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| Laine - I’ve definitely seen Walther’s hyperpersonal “selective self-presentation” at work in my relationship with my boyfriend. In the beginning stages of our relationship, our self-disclosure was most often via instant messaging for the very reason that Walther claimed—“people who meet online have an opportunity to make and sustain an overwhelmingly positive impression.” IM allowed us to carefully process and edit what were going to say before we committed to saying it by pushing “send.” I would often type on the instant message screen, read it through, delete it and start over if there was something that I said in a way that might leak information that I wasn’t yet ready to disclose.
I have found that once you move beyond the slower pace of online interaction and get used to the pace of face-to-face interaction, it’s hard to go back. For example after we became comfortable with each other face-to-face, our CMC became almost nonexistent. When we are living in separate states, the different pace of online communication becomes frustrating. |