtF interview)
No!! I like the idea of Facebook and Twitter being real. No point in doing stuff
just for the status update. (Michael, male, 31, text-based exchange)

When asked about the habits and practices of others, however, responses were far
more varied.
Triangulating the Self 517

In response to whether others engage in offline behaviors for the sake of digital
documentation, Kathy (female, 20) and Christina (female, 22) (FtF group interview)
simultaneously exclaim:

Yes!! [both start laughing]

K: I know soooooooooooo many girls who do this. Like, “oh, let me go to the
coolest bar so I can update it and show you how awesome my life is.”
C: Yeah, I mean, I’m just like, I don’t care what you think, I’m going to do what
I’m going to do, and you may think it’s boring and that’s fine. But some people
just feel like they have to go out and do all these things like, “oh look at how great
my life is.”

Similarly, Carina (female, 23, FtF interview) says:

It’s really sad but I totally know a guy who does this. He even kind of admits it.
Like he said that he sees other people’s Facebook posts and they are doing all of
these really great things, so he feels like, I have to go to these parks, and ride these
trails, and travel so that I can keep up. And of course he has to post about it or it
doesn’t count.

And Jocelyn (female, 19, FtF interview) says:

Yes, sadly, although hopefully no one I’m good friends with … I’m … cynical
about kids these days.
Lindsay (female, 24, text-based exchange), Jamie (female, 26, text-based
exchange), and Dianne (female, 36, text-based exchange) all share instances in
which they suspected others of engaging in preemptive action:

Sometimes you see status updates that are clearly meant to get attention … I have
these relatives they care a lot about money and what people think. Sometimes
they do things to be seen, I know they do that because they make a HUGE deal
about seeing some person that’s supposed to be important or have a lot of money
and so, it would absolutely not surprise me if they did something for the purpose
of posting on Facebook that they went somewhere or saw something … : I think
it’s silly. If you didn’t want to do it in the first place, why did Facebook change
your mind? (Lindsay)
I … know someone who works really hard to show how racially diverse she is …
she works really hard to setup an image where she has some legitimacy in black
culture. I think she also works really hard to post pics or check in to black events.
(Dianne)
I do know a couple of people from “outside” [of my close network of friends] who
definitely enjoy doing certain things in part because of the satisfaction or positive
reinforcement they get from posting it on Facebook—one girl puts a note up for
every time she compliments a random stranger and “makes their day,” which is
great and all, but I can’t help but think she only does it to report it online. (Jamie)

Reinforcing the (im)moral meanings tied to preemptive action, participants

accompany their responses with negative sentiments about the practice. Nancy
(female, 37, text-based exchange), for example, describes preemptive action as a
518 Symbolic Interaction Volume 37, Number 4, 2014

“contrived and exhausting way to live life.” Similarly, Jamie, in her quote above,
describes this kind of behavior as “sad” and “hopes” that none of her close friends
do it, while Lindsay thinks her family members are “silly” for allowing Facebook to
alter their courses of action.
This gap between perception of self and perception of others is theoretically
important and highlights several things. First, it illuminates the tension within selfing
processes between performativity and the moral imperative of authenticity—or the
necessity of hiding performative efforts from others and from the self (Goffman
1955; Hochschild 1983; Trilling 1972). Participants do not simply deny their own
performativity, but do so out of the social and psychic needs of identity maintenance.
Further, in articulating the reprehensible preemptive action of others, participants
reinforce a moral order in which actors ought not try to be anything, but rather, to
engage as their “True Selves.” Indeed, the mere potential to engage in preemptive
action becomes an important discursive tool; an alter against which participants
define the self in accomplishing an ideal-authentic balance.

SUMMARY AND LIMITATIONS

Selfing processes are complex and necessarily altered by the technologies of the
time. I set out to discern the specific conditions of selfing processes in a networked
era, and explore how networked individuals navigate these conditions, with a focus
on achieving presentational balance between ideal and authentic. I identified three
key conditions of selfing processes within a networked era: fluidity of online and
offline, expectations of accuracy, and overlapping social networks. More concretely,
networked individuals negotiate identity in multiple online and offline environments,
with an array of digital and physical tools, in front of, and in collaboration with, a
diverse network of others. In managing identity negotiations within this context, I
argue that social actors engage in varying degrees of triangulation, employing digital
and physical props (Goffman 1959) to integrate performances across time, networks,
places, and platforms. These performative set ups vary in their purposiveness, from
implicit networked logic to the more explicitly staged preemptive action.
This is not to say, of course, that contemporary processes of the self are something
separate or wholly unique from those in the predigital era. Indeed, the self has
always been a collaborative project and documentation a key component. The
family photo album, prom pictures, and souvenir T-shirts have been important
artifacts in establishing and maintaining identity meanings. However, in light of
expanded means of digital connectivity, an increasing prevalence of documentation
and mobile documenting devices, and pervasive nonanonymous digital referents in
the form of SNS profiles, networked individuals navigate an interaction environ-
ment with a faster pace, highly participatory diverse audiences, and deliberative,
often text-based, presentational formats. While classic conceptions of the self are
still applicable, the processes by which self and identity are accomplished have
been—for better or worse—irrevocably altered.
Triangulating the Self 519

The networked era affords an interaction environment in which self-triangulation

becomes an important performative tool. The interactive move toward triangula-
tion is perhaps best highlighted through its absence, through cases in which social
actors fail to triangulate, and suffer social and/or material sanctions. For example,
during the 2012 presidential election, a YouTube video of candidate Mitt Romney,
speaking at what he presumed was a private fundraising dinner, went viral. In this
video, Romney infamously discounted 47% of American voters as entitled, depen-
dent, and mindlessly slated to vote for the incumbent. What the American public saw
was not a glimpse into Romney’s “True Self,” but rather, the lag between the Romney
team’s interactional assumptions and the affordances and dynamics of interaction in
a networked era. The Romney team engaged socially as though contexts were still
segmented, as though digital and physical were separate spheres, as though perfor-
mances could still reflect Mead’s (1934) multiple Generalized Others, unchecked and
unhindered by their coexistence.
Such separation is impossible for a public figure and increasingly difficult for
general citizens within networked publics. A new interactional reality consists
not only of self-documentation norms but also the technologically afforded docu-
mentation from above, below, and lateral directions (Mann, Nolan, and Wellman
2003). Parceling out the liberatory versus constraining potentials of such doc-
umentation is beyond the scope of the present work. Instead, I point out the
prevalence of self and other documentation to paint a descriptive and predictive
portrait of the interactional landscape, in which triangulation—connecting per-
formances in multiple arenas—becomes a key component of successful selfing
practices
An analysis of the complex and mutually constitutive relationship between iden-
tity and technology requires deep penetration of self and identity processes—many
of which reside far below the surface. This was certainly the case in the present study,
as open articulation of explicit self-presentation strategies threatened the authen-
ticity that participants strove to accomplish. As such, my third research question
addressed which methodological techniques are effective in illuminating the com-
plexities of selfing processes for networked individuals. I found that MPPQ tech-
niques, combined with direct self-reports, produced robust data, recording experien-
tial accounts while unearthing that which remained unarticulated.
Although this work offers important insights, it is not without limitation. The
nonrandom sample and open-ended interview style, while offering nuanced and the-
oretically rich data, does not lend itself to generalizability. Generalizations from this
study should therefore be cautiously made and empirically tested. In this vein, the
sample was disproportionately young, female, and highly educated. Determining the
effects of this demographic makeup, if any, is beyond the scope of the present work.
However, empirical applications of these theoretical insights in other settings, with
different demographic distributions, will work to reinforce and/or refine the argu-
ments I make in the preceding text.
520 Symbolic Interaction Volume 37, Number 4, 2014

REFERENCES
Anderson, Keith J. 2001. “Internet Use Among College Students: An Exploratory Study.” Journal
of American College Health 50:21–6.
Beneito-Montagut, Roser. 2011. “Ethnography Goes Online: Towards a User-Centered Method-
ology to Research Interpersonal Communication on the Internet.” Qualitative Research
11:716–35.
boyd, danah. 2008. “Why Youth Heart Social Network Sites: The Role of Networked Publics in
Teenage Social Life.” Pp. 119–42 in Youth, Identity, and Digital Media, edited by D. Bucking-
ham. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
. 2010. “Social Network Sites as Networked Publics: Affordances, Dynamics, and Implica-
tions.” Pp. 39–58 in A Networked Self: Identity, Community, and Culture on Social Network
Sites, edited by Zizi Papacharissi. New York: Routledge.
boyd, danah. and Nicole B. Ellison. 2007. “Social Network Sites: Definition, History, and Scholar-
ship.” Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication 13:210–30.
Brenner, Joanna. 2012. “Pew Internet: Social Networking.” Pew Internet and American Life
Project. Retrieved September 12, 2014 (http://pewinternet.org/Commentary/2012/March/
Pew-Internet-Social-Networking-full-detail.aspx).
Bucher, Taina. 2012. “Want to Be on the Top? Algorithmic Power and the Threat of Invisibility on
Facebook.” New Media & Society 14:1164–80.
Burke, Peter J. and Jan E. Stets. 2009. Identity Theory. New York: Oxford University Press.
Callero, Peter L. 2003. “The Sociology of the Self.” Annual Review of Sociology 29:115–33.
Castells, Manuel. 1996. The Rise of the Network Society: The Information Age: Economy, Society,
and Culture, Vol. I. Malden, MA: Blackwell.
Cooley, Charles Horton. 1902. Human Nature and the Social Order. New York: Scribner.
Dahan, Michael and Gabriel Sheffer. 2001. “Ethnic Groups and Distance Shrinking Communica-
tion Technologies.” Nationalism & Ethnic Politics 7:85–107.
Davis, Jenny L. 2010. “Architecture of the Personal Interactive Homepage: Constructing the Self
Through MySpace.” New Media & Society 12:1103–19.
. 2012a. “Prosuming Identity: The Production and Consumption of Transableism on Trans-
abled.org.” American Behavioral Scientist 56:596–617.
. 2012b. “Accomplishing Authenticity in a Labor-Exposing Space.” Computers in Human
Behavior 28:1966–73.
Denszin, Norman K. 1987. The Alcoholic Self . London: Sage.
Deuze, Mark. 2011. “Media Life.” Media, Culture & Society 33:137–48.
Dingwall, Robert. 1997. “Accounts, Interviews, and Observations.” Pp. 51–6 in Context and Method
in Qualitative Research, edited by Gale Miller and Robert Dingwall. London: Sage.
Donath, Judith and danah. boyd. 2004. “Public Displays of Connection.” BT Technology Journal
22:71–82.
Edwards, Allen L. 1957. The Social Desirability Variable in Personality Assessment and Research.
New York: Dryden.
Ellison, Nicole B. 2011. “Connection Strategies: Social Capital Implications of Facebook-Enabled
Communication Practices.” New Media & Society 13:873–92.
Ellison, Nicole B., Charles Steinfield, and Cliff Lampe. 2007. “The Benefits of Facebook “Friends:”
Social Capital and College Students’ Use of Online Social Network Sites.” Journal of
Computer-Mediated Communication 12:1143–68.
Enochsson, Ann-Britt. 2011. “Who Benefits from Synchronous Online Communication? A Com-
parison of Face-to-Face and Synchronous Online Interviews with Children.” Procedia - Social
and Behavioral Sciences 28:15–22.
Erickson, Rebecca J. 1995. “The Importance of Authenticity for Self and Society.” Symbolic Inter-
action 18:121–44.
Triangulating the Self 521

Freud, Sigmund. [1918] 1998. Totem and Taboo, edited by Paul Negri and translated by A.A. Brill.
Mineola, New York: Dover Publications.
Gatson, Sarah N. 2011. “Self-Naming Practices on the Internet: Identity, Authenticity, and Commu-
nity.” Cultural Studies Critical Methodologies 11:224–35.
Glaser, Barney. 1978. Theoretical Sensitivity: Advances in the Methodology of Grounded Theory.
2nd ed. Mill Valley, CA: Sociology Press.
Goffman, Erving. 1955. “On Face-Work: An Analysis of Ritual Elements in Social Interaction.”
Psychiatry 18:213–31.
. 1959. Presentation of Self in Everyday Life. New York: Doubleday.
. 1961. Asylums: Essays on the Social Situation of Mental Patients and Other Inmates. New
York: Doubleday.
. 1983. “Felicity’s Condition.” American Journal of Sociology 89:1–53.
Gonzales, Amy L. 2008. “Identity Shift in Computer-Mediated Environments.” Media Psychology
11:167–85.
Gonzales, Amy L. and Jeffrey T. Hancock. 2011. “Mirror, Mirror on My Facebook Wall: Effects of
Exposure to Facebook on Self-Esteem.” Cyberpsychology, Behavior and Social Networking
14:79–83.
Hall, Martin. 2000. “Digital S.A.” Pp. 460–75 in Senses of Culture: South African Culture Studies,
edited by Sarah Nuttall and Cheryl Ann Michael. Cape Town, South Africa: Oxford Univer-
sity Press.
Hampton, Keith N., Lauren Sessions-Goulet, Lee Rainie, and Kristen Purcell. 2011. “Social
Networking Sites and Our Lives: How People’s Trust, Personal Relationships, and Civic and
Political Involvement Are Connected to Their Use of Social Networking Sites and Other
Technologies.” Pew Internet and American Life Project. Retrieved September 12, 2014
(http://www.pewinternet.org/Reports/2011/Technology-and-social-networks.aspx).
Hancock, Jeffrey T., Christopher Landrigan, and Courtney Silver. 2007. “Expressing Emotion in
Text-Based Communication.” in The SIGCHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing
Systems. New York.
Hesse-Biber, Sharlene and Amy J. Griffin. 2013. “Internet-Mediated Technologies and Mixed Meth-
ods Research: Problems and Prospects.” Journal of Mixed Methods Research 7:43–61.
Hochschild, Arlie. 1983. The Managed Heart. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
Hogan, Bernie. 2010. “The Presentation of Self in the Age of Social Media: Distinguishing Perfor-
mances and Exhibitions Online.” Bulletin of Science, Technology & Society 30:377–86.
Hyman, Herbert. 1994. “Do They Tell the Truth?” Public Opinion Quarterly 8:557–9.
Jurgenson, Nathan. 2011. The Faux-Vintage Photo: Full Essay (Parts I, II, and III) in Cyborgol-
ogy.com, edited by N. Jurgenson and P. Rey.
Kassarjian, Harold H. 1974. “Projective Methods.” Pp. 85–100 in Handbook of Marketing Research,
edited by Robert Ferber. New York: McGraw-Hill.
Kendall, Lori. 1998. “Meaning and Identity in ‘Cyberspace’: The Performance of Gender, Class, and
Race Online.” Symbolic Interaction 21(2):129–53.
Lim, Sun Sun, Shobha Vadrevu, Yoke Hian Chan, and Iccha Basnyat. 2012. “Facework on Facebook:
The Online Publicness of Juvenile Delinquents and Youths-at-Risk.” Journal of Broadcasting
& Electronic Media 56:346–61.
Madden, Mary and Katherine Zickuhr. 2011. “65% of Adults Use Social Networking Sites.” Pew
Internet and American Life Project. Retrieved September 12, 2014 (http://pewinternet.org/
Reports/2011/Social-Networking-Sites.aspx).
Mann, Steve, Jason Nolan, and Barry Wellman. 2003. “Sousveillance: Inventing and Using Wear-
able Computing Devices for Data Collection in Surveillance Environments.” Surveillance &
Society 1:331–55.
Marche, Stephen. 2012. “Is Facebook Making Us Lonely?” The Atlantic (http://www.theatlantic.com/
magazine/archive/2012/05/is-facebook-making-us-lonely/308930/).
522 Symbolic Interaction Volume 37, Number 4, 2014

Markham, Annette. 2009. “How Can Qualitative Research Produce Work That Is Meaningful
Across Time, Space, and Culture?.” Pp. 131–53 in Internet Inquiry: Conversations About
Method, edited by Annette Markham and Nancy Baym. London: Sage.
. 2013. “Remix Culture, Remix Methods: Reframing Qualitative Inquiry for Social Media
Contexts.” Pp. 63–82 in Global Dimensions of Qualitative Inquiry, edited by Norman K.
Denzin and Michael D. Giardina. Walnut Creek, CA: Left Coast Press.
Marwick, Alice E. and danah. boyd. 2011. “I Tweet Honestly, I Tweet Passionately: Twitter Users,
Context Collapse, and the Imagined Audience.” New Media & Society 13:114–33.
Marwick, Alice and Nicole B. Ellison. 2012. ““There Isn’t Wifi in Heaven!” Negotiating Visibility
on Facebook Memorial Pages.” Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media 56:378–400.
McLaughlin, Caitlin and Jessica Vitak. 2012. “Norm Evolution and Violation on Facebook.” New
Media & Society 14:299–315.
McLuhan, Marhall. 1994. Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man. Cambridge, MA: MIT
Press(Original work published 1964).
McMillan, Sally J. and Margaret Morrison. 2006. “Coming of Age with the Internet: A Qualitative
Exploration of How the Internet Has Become an Integral Part of Young People’s Lives.”
New Media & Society 8:73–95.
McPherson, Miller, Lynn Smith-Lovin, and James M. Cook. 2001. “Birds of a Feather: Homophily
in Social Networks.” Annual Review of Sociology 27:415–44.
Mead, George Herbert. 1934. Mind, Self, and Society. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
Meyrowitz, Joshua. 1994. “Medium Theory.” Pp. 50–77 in Communication Theory Today, edited by
David Crowley and David Mitchell. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Miller, Daniel and Don Slater. 2000. The Internet: An Ethnographic Approach. Oxford: Berg.
Nakamura, Lisa. 2002. Cybertypes: Race, Ethnicity, and Identity on the Internet. London: Routledge.
. 2007. Digitizing Race: Visual Cultures of the Internet. Minneapolis, MN: University of
Minnesota Press.
Nisbett, Richard E. and Timothy D. Wilson. 1977. “Telling More Than We Can Know: Verbal
Reports on Mental Processes.” Psychological Review 84:231–59.
Ostapczuk, Martin and Jochen Musch. 2011. “Estimating the Prevalence of Negative Attitudes
towards People with Disability: A Comparison of Direct Questioning, Projective Question-
ing, and Randomised Response.” Disability and Rehabilitation 33:399–411.
Portwood-Stacer, Laura. 2012. “Media Refusal and Conspicuous Non-Consumption: The Per-
formative and Political Dimensions of Facebook Abstention.” New Media & Society.
doi:10.1177/1461444812465139.
Rainie, Lee and Barry Wellman. 2012. Networked: The New Social Operating System. Cambridge,
MA: MIT Press.
Raynes-Goldie, Kate. 2010. “Aliases, Creeping, and Wall Cleaning: Understanding Privacy in the
Age of Facebook.” First Monday 15. Retrieved August 11, 2011 (http://firstmonday.org/htbin/
cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/viewArticle/2775/2432).
Robinson, Laura. 2007. “The Cyberself: The Self-ing Project Goes Online, Symbolic Interaction in
the Digital Age.” New Media & Society 9:93–110.
Salmons, Janet. 2010. Online Interviews in Real Time. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
Sessions, Lauren F. 2009. “The Cyberself: The Self-ing Project Goes Online, Symbolic Interaction
in the Digital Age.” First Monday 14. Retrieved September 12, 2014 (http://firstmonday.org/
htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/2539/2242).
Sibona, Christopher and Steven Walczak. 2011. “Unfriending on Facebook: Friend Request and
Online/Offline Behavior Analysis.” in 44th Hawaii International Conference on System Sci-
ences. Hawaii: Computer Society Press.
Snow, David A. and Leon Anderson. 1987. “Identity Work among the Homeless: The Verbal Con-
struction and Avowal of Personal Identities.” American Journal of Sociology 92:1336–71.
Spradley, James. 1979. The Ethnographic Interview. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.
 Triangulating the Self 523

Stieger, Stefan and Anjas Göritz. 2006. “Using Instant Messaging for Internet-Based Interviews.”
Cyber Psychology & Behavior 9:552–9.
Stryker, Sheldon. 1980. Symbolic Interactionism: A Social Structural Version. Menlo Park, CA:
Benjamin Cummings.
Stutzman, Fred, Robert Capra, and Jamila Thompson. 2011. “Factors Mediating Disclosure in Social
Network Sites.” Computers in Human Behavior 27:590–8.
Subrahmanyam, Kaveri, Stephanie M. Reich, Natalia Waechter, and Guadalupe Espinoza. 2008.
“Online and Offline Social Networks: Use of Social Networking Sites by Emerging Adults.”
Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology 29:420–33.
Swann, William B., Jr. and Craig A. Hill. 1982. “When Our Identities Are Mistaken: Reaffirming
Self-Conceptions Through Social Interaction.” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology
43:59–66.
Tokunaga, Robert S. 2011. “Social Networking Site or Social Surveillance Site? Understanding
the Use of Interpersonal Electronic Surveillance in Romantic Relationships.” Computers in
Human Behavior 27:705–13.
Toma, Catalina L., Jeffrey T. Hancock, and Nicole B. Ellison. 2008. “Separating Fact from Fiction:
An Examination of Deceptive Self-Presentation in Online Dating Profiles.” Personality and
Social Psychology Bulletin 34:1023–36.
Tourangeau, Roger and Tin Yan. 2007. “Sensitive Questions in Surveys.” Psychological Bulletin
133:859–83.
Trilling, Lionel. 1972. Sincerity and Authenticity. Boston, MA: Harvard University Press.
Tufekci, Zeynep. 2008. “Can You See Me Now? Audience and Disclosure Regulation in Online
Social Network Sites.” Bulletin of Science, Technology & Society 28:20–36.
Turkle, Sherry. 1995. Life on Screen: Identity in the Age of the Internet. New York: Touchstone.
. 2011. Alone Together: Why We Expect More from Technology and More from Each Other.
New York: Basic Books.
Walther, Joseph B. 1996. “Computer-Mediated Communication: Impersonal, Interpersonal, and
Hyperpersonal Interaction.” Communication Research 23:3–43.
Walther, Joseph B., Brandon Van Der Heide, Lauren M. Hamel, and Hillary C. Shulman. 2009.
“Self-Generated Versus Other-Generated Statements and Impressions in Computer-
Mediated Communication: A Test of Warranting Theory Using Facebook.” Communication
Research 36:229–53.
Zhao, Shanyang, Sherri Grasmuck, and Jason Martin. 2008. “Identity Construction on Face-
book: Digital Empowerment in Anchored Relationships.” Computers in Human Behavior
24:1816–36.

ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTOR(S)

Jenny L. Davis is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at James Madison University. Her research
focuses on microprocesses of identity and community. She blogs regularly for Cybogology.org and
tweets @Jenny_L_Davis.

View publication stats