Before freshman year, I met my college roommate online. A common friend of ours thought we would get along and our friendship began over instant-messenger. During high-school, we had been over this common friend’s house at the same time at a party and another time to play poker, but we had never introduced ourselves or really knew each other at all. Thus, our online conversations were the first conversations we had, even though we had a vague idea of who each other was. The first things we talked upon were based on common ground such as sports interests and common friends, but the theory that best describes how our friendship left virtuality (from the online-realm to the real-world) is SIDE theory.
SIDE theory takes into consideration two main factors: whether the person is anonymous and whether the person identifies as an individual or a group member. Online, when talking about common ground interests (one of McKenna’s factors) such as sports, we identified as individuals because for example, even though we both love baseball, he was a Mets fan and I was a Yankees fan, so we both held our individual identities. Using this example, I liked him because we both liked baseball, but less so that he did not root for the Yankees as I did. The first time we met to hang out together in person was at a party that a Cornell freshman hosted for other incoming Cornell freshman. The situation obviously brought to the forefront hat we had a lot in common with regards to our new in-group as Cornell students. We met new friends who were also attending Cornell, and talked about things that we both knew about the school.
So, we were not visually anonymous, and we shared a group identity when we met in person, while online we were visually anonymous and held individual identity. And, in fact, we liked each other more after our initial offline meeting. This is consistent with SIDE in the sense that we departed from our individual identities online and our in-group identities became more salient offline. This was likely due to the fact that we went to a party with all future Cornell students and that we expected positive responses from in-group topics such as discussion about the dorm rooms and sports teams. So, we had a positive impression of each other online, but liked each other even more offline, thus showing that our attraction as friends increased as we left virtuality.
Comm 245 Blue: 11- So I guess I'm your roommate....
Comm 245 Blue: Assignment 11: Coming to College
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2 comments:
Thats great that you hit it off so well with your college roommate. You said, "And, in fact, we liked each other more after our initial offline meeting" which interestingly does not support Ramirez & Wang's theory that meeting FtF after CMC communication leads to disappointment and negative effects. I think it is interesting to consider the social information processing theory stating that relational development over time would have been sufficient. Do you think that your relationship may have ended up the same through only CMC? I think there are a large number of factors that may influence this kind of outcome.
Daniel,
I found your blog post very interesting. You do a good job of tying in concepts from class into your blog. The relationship you describe does not align with all the findings of the concepts we learned in class, which is interesting. I like how you use an example that contradicts the observations of Ramirez and Wang. It offers a different perspective into relationships that that move from CMC to FtF.
Great job!
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