3.2.2. Establishing personal identity
We were especially interested in potential markers that might be used to express the user's identity, as this is an important
developmental task during emerging adulthood. Contrary to prediction, expressing identity/opinions was rarely selected in
responses to survey queries for reasons for using Facebook (26.37% reported “some” and 64.13% “not much”). Finding love, another
facet of emerging adulthood, was also rarely selected (6.90% “some” and 91.95% “not much”).
Because the profile is where students establish howthey present themselves to others, which is a facet of identity,we presented
students with questions about what types of personal information they posted or left out on the profile page. Of the categories of
personal information that Facebook provides space to include on the profile page, those most often included were demographic
types of information (e.g., hometown, birthday), interests, and media preferences (see Table 3).
For each possible category of information that can be included in the profile, students were asked a series of survey questions
about why they included each item. Interestingly, students often posted media preferences – favorite books, music, and movies – as
a way to express identity (see Table 3). The “About Me” category, which allows users to describe themselves in a sentence or two
using any kind of information they desired, was also commonly chosen as an expression of their identity. In this section, college
students sometimes write funny facts, clever statements, or provide links to pictures and websites that they like. Identity was also
expressed through religion, political views, and work, which are classic indicators of ideology, but these identity markers were less
often selected than were media preferences. Including information because it was important for people to know was a primary
reason given for including school, birthday, and relationship status. In sum, traditional markers of identity, such as religion,
political ideology, and work were important indicators of identity (Arnett, 2000; Erikson, 1963), but so were media preferences,
which were selected more often than were the classic identity markers.
Who is able to view the profile may also play a role in howcollege students present themselves and what they chose to include.
Profile information on Facebook can be made available to either one's friends or all members of one's network. Nearly every
student (96.74%) reported that their college was their “primary” network. Only 25% belonged to more than one network, 52.17% of
whom belonged to a geographical area network, 34.78% to a high school network, 13.04% to another college network, and 4.35% to
a career or job network. Students varied with respect to who had access to their profile: 61.96% of respondents allowed their profile
page to be seen by all of their networks and all of their “friends”, 34.78% allowed only their friends, and 3.26% allowed some of their
networks and all of their friends. Put simply, most students provide open access to personal information.
The ability to instantaneously post numerous photos of oneself and one's friends, which can convey considerable information
about the self, is made possible by newer digital media. In fact, the majority of student responses to the survey indicated that
posting photos helped to express who they are to other Facebook users “a whole lot” (24.18%) or “quite a bit” (38.46%). Facebook
members are given unlimited space to post photos on their profiles. In general, the number of pictures posted to the profile varied
greatly, with a median value of 67.50 (range of 0–1095 after one outlier was removed from the high end of the distribution).
A Mann–Whitney nonparametric test revealed that females posted significantly more photos than males did, z = − 3.43, p b
.01 (Mdn=104.50 for females and 8.00 for males). Females were more often tagged in photographs thanwere males (z=−3.15,
p b .01; Mdn=144.00 for females and 50.00 for males, with two outliers removed from the high end of the distribution). A test of
responses on a four-point (“none” to “almost all”) Likert scale revealed that females were also more likely than were males to
“untag” photos (remove their name from another member's photograph on which the member had added their name), χ2(3, N=
92)=8.60, p=.04 (see Table 4). Specifically, more females reported that they untag “quite a few” (20.00%) or “almost all” (8.33%)
photos compared to males (18.75% “quite a few” and 0% “almost all”). In addition, whereas the majority of students of both sexes
reported untagging “some” photos (50.00% of males, 61.67% of females), far more males reported untagging no photos than did
females (31.25% “none” for males,10.00% for females). The most common reason for females to untag a photowas displeasure with
their appearance in the photo (88.68% of females who untagged photos), indicating that howthey lookedwas an important part of
their self-presentation to others. Males untagged photos because they were displeased with their appearance (56.52%) and/or
because the photos depicted them engaging in an act that they did not wish for others to see, such as underage drinking (34.78%).