For this assignment I decided to analyze my best friend’s Facebook profile. I thought that she would be an appropriate person to consider since I know her very well and she tends to be extremely honest so I was curious to see how she portrayed herself online. I first asked her to rate the accuracy of her profile based on the different elements. She rated herself a 5 on all categories and after carefully looking over all aspects of her Facebook page, she is 100% correct with all information. Where some people tend to hide certain interests such as listening to bands like NSYNC or watching movies such as High School Musical, my friend posted all interests whether they were “cool” or not.
After verifying the truth of her profile, I decided to consider the Feature Based Approach. The Social Distance and Media Richness only assume richness and distance affect the use of particular media and that is why I chose Feature Based. According to this approach, synchronicity (degree to which messages are exchanged instantaneously), recordability (degree to which information is documented) and distribution are considered (if speaker and listener share same physical space). In regards to my friend’s facebook profile, it is an asynchronous space and the theory predicts that in synchronous spaces such as Ftf or instant messaging more lying occurs since people tend to lie spontaneously. Since Facebook is high in recordability considering all of the information is on record on the internet, according to the Feature’ Based Model, individuals are less likely to lie as in my friend’s case. This makes sense because people are more likely to get caught when lies that are recordable as they are on facebook. In regard to distribution, facebook is a medium where individuals are distributed. The theory suggests people are more likely to lie about issues such as physical setting. For example, on the phone you could easily say I am studying, when you are really at the movies. On Facebook, you can update your status to say where you are. In regards to my friends profile she did not have her status written at the time. However, often the status of a person of Facebook is a lie simply because they forget to change it. For example, one of my friends had “At Olin” for fours days. I am sure he was not at olin for four straight days, he just did not have the opportunity to change his profile. I think that based on my findings, facebook supports the features based model. THe theory even accounts for the fact that in regards to deception, not all lies are homogeneous. Also lies about facts are least likely to be told in a recordable media. I think recordability most certainly had a major impact on the truth behind my friends Facebook since Facebook mainly lists facts about a person.
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Hi Kateyln. I reached very similar results after analyzing my friend’s Facebook profile. Just like your friend, my friend claimed to be completely accurate in his profile, and he was truthful on this assessment. I think that you were correct to analyze your friend’s profile in consideration of the Feature-based Approach because the synchronicity, recordability, and distance play crucial roles in communication technology deception. In addition, the Social Distance Theory and the Media Richness Theory do not address Facebook specifically. In order to consider Facebook using these two theories, it would be necessary to assess the degree to which Facebook is a rich medium. Perhaps you could have added this to your blog. Nonetheless, given the unique dynamics of Facebook, I agree with you that recordability plays a significant role in deception. Given the fact that Facebook connects people who already know each other, for the most part, it is likely that individuals will not post deceitful information because they will most likely get caught. Given Facebook’s recent inception and complicated nature, it definitely requires specific research.
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