Hyperpersonal Communication

We have recently explored the concept of hyperpersonal communication. This is communication that is protected by online interaction, making it more socially desirable than face-to-face interactions. We discussed the four factors of hyperpersonal communication; the sender, the receiver, the channel, and the feedback loop. These four factors all interact through hyperpersonal communication, specifically online. For example, the sender would be whoever is choosing to send an original message to someone else. The person that they send this message to would be the receiver. The channel would be the format in which the communication is occurring. For example, a chatroom would be considered a channel. The feedback loop is however the receiver is interpreting information they are receiving from the sender. A sender is able to present themselves in whichever way they would like. The sender could completely create a new identity and personality and present themselves as a totally new person. While the receiver has the capability to decide whether or not to believe the sender, in many cases the information that is presented to them is understood to be the truth.

Most people that have a Facebook or any other social media profile, edit the information that can be seen by others, such as pictures, interests, and posts. I think that everyone can say that they have untagged or deleted a picture of themselves from Facebook that they did not enjoy. Deleting a picture is not the same thing as faking an entirely new identity but it is just an example of how everyone does small enhancements to their online persona in order to create the ideal version of themselves. I generally try to talk to people online only if I have met them before in person, even if briefly. Many times if you meet someone in person that you maybe have come across through Facebook, you find that their life may not be as glamorous as they have portrayed it to be.

I find it very interesting that people often engage in this type of communication. I personally don't know if I would be comfortable meeting someone online and developing an intimate relationship with that person. Although, I can't say that I have never spoken to someone online but in most of these scenarios I have known these people through friends or previous brief interactions such as in a class. People that are receivers are likely to want to believe whatever the sender is telling them because it is normally an idealized perception of a person. For example, in online dating profiles or social media, people can choose to portray themselves as more attractive and interesting than they may actually be. I recently watched a video that one of my friends posted of a social experiment in which an attractive girl matched with guys on dating application, Tinder and then agreed to meet with them. When she went to the meetings she was wearing a fat suit in order to see how the guys would react to her looking completely different than she did in her profile. Most of the guys that met up with her ended up coming up with an excuse to leave. Whether they said they were offended by her lying about her appearance, or they simply needed to "use the bathroom" by the end of this experiment the girl had been ditched by most of her Tinder matches. After watching this video it's interesting to see that people actually would be offended by someone lying in an online profile. I think that when you begin to speak to anyone that you have never met in person, you have to expect that something they are putting on their profile could be an exaggeration or inaccurate.

Examples of these types of false information in online dating scenarios can also be seen in the show Catfish. Most of the people on the show end up being heartbroken because they have wasted many years of their lives engaging in intimate online relationships with people that either don't actually exist, or are enhanced versions of the real person. I think that scenarios like this can be very dangerous. When you engage in communication with someone you cannot definitively say is who they claim to be, then you must be prepared for any outcome. I know that my parents always used to warn me about who I'm speaking to online. They said that even if the person claimed to be my friend or someone I knew, they could easily be lying because I could not see them as they were typing to me to confirm if they were telling the truth or not. Hyperpersonal Communication can be used as a way to victimize people. For example, if a sexual predator was using a blog or forum site that was supposed to be for young teenage girls, they could end up convincing the girls to meet with them. These negative aspects of hyperpersonal communication seem to be overlooked more often than not. As new technology arises and it becomes more common to speak over the Internet, people become less concerned with the potential dangers.