Anonymity, Pseudonymity, and Identity Formation

Anonymity or use of pseudonyms (noms de plume) in CMC sometimes has been used in educational and business applications to encourage frank response or unbiased exchange (Harasim, 1993). However, there are networks discouraging anonymity; such is the WELL, for example (Rheingold, 1993).

Furthermore, it has been also argued that anonymity can be seen as of positive value, when it creates opportunities to invent alternative versions of one's self and to engage in untried forms of interaction (Myers, 1987a, 1987b; Reid, 1991). In role-playing CMC forums, the use of pseudonyms or "nicks" (for "nicknames") sometimes is believed to "allow people to be other than 'themselves,' or more of themselves than they normally express" (Danet & Ruedenberg, 1994). Moreover, Matheson & Zanna (1990) support that anonymous or pseudonymous communicants feel more confortable and willing to reveal personal information, thus, developing social interdependence and perhaps even intimacy, by reducing the constraints of stereotypes that prescribe more socially independent behavior.

On the contrary, in CMC often happens that the use of anonymity or pseudonymity hides identity for the purpose of a decrease in social inhibition and an increase in flaming; for example, people are found more insulting when using an anonymous CMC (Baym, 1995; Myers, 1987a, 1987b; Reid, 1991). Usually, the practice of hiding identity is protecting a communicant in a public forum from adverse social reactions to the expression of views which might be considered socially deviant or from being identified as participating in a CMC forum popularly perceived as socially deviant. The latter is the case of certain sexually explicit or pornographic USENET newsgroups (Jaffe et al., 1995).

The fact is that sooner or later even anonymous communicants do build identities for themselves. The general tendency is that in CMC both anonymous and non-anonymous communicants creat their own identies actively and collaboratively by processes of naming, signing signatures, role creation, and self-disclosure (Baym, 1995). According to Myers (1987b), CMC users' names are "transformed into trademarks, distinctive individual scents by which their users are recognized as either friends or enemies within an otherwise vague and anonymous communication environment." In this way, not only fictional identies can be created, but anonymous users can switch genders, appearances, and countless other usually integral personality aspects (Carpenter, 1983; Reid, 1991). Finally, the so called "signature files," attached to the bottom of posts, represent, according to Baym (1995), "one of the most immediate and visually forceful cues to identity." These signature files, besides the poster's name and e-mail address, usually include quotations, personal or company disclaimers, and illustrations created using ASCII characters (punctuation marks and letters).

From the above, one may conclude that computer-mediated communication does constitute a social space, where people interact by inventing new personas, recreating their own identities, or both, in the course of communication practices. Although these types of identity managing processes are common to almost all of the discursive practices of mass media, it is assured by Poster (1995) that textual CMCs "go considerably beyond." According to Poster, "the individual's performance of the communication requires linguistic acts of self-positioning," in which "individuals read and interprete communications to themselves and to others and also respond by shaping sentences and transmitting them."

Some Gender Issues

One of the most interesting topics in computer-mediated communication is the question of sex differences and the relation between gender and computer networking. In general, the statistics for women in the computer science fields are estimated rather low and this is attributed to the early stereotyping of roles (for example, through toys for boys and girls) and to existing social attitudes in workplaces (Shade, 1993). Moreover, women are considered not to be very well represented on most computer networks, although there are exclusively women-only mailing lists and computer conferences (Shade, 1993; Smith & Balka, 1991).

As we have already seen, computer-mediated communication has been claimed to be a medium that, in the absence of physical and social cues, it allows more democratic communication and, thus, more equitable gender communication (Graddol & Swann, 1989). Moreover, CMC has been argueed to be "anarchic," lacking in established conventions of use (Ferrara et al., 1991), resulting in a breakdown of traditional hierarchical differences in communication.

Contrary to these claims, Susan Herring (1993) presents results about activity on two academic e-mailing lists (Linguist and Megabyte University or MBU) illustrating that, even in academic CMC, men and women do not participate equally. Rather, she claims, a small minority of men still dominate the discource and choice of topic, as well as exhibiting a self-promotional and adversarial rhetorical style. Thus, Herring concludes that "because of social conditioning that makes women uncomfortable with direct conflict, women tend to be more intimidated by these practices and to avoid participation as a result" (Herring, 1993).

Similar conclusions to those of Herring were reached by Lynn Cherny (1994) in her study of gender differences in the text-based virtual reality environments, as MUDs and MOOs. Cherny found that indeed there are differences in how men interact versus how women interact: "men use more physically violent imagery during conversation and women are more physically affectionate towards other characters than men are" (Cherny, 1994).

Kathleen Michel (1992) investigated gender differences in KIDCAFE, a networking project that links children around the world. She sought to apply linguist Deborah Tannen</a>'s theories of the gender differences in conversation: the "rapport" (cooperative, intimate style) versus "report" (information giving) styles of talk. In general, more women favor the "rapport" style, while more men favor the "report" style (Tannen, 1990). Michel concluded that, although there are different conversational patterns between boys and girls, they are not as discrepant as Tannen would indicate. Moreover, she observed that CMC can have very positive effects for cross-gender communication among school children (Michel, 1992). However, the findings of Kaplan & Farrell (1994) have supported Tannen's work; in particular, they observed that young women's messages are quite short and their participation is driven by their desire to keep the conversation going than the desire to achieve consensus on some issues (Kaplan & Farrell, 1994).

J. Michael Jaffe and his group (1995) have investigated whether the use of pseudonyms migates gender-based differences of CMC patterns. They found that "women tended to mask their gender with their pseudonym choice while males did not," an observation underscoring "the implicit social pressure that women feel when interacting in mixed-gender situations" (Jaffe et al., 1995).

According to Leslie Regan Shade (1993), "despite the relative anonymity of CMC, though, some women report that they are often harassed and intimidated from posting and participating on conferences via e-mail" (Shade, 1993). Gladys We (1993) too refers to cases of sexual harassment and abuse against women, as, for example, one woman reported to her that "in response to my postings he sent e-mail calling me 'hairly legged feminazi'... and did lots of innuendos about the probable deficits of my personal life" (We, 1993).

Amy Bruckman (1993) has conducted research on social interactions and gender swapping in the text-based virtual reality environments of MUDs. She has found that female MUDders are often "besieged with attention," including unwanted sexual advances, and that male players will often log on as female characters and behave suggestively, further encouraging sexual advances (Bruckman, 1993). Pavel Curtis (1992) has noted that in MUDs the most promiscuous and sexually aggressive women are usually played by men (Curtis, 1992).

There are many well-publicized stories and folklore about people who created entirely new persona online (including gender swapping) and about the reaction that followed the identity disclosure. In 1985 Lindsy Van Gelder reported the case of a man who used the network to play out assumptions about gender roles. In real life he was a prominent New York psychiatrist in his early fifties, called "Alex," and on the network he presented himself as a female neuropsychologist, "Joan," who had recently been severely disabled in a car accident. Over the two years that Joan was online, she developed intimate relationships (in some cases online romances) with other women, although never face-to-face, and "she served both as a support for other disabled women and as an inspiring stereotype-smasher to the able-bodied" (Van Gelder, 1991). Eventually it was revealed that Joan was not only not disabled but he was Alex, "who was engaged in a bizarre, allconsuming experiment to see what it felt like to be female, and to experience the intimacy of female friendship" (ibid.). The response to this revelation was intense: many felt betrayed and outraged. Others felt disappointed, regretted the "death" of the virtual friend "Joan," and wished to continue a friendship with that person, "to relate to the soul, not the sex of the person" (ibid.).

As Lesley R. Shade and Gladys We (1993) wrote, "the new 'electronic frontier' is unfortunately still a very masculine dominated space, one in which many women may feel uncomfortable at the best of times. Ensuring equitable gender access to the Internet should be a prerogative of this information age" (Shade & We, 1993)

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