Online Interaction and Identity Development: The Relationship between Adolescent Ego Identity and Preferred Communication Activities

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the types of communication activities adolescents reported as important and used most frequently, and how these communication preferences were reflected in adolescents' identity development status. Participants were approximately 600 new university students who completed a survey regarding 18 communication activities, along with the Erikson Psychosocial Stage Inventory identity subscale. Data analysis was conducted in two phases. To reduce the frequency and importance data to a manageable size, exploratory factor analyses and confirmatory factor analyses were conducted. Two identical factors were identified and validated related to the importance and the frequency of communication activities. The first factor comprised four items related to online ''performance": online gaming, participation in virtual reality settings, live chat with strangers, and live chat with groups unknown to the individual. The second factor comprised four communication activities that occurred on social networking sites as individuals created lasting "exhibits" of themselves: updating a personal profile, viewing the profiles of others, posting status messages, and sharing pictures or other content (articles, jokes, videos) with others. Analysis of means indicated that the three communication activities rated as most important and frequently used were face-to-face interaction, voice calls and text messaging. These were followed by social networking activities, and then writing activities such as blogging. The performative activities identified in the exploratory factor analysis were ranked as least important and least frequently used. Regression analysis revealed small but statistically significant negative relationships between the reported importance of performative activities and identity development status, and between the reported frequency of performative activities and identity development status. Small positive relationships were also identified between the importance of face-to-face interaction and identity development status, and the importance of voice phone calls and identity development status. Small positive relationships were also identified between the frequency of face-to-face communication and identity development, between the frequency of voice phone calls and identity development, and between the frequency of email use and identity development.