Background:
...social constructionist framework theorizes that individuals form and constantly readjust their self-perceived identity through interactions with family, friends, and the individual's environment, such as school, church, work, social gatherings, and media (Evans, Forney, Guido-DiBrito, 1998).
Study Procedure:
This study aimed to understand identity construction and cognitive dissonance resolution in an asynchronous, nonymous environment. By "nonymous," we refer to social networking sites that are not completely anonymous in nature, but rather grounded to some extent in the real world.
In a qualitative study of 1280 college students with Facebook accounts across 14 institutions, we found a significant dissonance (S < 5%) between personality and lifestyle traits participants shared when speaking with an interviewer face-to-face (f2f) and those descriptions posted on Facebook profiles. In general, participants' online identities tended to be more extroverted, more eclectic, more epic in nature, and less reality-based. For instance, when one participant was asked to describe his profession in person, he stated that he worked at a local film-rental retailer. On his "profession" description on Facebook, he listed "vampire slayer & rawkin suga-daddy."
When these discrepancies were pointed out to participants, a majority (P < 5%) became visibly confused; a minority displayed physical hostility. When subsequently asked to explain the discrepanies, the usual response was disavowal ("Oh, I was just joking around there," or "That's not me, that's my online me.").
However, a minority of respondents displayed no sign of cognitive dissonance. This group also overwhelmingly reported more hours spent in virtual nonymous environments than the median.
Conclusions
...seems to be a strong correlation between hours spent on virtual nonymous environments and the respondent's difficulty in resolving differences between real and virtual selves. In other words, the more time a subject spends with a virtual identity, the greater does the subject assimilate that as a coexisting identity in reality...
Further research:
...questions include MRI brain mapping comparisons of schizophrenic individuals' prefrontal cortex and those of individuals with highly-developed virtual selves...
References:
Journal of College Student Development, Volume 50, Number 3, May/June 2009, pp. 253-270 (Article) DOI: 10.1353/csd.0.0075
How Identity and Perspective Constrain Moral Choice. Kristen Monroe International Political Science Review / Revue internationale de science politique, Vol. 24, No. 4 (Oct., 2003), pp. 405-425
Cognitive Dissonance and Its Resolution: A Study of Lesbian Christians. Kimberly A. Mahaffy. Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, Vol. 35, No. 4 (Dec., 1996), pp. 392-402
Time Flies When You're Having Fun: Cognitive Absorption and Beliefs about Information Technology Usage, Ritu Agarwal, Elena Karahann. MIS Quarterly, Vol. 24, No. 4 (Dec., 2000), pp. 665-694
The Anthropology of Explanation. Charles W. Nuckoll. Anthropological Quarterly, Vol. 66, No. 1 (Jan., 1993), pp. 1-21
Whitlock, Gillian and Anna Polett. "Self-Regarding Art." Biography. Volume 31, Number 1, Winter 2008.
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