Table of Contents Introduction: Welcome to Facebook! Culture Moving into the Digital Age: Identity and Capital digital Culture Research: Online Identity Theories Measuring a Virtual World: Methods Limitations

Creating Identity in a Digital Age: The Facebook Addiction

Elizabeth Koenig

May 12, 2008

Table of Contents

Introduction: Welcome to Facebook!…………………….............................................3

Culture Moving into the Digital Age: Identity and Capital ………………...……….4

Digital Culture Research: Online Identity Theories…………………………..……..9

Measuring a Virtual World: Methods………………………………………………...12

Limitations……………………………………………………………………………...14
I: What is your Relationship Status? Constructing Identity on the Profile Page....15

-Facebook Psychos: The Contrived Profile…………………………………..17

-Profile Pictures…………………………………………………………….….19

II: It's free and anyone can join: Reasons and Advantages for Joining (and not Joining) Facebook………………………………………………………………...……22

Facebook.com is one of many social networking websites that allow users participate in virtual communities using self-created profiles. It lets users fill out designated forms (regarding such things as their hometown, their favorite movies, and their favorite books) to allow other users to know more about them. Facebook refers to itself as a "social utility" used to facilitate communication between people based on networks of schools, geographies, and workplaces (Facebook 2007:http://www.facebook.com). Originally launched from a Harvard dorm room in February of 2004, Facebook expanded to other colleges and universities to allow the students with a valid e-mail address from those institutions to join the site. Now, it is available to anyone who has an email account. It claims to have around 70 million active users (people who have returned to the site in the last 30 days). As of October 2007, the site claims to have an average of 200,000 new users every day and an average of 3 percent weekly growth since January of 2007 (Facebook 2007:http://www.facebook.com). According to results gathered for Facebook by comScore, Facebook.com is the sixth most trafficked website in the world (Facebook 2007:http://www.facebook.com).

Of all internet users in the world, about 6.8 percent of them visit Facebook and view an average of 24 pages on the site per visit (Alexa 2008:http://www.alexa.com). It is no question that with an average usage time of 20 minutes, Facebook is a highly used social tool (a forum for interacting with others and networking) by many people, especially young people (Facebook 2007:http://www.facebook.com). With the extremely high usage patterns and explosive growth of Facebook as well as other social networking sites, the question as to why these sites are so popular and interesting to people arises. How does using a site that promotes networking so often affect a person’s life? What is the attraction to Facebook?

The point of this study is to examine how Facebook users construct their online profile identities and how that affects their off-line identity. This study used qualitative methods. In addition, this study explored Facebook use in relation to Cooley’s looking-glass self (1983:184) in order to consider the process of self-reflection through re-examining of profile pages via Cooley’s theory. Most important, the study examined the creation of online cultural and social capital and why that virtual commodity is valuable in users’ everyday lives. Through analyzing the reasons people get (and don’t get) Facebook, identity construction through the profile page, and the addictive nature of Facebook, I applied the social theories mentioned above to answer: What is the attraction to Facebook? I found that through a presentation of cultural capital online, users gain social capital and are able to better understand and reinforce their own identities through the Facebook.

Research on the "digital culture" shows that what is emerging in the virtual world is a reorganization and reinterpretation of reality-based culture. This makes all internet users "active agents in the process of meaning-making..." and although it is relatively new, this "digital culture" is in no way separate from a "reality-based" culture (Dueze 2006:63-75). On Facebook, the construction of users’ profiles allows them to participate directly in meaning-making, letting them become direct members of a digital culture. Participants create their online identities according to what they have decided is meaningful.

One controversial aspect of digital culture is that it can create highly personal communities via different networking forums, one of which is Facebook, while at the same time fostering isolation. Users are connected through various networks but at the same time they are alone in front of a computer screen (Dueze 2006:63-75). Some argue that this leads to a society where individuality is highly valued, as Matei writes: "It seems as though virtual communities have come to absorb some of the conflict of the need for community in an individualist-driven society" (2005:http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol10/issue3/matei.html). If this is true, it could explain the attraction to join social networking websites like Facebook. The creation of a virtual identity (and consequent communication venues) could be the future of socializing, so the methods of how people construct their virtual “selves” must be examined.

The concepts in Pierre Bourdieu’s “Forms of Capital” (1986) are key when considering the importance of what a user includes in his or her Facebook profile to construct his or her online "identity." Bourdieu proposes three types of capital: “economic capital, which is immediately and directly convertible into money and may be institutionalized in the form of property rights; as cultural capital, which is convertible, on certain conditions, into economic capital and may be institutionalized in the form of educational qualifications; and as social capital, made up of social obligations (‘connections’)…” (1984:241-258). When considering Facebook, both cultural capital and social capital play significant roles. A user uses and demonstrates his or her cultural capital to construct a profile (displaying cultural tastes) and the profile then works as a vehicle for gaining social capital through interaction with others.

In the same way people identify themselves aesthetically in the non-virtual world (picking out the clothes they want to wear, choosing their favorite music, etcetera), people also construct a virtual identity through their personal presentation on Facebook profiles. The decision to include one band the user likes and not another on one’s profile shows a method of selection based on cultural capital. Sarah Thornton’s expansion on Pierre Bourdieu’s ideas on cultural capital are also very relevant: [“knowledge that is accumulated through upbringing and education which confers social status” (1997:186)] and social capital: [stems not from what you own or know, but from who you know (and who knows you) (1997:186)] as well as her addition of subcultural capital: a youthful adaptation of cultural capital by creating status in the eyes of a member of that subculture (1997:186). Facebook is a communications device that relies solely upon "who you know and who knows you." Once the connections are made between profiles of different people, (probably with similar cultural capital), social capital is gained and then can be used to benefit the person. The research Nicole Ellison (2006: http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol12/issue4/ellison.html) has done shows that social capital is beneficial in many areas of life:

Social capital has been linked to a variety of positive social outcomes, such as better public health, lower crime rates, and more efficient financial markets (Adler & Kwon, 2002:17-40). According to several measures of social capital, this important resource has been declining in the U.S. for the past several years (Putnam, 2000). When social capital declines, a community experiences increased social disorder, reduced participation in civic activities, and potentially more distrust among community members. Greater social capital increases commitment to a community and the ability to mobilize collective actions, among other benefits. Social capital may also be used for negative purposes, but in general social capital is seen as a positive effect of interaction among participants in a social network [Helliwell & Putnam, 2004:1435-1446]

It is appropriate to observe the societal value placed on Facebook connections and the attraction to becoming involved and spending time accumulating more connections in order to accrue more social capital. Ellison found that “Internet use alone did not predict social capital accumulation, but intensive use of Facebook did” (2007: http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol12/issue4/ellison.html). Users are spending more time on Facebook to accumulate more social capital. According to Burt (2002), the more "memberships" a person may have through their social capital, the more powerful their reputation can be, which creates real-world advantages. These real world advantages spring from the connections formed through networking. For example, a person looking for a job might know one of the people hiring from a school they attended together or through a mutual friend. The more connections a person has, the more likely he or she may use them to his or her advantage. Sometimes, people will misrepresent themselves to generate more valuable social capital for themselves.

Erving Goffman wrote about how people represent themselves to cater to other people’s expectations: “Sometimes he [anyone] will intentionally and consciously express himself in a particular way, but chiefly because the tradition of his group or social status require this kind of expression and not because of any particular response […]” (1959:1-24). This could mean that people’s social capital is tied to their social status. By inflating one’s self expression to gain entry to a different social status, the person is manipulating their self-presentation in order to create more capital. In terms of Facebook, it makes sense that a Facebook user would adhere to social rules when constructing one’s profile page. Those rules may correspond to the prestige a user attempts to maintain through the image she is trying to give off via her virtual identity. The user has the option to inflate herself in order to look a certain way if she wants to. To “check” and reassure the user that what he or she has constructed is falling right in the social category he or she wants, the “looking-glass self” becomes an active phenomenon.

Charles Horton Cooley asserts that the looking-glass self is comprised of three parts: “the imagination of our appearance to the other person, the imagination of his judgment of that appearance, and some sort of self-feeling, such as pride or mortification” (Cooley 1983:184). Facebook users may browse their own, self-constructed profile page after viewing a friend’s profile page for the purpose of self-assessment, creating a similar self-perception cycle reflecting that of Cooley’s. The “new” three parts of self-perception would become reading another users’ profile while imagining one’s own profile appearance, reading one’s own profile while imagining the other users’ judgment, and judging oneself based on these perceptions. Self-evaluation through the use of Facebook could lead to users modifying their profile pages to conform based on how they want others to perceive them.

In addition to older social theories employed by cultural anthropologists, I also tapped into the growing field of digital culture and the theories behind it to supplement my research.

Digital Culture Research: Online Identity Theories

Cliff Lampe uses three theories to examine the function of profile elements: signaling theory, common ground theory, and transaction cost theory. Signaling theory analyzes the kind of information presented in a profile and the information it conveys about the user to others. Signaling theory suggests that the signals chosen to represent users have a "weight" that could be used in certain social communities, as opposed to signals the user could have chosen (but did not) that were irrelevant to those same social communities (2006: http://www.msu.edu/~lampecli/papers/chi2007_slashdot.pdf ). That "weight" could be defined as the amount of social capital associated with it. Ellison used quantitative survey data, and found that students at Michigan State University gear their profile information to be accessible by their high school friends (Ellison 2007:http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol12/issue4/ellison.html). The signals used by the subjects had a common theme with their high school friends such as home town or high school attended. The second in the three theories is common ground theory, which addresses why users all fill out the same kind of form. This simply explains that the ability for all users to fill out the same profile page puts all the users on the same playing field, forcing a person to water him/herself down to exactly how they want to be represented as well as creating an easy way to judge people using the same criteria. Last is transaction cost theory, combining both signaling theory and common ground theory to form a bridge that links the signals to other people (Lampe 2006: http://www.msu.edu/~lampecli/papers/chi2007_slashdot.pdf). By putting signals on a form that remains the same, a person can reduce the “cost” of “transactions” (the process of searching for people who you want to find) while still gaining a substantial amount of social capital (Lampe 2006:http://www.msu.edu/~lampecli/papers/chi2007_slashdot.pdf).

Previous studies on the intensity of use of Facebook found links involving creating connections with friends from high school. Facebook is relevant to “bridging” social capital in order to create what is known as “weak ties” between college students and their friends from high school. Weak ties are social connections that are not maintained through direct and frequent personal contact. Since the advent of social networking sites, more weak ties are maintained between high school friends after they go to college. Through the maintenance of these “weak ties,” Ellison explains that the social capital that college students acquire in high school can be maintained in college, leading to more fulfilled college students with larger networks of potential resources (2007:http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol12/issue4/ellison.html). Social networking websites allow for weak ties to be maintained with little effort and provide social capital through another connection. Another explanation of high-intensity use was the potential for college students to gain social capital through continuing maintenance relationships between users who are already close friends or family members. This type of reinforcement also provides social capital, enhancing relationships as well as well-being (Ellison 2007:http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol12/issue4/ellison.html). The potential for the intensity of Facebook users to be dependent on their well-being, measured by their self esteem and their satisfaction with life, has also been researched. Ellison asserts further that: “Facebook use may be helping to overcome barriers faced by students who have low satisfaction and low self-esteem. Because bridging social capital provides benefits such as increased information and opportunities, we suspect that participants who use Facebook in this way are able to get more out of their college experience” (Ellison 2007: http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol12/issue4/ellison.html). Like Ellison, this research will examine the intensity of Facebook use. What her study fails to consider is the connection between Facebook usage and the users’ identity (“true self”) and projected identity (“projected self”). In addition, Ellison’s research used only quantitative research, and fails to examine users’ motivations or perceptions.

The intensity of use can also be linked to transaction cost theory. The popularity of e-commerce has been explained by the ease the internet provides when shopping for a specific product. Users have the option to compare prices and buy exactly what they want only using search terms and by clicking on relevant links (less of a “search cost”), cutting down “transaction costs” (as opposed to transactions that would happen in a reality-based shopping experience) (Lampe 2006: http://www.msu.edu/~lampecli/papers/chi2007_slashdot.pdf). If there are too many transaction costs, the exchange may fail (Lampe 2006: http://www.msu.edu/~lampecli/papers/chi2007_slashdot.pdf). In this way, transaction cost theory is connected with the ease of use of social networking websites such as Facebook. The search cost of looking for a person with a specific connection is reduced due to the information available on a profile, creating more ease of use and possibly creating more use in general (Lampe 2006: http://www.msu.edu/~lampecli/papers/chi2007_slashdot.pdf). Author’s also shows that in 2006 users of Facebook have more “friends” connected on their profile if they fill out fields that allow them to be connected with common referents rather than more open-ended “likes” and “dislikes” (Lampe 2006: http://www.msu.edu/~lampecli/papers/chi2007_slashdot.pdf). This also means that the more items listed on a profile, the more likely that person will be found in a search (Lampe 2006:http://www.msu.edu/~lampecli/papers/chi2007_slashdot.pdf), which relates to the reasons for filling out a profile in the first place: to be found.

I found out how Facebook users construct their online profile identities and how that affects their off-line identity through qualitative methods.

Measuring a Virtual World: Methods

Because I am a college student at Warren Wilson College in Asheville, North Carolina, most of my research was conducted on the campus of the College, as well as in various e-mail correspondence and telephone calls with informants.

This research employed latent content analysis and interviews to examine how Facebook users construct their online profile identities and how that affects their off-line identity.

I completed a content analysis of Facebook profile pages to find out how identity was portrayed through individual “profile” pages. On the profile pages I examined how users completed categories the Facebook offers users to fill out (Activities, Interests, Favorite Music, Favorite TV Shows, Favorite Movies, Favorite Books, Favorite Quotes, About Me, Education, etc). I also examined pictures available on profile pages (including activities in pictures, objects in pictures, and the setting in which the picture was taken).

In order to select pages for analysis I used snowball sampling to select Facebook pages to review. I asked informants about specific profile pages that they thought were interesting or worth analyzing based on the content the profiles provided. To protect the identities of the people who created the profile pages, I did not use names or any identifying information in my findings. All sensitive information was kept on my personal computer, which is password protected, as well as in my email account and campus server storage area, also both password protected.

After I analyzed the profile pages, I operationalized the data I gathered to form operational categories that assisted me in forming questions to ask in interviews. For the interviews, I employed semi-structured and informal techniques. I selected interviewees using snowball sampling and deviant case sampling. I used deviant case sampling to interview people who did not have an account on Facebook to try and understand why they chose not to construct an identity on Facebook. For the interviews I used verbal informed consent. Participants were informed of how they could get in contact with me if they wished to see the results of the research. I used a tape-recorder to record the interviews and each interview lasted between fifteen minutes to an hour in length.

In addition to reviewing profile pages and performing interviews, I also conducted informal fieldwork employing participant observation. All participants were notified of this fieldwork and agreed using verbal consent for me to use the data I collected. I performed this fieldwork in dorms and other social areas at Warren Wilson College, in homes and restaurants in Asheville, North Carolina as well as in Columbia, South Carolina, and in informal conversations with various people on the phone.

Once I collected my data, I transcribed my notes and the interview tapes onto documents on my computer. I coded these data according to conceptual categories I formed from the background research I had already done and then organized the data so that it all fit into clearly themed categories. From there, I was able to organize and write my paper.

One limitation of this research is imposed by the privacy restrictions that the Facebook website provides for its users. Because information users put on their profiles is almost always very personal (pictures of users connected with their first and last name, contact information, etcetera) users often only allow certain “friends” or specific networks to have full access to their profile. This is especially strict when a user wants to join a school-based network or a business-based network. Facebook requires users who wish to join these networks to supply an official email given by the institution to be allowed entrance. Once users do enter a network like this, they then can view all the other profiles in that network. Because I am only associated with Warren Wilson College, I had access only to that network and could not extend my profile page analysis to all networks. This limitation is mitigated by employing snowball sampling. Within my own and others connections I was able to analyze enough diverse profile pages to have an accurate sample.

Users have also have a privacy setting that lets them create a “limited profile.” This allows users to create a profile and select who of their “friends” and which networks will see that profile. They can choose to limit the content of their profile for other users they choose as well as other networks. Thus, if a user employs these privacy settings, I could access only a limited or restricted version of a full profile.

Because I have been a member of social networking websites at their inception, I have a large amount of previous knowledge that make my own view biased. As an advocate for Facebook at my own college, while doing interviews it is safe to say that many of my informants knew of my affinity and positions on Facebook before they were interviewed.

On Facebook, the construction and manipulation of users’ profiles allows them to participate directly in meaning-making, letting them become active members of a digital culture.

When one registers on Facebook, one is presented with an array of different sections to “fill out” about themselves. These sections are Basic: (Sex, Birthday, Hometown, Political Views, Religious Views,) Contact: (Emails, IM Screen Name, Mobile Phone, Land Phone, School Mailbox, Residence, Room, Address, City, Zip, and Website,) Relationships: (Relationship Status, Former Name, Interested in, and Looking for,) Personal: (Activities, Interests, Favorite Music, Favorite TV Shows, Favorite Movies, Favorite Books, Favorite Quotes, and About Me,) Education: (College/University, Concentration, High School,) Work: (Employer, Position, Description, City, and Time Period,) and Picture, where the user is allowed to upload one picture to be their main profile picture. Some options allow for freehand answers, some only give boxes to check (looking for: friendship, dating, a relationship, networking) or drop down boxes (relationship status: single, in a relationship, in an open relationship, engaged, married, it’s complicated.)

Participants create their online identities according to what they have decided is meaningful, a decision influenced by their cultural upbringing. Rebekah Nathan (2005) studied undergraduate college culture at a large university in the United States. In her study, she found that college students participated in identity construction on the doors of their dormitory rooms. She studied the patterns and themes of the mostly magazine-cut-outs pasted on each door that represented the inhabitants of the rooms. What she found is not unlike how many Facebook profiles are constructed; she writes that: “…most used a collage-like genre to create a carefully constructed impression of freethinking spontaneity and individuality. …It’s [the door’s] content references to booze, nakedness, craziness, youth, celebrity, and sexuality were often common themes, which conveyed even larger themes of freedom and fun” (Nathan 2005:24). Facebook profiles tend to follow the same patterns, users manipulate their profile as if it is their image to, in many cases of student users, celebrate the themes of “freedom and fun.” For example, on Facebook I saw people making funny faces in front of the Taj Mahal, pictures that include several happy friends or a significant other, clothes that indicate a formal party, a backpacking trip, or a boating jaunt, pictures of the user next to a giant plastic gorilla, in a snow drift, or playing a guitar. In contrast, many adult users use their profiles to show off their family identity. Many user pictures of older users are actually pictures of their children. This transference of a parent’s identity into their child’s is common and can also be likened to Christmas card photographs, which often feature the children and pets of a family but not the parents.

Facebook users, like the university undergrads Nathan studied, are in full control of what their profile says about them and what others say about them on their profile. In many cases users are aware of their creative license in creating their online identities. Trisha, who has had a Facebook account for close to three years, told me:

“I think in a way I kind of create the person that I would want to present my self through, like knowing, for instance, if someone was to look at it [my profile] I would want them to see me the way I wanted everyone to see me. Like, I put myself on there as the best way that I can. And I put things on there that I want people to know about me. Opposed to like, things that are true but I don’t care if anyone knows. Like for my interests, I have lots of interests, but I keep them as ones that I want people to know I’m interested in.”

The process of selecting the specific items that she wants to use to attract other users like her involves the use of cultural capital and subcultural capital. Thornton shows that people use these forms of capital in selecting things used in everyday life: “Just as books and paintings display cultural capital in the family home, so subcultural capital is objectified in the form of fashionable haircuts and well-assembled record collections…" (Thornton 1997:186).

In order to construct an “attractive” Facebook profile, a user must be fluent in the language of his or her culture. Displaying cultural capital on a profile page is what helps culture and subculture members identify one another. On Facebook, there are overarching themes, like those presented by Rebeckah Nathan, of freedom and fun. A carefully constructed profile leads to a more positive reaction by others and increased social capital. The carefully constructed profile can be too carefully constructed, as I will explore in the next section. In order to take Facebook seriously, one must present themselves as though they do not take it seriously.

Facebook Psychos: The Contrived Profile

The amount of control over presentation in a profile can lead to what Erving Goffman would call a “contrived performance:” “…contrived performances we tend to see as something painstakingly pasted together, one false item on another, since there is no reality to which the items of behavior could be a direct response” (1959:1-24). In terms of Facebook, some users are viewed as contrived because their “performance” on their profile is considered extreme. Extreme elements were explained (and shown) to me as a profile that looks as if the user has put a significant amount of time into its’ construction, for example: staged pictures of the user, having all the profile fields filled out completely, a well-thought-out status at all times, and excessive photo albums or pictures they have tagged of themselves. Even having “too many” friends was a sign of a contrived performance: "Researchers learned that while people perceive someone who has a high number of friends as popular, attractive and self-confident, people who accumulate “too many” friends (about 800 or more) are seen as insecure." (Rosenbloom 2007:http://www.nytimes.com/) In my own research, one undergraduate student named Jordan described a “contrived” profile: “there’s like, a ton of applications, and, there’s an extensive list of their interests and favorite books and everything, and lots of pictures. When they comment on their own wall.” Trisha, another undergrad, described a specific profile that she viewed as “funny:”

She [the owner of the profile] is always updating and adding pictures of herself and they’re always the same. And I know her statuses are like trying to get people to think of her in that way and I just think it’s funny cause it’s like, I don’t think it’s that, like, cool, I guess, because it’s not like I am judging her but kind of, like every time I see her I think of her Facebook status.
Many users report that they censor themselves and judge others on their personal appearance on Facebook. In one qualitative study, it was suggested that users of Facebook judge impression management skills when evaluating profiles: "Remarks made by the participants [users of Facebook] indicated that profiles are judged on the impression management skills of its creator, and especially noticed impressions that are artificial or contrived: ‘[I like to see] all the hot chicks who pretty much show that they have no self esteem, that amuses me’” (Dwyer 2007:5).

In my interviews it also became clear that there is a very thin line between a nice Facebook picture and a picture viewed as narcissistic and unacceptable, probably due to the negative reception the “contrived performance” receives.

Contrived profiles are only an example of a Facebook profile that does not match up with the cultural standards of a specific group, whether that be on purpose, by accident, or because the user is a user of a different set of cultural capital (a member of a different subculture, etc). It is generally thought, however, that a contrived performance is one that clearly shows the amount of time a user has put into constructing his or her profile, detracting from the “natural-ness” of how a user “should” be presented.

Profile Pictures

The method of selection used to construct items on the profile are also employed to construct all other areas of the profile, especially the profile picture chosen and the pictures displayed of the user. On Facebook, users are allowed one profile picture, which their entire profile is identified with in a search or in a group. In addition, users can “collect” pictures of themselves that they or others “tag” with the users name. All pictures that have been tagged of one person are connected to that person’s profile in a “directory” that can be viewed by anyone who can see the user’s profile page (their “friends” and their “network”). The user can restrict who sees the photos, as well as “un-tag” themselves from an undesirable picture. Again, Rebekah Nathan examined the University doors and found that in her dorm, pictures of “real people” were strangely absent in most cases. When they did appear, her description reflects exactly the way in which most Facebook pictures can be categorized:

“…the typical images were not serious; they are often posed, but in poses that contrast with the family album picture. Instead of smiling naturally, people are often making faces, or purposely ‘over’-smiling, or sticking out their tongues. They appear in unusual positions (on the ground; with their butts sticking out) and / or off balance, with legs and arms akimbo, as if caught in some spontaneous and ‘fun’ activity. The photos almost exclusively feature the resident with others of the same age group.” [2005:24]
Like Nathan, I observed patterns in Facebook profile pictures: glamorous pictures making the user look as attractive as possible (usually a close-up of the face or body), funny pictures of users with a strange object or making a face, pictures with friends, pictures in exotic places, etc. Nathan describes photos on the dorm doors, very similar to what is also observed on the Facebook: “Many of the photos-just as the words, phrases, and images included-are calculated to say something like: ‘Here I am doing crazy / spontaneous / ‘fun’ things’; ‘Here I am having a good time with my friends’; or sometimes, ‘I’m a unique and eccentric individual’”(2005:24). In interviews, it seemed as though there was a strict unwritten code on what made a “good” Facebook profile picture. The code consists of how natural a Facebook user can display oneself, while masking a possibly heavy-Facebook user. One informant, a young woman in college named Sarah, gave a good description of the code. She describes what she thinks a good profile picture would be: “um, not a picture of you trying to look really good, just a picture of yourself. And I don’t like it when people have pictures of them with 10 other people because you don’t know who they are and um, I don’t like it when people have question marks, just a picture, you know, not a picture with your boobs hanging out.” Trisha’s criteria for a profile picture were:

…first it has to be one that makes me look nice, I don’t want to look like an idiot, well, I’ve looked pretty stupid in some of them but never like, unflattering, and, kind of depends on what time of year it is, and if I’m hanging out with friends that I haven’t seen in a while and I’ve just gotten back, like when I’ve just gotten back to school or whatever I would put ones of me and my friends from here, or um, pictures that just are particularly funny, like right now I just have one of my face, like, pretty simple, like, I just have nothing cool going on to show off, you know? So just kinda like a plain one. Like if I’m doing something somewhere I might take a picture of me somewhere cool and put it on. But usually they’re either funny or plain.

…if I am with someone I don’t want people to see me with (giggles) or if I’m doing something sort of embarrassing, like I have a lot of cousins and brothers and sisters so if I’m being shitfaced or something in a picture I wouldn’t want people to see me like that. Or if I’m wearing something too sexy that I wouldn’t want my cousins to see, like at a club or something… [bad pictures of other people are] like, slutty ones, like if they’re wearing hardly anything, or if they’re trying to have sex appeal, it’s kind of weird, or it’s really if I think they’re attractive or not, cause even if it’s a really hot guy and he’s doing something wicked dumb and looking like an idiot in it, I won’t judge him necessarily off of it. Because usually people put either the best picture of them or a really hilarious one, that isn’t necessarily bad, like that one of Roger and me decked out in stupid clothes, it wasn’t the best picture I have but I thought it was really funny but people were probably like “what the hell is she doing” I don’t think it matters.

At one point in my research, I witnessed several arguments among peers concerning pictures taken at a party. All of the people in the pictures wanted the pictures to be posted and tagged on Facebook, but no one wanted to actually put the pictures up on their profile and tag them. When asked about this, one informant told me, “[I don’t want to put the pictures up] because, it looks stupid, I already have a million albums up. People make fun of me. Someone else do it.” The collective image one puts forth on Facebook must not appear to be narcissistic, as it could if one were to post many pictures of him or herself and tag themselves in them. This problem will not occur if someone else tags the picture of the person from his or her account.

Profile picture selection plays an important role in how Facebook users present themselves on Facebook. It is one aspect to the profile that truly represents a person and is a major judgment point by others’. The way in which people select and judge profile pictures relies upon each persons’ cultural capital values, their ability to manage their contrived performance, and their impression management skills.