 The magazine of the Melbourne PC User Group Online Relationships - Liars or Friends? Monika Merkes monika@melbpc.org.au |
Physical contact is an important dimension of friendships and intimate relationships, and it may not appeal to some people to develop a relationship with a person whose physical reality they have never experienced. However, online relationships - friendships and romantic relationships - are common. Are people in chat rooms, news- groups and other online meeting places honest about who they are? How much is illusion?
In this article, I try to find some answers to the following questions:
- How common are online relationships?
- Who has online relationships?
- How does trust develop in online relationships?
- If people lie, are there patterns?
- How easily are liars found out?
- Are online relationships also conducted offline?
The respondents were between 15 and 57 years old with an average age of 32
years and contributed to an average of five newsgroups on a monthly basis. Nearly two in three people
reported that they had formed a personal relationship with someone they had met for the first time via an
Internet newsgroup.
Opposite-sex relationships were slightly more common than same-sex relationships, and only a few were
romantic relationships (8%). Relationships ranged in duration from less than one month to six years, but most
were less than one year old. Participants communicated regularly with their online partners. Nearly a third
reported that they communicated with their partners at least three or four times a week, and over half did so
on a weekly basis.
Women were more likely than men to develop online relationships (72% compared to 55%). The likelihood of
developing online relationships did not appear to be influenced by age or marital status. The best predictor
for developing an online relationship was the duration and frequency of people's participation in newsgroups.
Those who had developed personal online relationships contributed more frequently to newsgroups and used
direct e-mail more often to respond to a greater number of newsgroup contributors than people who did not
have online relationships.
Nearly all people with online relationships used direct e-mail to communicate with their online friends. A
surprising number also used other ways to contact their friends: telephone (35%), letters (28%), and
face-to-face communication (33%).
A survey in the U.S.
http://www.pewinternet.org/reports/toc.asp?Report=58 asked 1,415 Internet users in January 2002 whether
the Internet played a crucial or important role in a range of decisions and experiences during the past two
years when they went through that moment or made that decision. The survey found that the Internet played an
important role for 15% of the Internet users who started a new romantic relationship and for 15% who
ended a romantic relationship, as well as for 14% of people who got married. Nobody said that the Internet
played a crucial role in their divorce.
The development of friendships requires honesty and trust. So how honest are people in cyberspace? Dr Monica
Whitty surveyed people who visit chat rooms. The surveys were completed by 160 women and 160 men between the
ages of 17 and 55 years with a mean age of 21.3 years. Among other questions, the survey participants were
asked how honest they were in chat rooms.
The survey found that those who spend 11 hours per week or more in chat rooms were more honest than those who
spend only 0-2 hours per week on this activity. Men lied more than women, and they lied more about their
gender, occupation, education and income. Younger people lied more than older people, and they were more
likely to lie about their age than older people. Women lied more for safety reasons than men. Further,
younger women were more likely than older women to withhold information so that others would not discover
their identity.
The more time people spend in chat rooms, the more open and honest they are. Dr Whitty suggested that the
development of trust in online relationships is gradual, which is similar to relationships in the physical
world. Young women who withhold information or lie for safety reasons might "bring their understandings of
face-to-face relationships to their interactions in chat rooms, and for this reason are more timid and
fearful of chat room interactions". As personal questions are asked frequently, honest answers might
provide enough information to identify and harass a young woman.
The Internet offers people the opportunity to experiment with their identity. For example, gender swapping
is much easier on the Internet than in real life. I asked Dr Whitty how good people are at gender swapping,
and how easy it is to detect a liar.
"People are not actually that good at this ... in fact previous research has found that people do leak
their gender through their language - even when they have screen names that appear the opposite
gender".
Online relationships - friendships more so than romantic relationships - are common and formed by women and
men of all ages. While online friends can't do the same things together like in the physical world - go for a
walk, have dinner or play tennis together - they can connect to each other through words.
Melbourne PC User Group has several newsgroups for its members. If you haven't done so already, join one or
more of these and make some new friends. In PC Update, March 2002 Bob Thomas wrote an article about
our newsgroups and how to join
http://www.melbpc.org.au/pcupdate/2203/2203article11.htm.
I hope to meet you there soon!
References
Whitty, M., & Gavin, J. (2001). Age/sex/location: Uncovering the social cues in the development of online
relationships. CyberPsychology & Behavior, 4 (5), 623-630.
Whitty, M. T. (2002). Liar, liar! An examination of how open, supportive and honest people are in chat
rooms. Computers in Human Behavior, 18 (4), 343-352.
Reprinted from the July 2002 issue of PC Update, the
magazine of Melbourne PC User Group, Australia
   |