Self-Presentation Vs. Impression Management

Boyd, Danah. “Impression Management in a Networked Setting” Reading pop culture, 2nd Ed Edited by Jeff Osbourne. Bedford / St. Martins, 2016, PP, 122-127

To continue, self-presentation is a concept in which people try to influence the perception of their image. It can be good or bad, it depends on the person. Morrie try to influence his image by teaching to other people, by loving his wife, children, and friends, by doing the right things, and also by always staying himself. He tries to be a mentor; he knows that he is not the best person on Earth, but he tries to do good things. Mitch is completely different. In the beginning, the only thing that matters to him is his status. The most important things for him were money, expensive cars, and fame, but not love. He just tries to portray himself as a great sports reporter. Nothing else matters to him, not even his wife. Morrie and Mitch present themselves differently, but the example to follow is clearly Morrie.

Learning about dramaturgy and the idea of maintaining self is very important to social interactions. Erving Goffman’s theoretical concepts that make up dramaturgy can be seen in many social settings especial at Starbucks. By using the different tools that make up impression management I can see how we are very much like actors in a play that are trying to maintain a believable performance.

impressions made on other people weather we are in contact with them or not (194). In the book,

Another outstanding concept in this movie was self-presentation/tactical impression management. Self- presentation and impression management are petty similar because they are both processes by which individuals attempt to control the impressions that other form of them during interaction. (DeLamater, 89-90). Throughout his movie Olive presents herself to everyone at her school as someone she was not. She was

This question provided an interesting contrast for the impression management theory. Overall, it seemed that these values and/or norms and expectations are to be adhered to. Although, in certain tribes such as the Cherokee tribe, there may be circumstances where these expectations become less strict. We believe that these values are upheld within formal settings

Within my daily interactions in my life, I observed impression management with my younger brother at his basketball tryouts. Impression management is defined as “the communication strategies people use to influence on how others view them” ( Chapter 4, 80). An example of that happened a month ago at my brothers’ basketball tryouts, my brother from what he perceived to me when we

"Self-presentation is the behavior and information we offer to others, almost always so that we can show ourselves in a favorable light. It’s how we shake a hand, smile, make eye contact. It’s the information we provide—and don’t provide. Self-presentation involves “tactics.” And those tactics often involve fakery: We smile when we’re not happy; we act interested when we’re bored; we stay awake when we’d like to crawl up on the table in the conference room and go to sleep. To be quite honest, we lie.

Image management is important, professionally and personally, because it affects the way people are perceived by others. People quickly make inferences with little knowledge and people's initial assumptions are often difficult to change. In the workplace, assumptions or “snapshots” of people can affect job satisfaction, cooperation, morale, productivity, and credibility. Snapshots of me include being quiet, hardworking, intelligent, nervous and self-conscious. The latter are negative assumptions that may affect my credibility and acceptance into a group. I often do not take the opportunities to present the “collage” of my successes and efforts, because I do not like to talk about myself or be in the spotlight. I need to practice on presenting

I chose the topic of self-concept through interpersonal communication because I had an interest in it. This interest is because I didn’t understand that one’s self-concept affected the way one is perceived by others. I learned self-concept through class discussions, but I wanted a better understanding of how communication affects one’s self-concept and how it affects one’s perception

Nisbett and Timothy DeCamp Wilson (1977) in efforts to add supporting evidence to an ideal similar to the Halo Effect. They staged two interviews with participants where the interview in both was a man that had a distinct accent (Nisbett & Wilson,1977). The interviewer in one group was as charming as he could be in his “appearance and mannerisms and accent” (Nisbett & Wilson, 1977). In the other, he was instructed to basically act more strict and harsh to the subjects. The resulting difference in ratings of the interviewer’s personality and other factors by the participants spoke to how people immediately judge someone based on how they presented themselves through multiple characteristics.

How first impressions are formed has been a subject of interest by many researchers in the area of psychology.

The image my parents may have thought me to be, at times, actually was not me. I wanted to be my parent’s princess and the golden child, so I acted in a way to seek their approval which in some ways was not the “real” me. These conditions occur because of the existence of self presentational rules according to Goffman. “When one individual enters the presence of others, he will want to discover the facts of the situation. Were he to possess this information.”Also when meeting an individual we try to get information about them so we can act accordingly to their approval. How we act with one friend may not be the way we act with another. We determine the person’s status and attitude and decide for ourselves if we want to be a part of that. When we gather the information when first meeting someone, it determines the way we think and act towards them.

According to authors Markus, H, & Wurf, E. (1987) a person’s behavior is driven by many other factors other than self-concept, the influence of self-concept will not always be shown in one’s actions, as a consequence it will show in one’s self-esteem and cause mood changes as well as how they interact with the world around them (p. 300).

Erving Goffman sees self-presentation in six aspects, which are all related to the idea of life as a drama; persona, performance, staging, teams, role, personal style. According to Goffman, a persona is when someone wears various personality ‘masks’ depending on which roles they are undertaking, for example, when someone is with their friends the mask they wear defines them as a kind, friendly person whereas when they are with the family the mask will come off and their personality will change. I wear a mask when I’m with my friends and this portrays me as a friendly, outgoing character, whereas the mask I wear at home is loud, moody and unproductive.