As I learn more and more about the social science behind Social Media I am still baffled by how many experienced individuals there are in this field that still swap and maintain multiple identities online. I’m not talking about those happy go lucky individuals who use Twitter as a fun social tool/game, rather I’m talking about those who use it primarily for serious knowledge management and community engagement or to fulfil their innate passions.

I’ll just for the record define what I mean by; changing your identity, as best I can. I know there are many ways to look at identity and I won’t do it justice in this blog post but hopefully this stimulates the topic. Your user name is an identity as it helps identify you. Your avatar photo is a representation of your identity and both these together define your identity online. If you suddenly stop Tweeting and focus on Re-tweeting or you start to rant a lot more online that is representative of your personality and is less about your identity. The government is serious about you maintaining one identity off-line and that’s the whole reason you have a passport and why it’s a crime to forge another person’s identity by creating another passport with your photo and a different person’s name in it. 

OK we got this far now let’s tuck into the essence of our subject; how you could cannibalise your own identity online and not even know you’re doing it. To explain this I need to describe the principal of mutual exclusivity and what better example could I use than one explained in “The Tipping Point” by Malcolm Gladwell using a favourite children’s TV program Sesame Street. The episode ran on Christmas Eve in 1997 and was simply called “Roy.” The episode starts with the main character Big Bird running into a new character on the show; a mail carrier. “The mail carrier hands Big Bird a package, and Big Bird is immediately puzzled: “Is this is the first time you have ever been here,” he asks “how did you know that I was Big Bird?”

MAIL CARRIER: Well, you have to admit, itsy easy to figure out! [Gestures broadly to Big Bird]

BB: Is it? [Looks at himself] Oh I see, the package is for Big Bird and I’m Big Bird. I forget sometimes. I’m just what my name says; Big Bird is a big bird.

Big Bird became sad. He realizes that everyone else has a name – like Oscar, or Snuffy – but has only a description. He asks the mail carrier what her name is. She says Imogene.

BB. Gee, that’s a nice name. [Looking to the camera, wistfully] I wish I had a real name like that, instead of one that just says what I am, as if I were an apple of a chair or something.

Thereupon begins a search by Big Bird for a new name. With the help of Snuffy, he canvases Sesame Street for suggestions – Zackledackle, Butch, Bill, Omar, Larry, Sammy, Ebenezer, Jim, Napoleon, Lancelot, Rocky – before settling on Roy. But then once everyone starts calling him his new name he realizes “it just doesn’t seem right,” he says “I think I made a big mistake.” He switches back. “Even if Big Bird isn’t a regular name, “he concludes, “it’s my name and I like the way all by friends say it.”

This was, at least on the surface, an excellent episode. The premise is challenging and conceptual, but fascinating. It deals with emotion and unlike other children shows tells children that it’s okay not to be happy all of the time. Most of all, it’s funny.

It sounds like it should be a winner, right?

Wrong!

The Roy show was tested by the Sesame Street research staff and the numbers were very disappointing.

Attention steadily dropped through the program from an initial 100% to 80% and by the fourth segment it was down to 40% then 50% then 20%. After viewing the show the kids were quizzed on what they had seen.”We asked very specific questions and were looking for clear answers.” Rosemary Truglio, Sesame Street’s research head said, “What was the show about? Sixty percent knew. What did Big Bird want to do? Fifty three percent know. What was Big Birds new name? Twenty percent knew. How did big bird feel at the end? Fifty percent knew.” By comparison another of the shows tested by Sesame Street at the very same time recorded 90% plus correct answers on the post show quiz. The show simply wasn’t making any impression. It wasn’t sticking.

Why did the show fail? The problem, at its root, is with the premise of the show – the essential aspect that Big Bird doesn’t want to be known as Big Bird. That’s the kind of wordplay that a preschooler simply doesn’t understand and this is the concept of identity management which we find confusing as adults in Social Media. We all make assumptions about words and what they relate to. What the Psychologist Ellen Markman calls the principal of mutual exclusivity. Simply put this means that people have difficulty believing that one object can have two different names. In adults this is still a primary concept and scepticism is caused as a result of identity mismatch online. Markman argues that if an object or person is given a second label, then that label must refer to some secondary property or attribute of the object. You can see how useful this assumption is to a child faced with the extraordinary task of assigning a word or label to everything in the world. Now as adults using Social Media and coming to terms with the multitude of technologies to relay and engage with others, our sense of matching labels and pictures with individuals and businesses is heightened and bordering initially on suspicion given we can’t see the person face to face. Identities which are most solid and carry the most trust are those which don’t change. A change breaks the trust associated with the identity and leads to confusion and often "Unfollowing."

The key message in relating the Sesame Street aspect of mutual exclusivity to our online Identity and what happens when a person changes an aspect of this Identity is as follows. The children watching  were losing attention throughout the program. At the point at which Big Bird changed his name they switched off nearly entirely and focused on other things in the room. Interestingly enough when Big Bird changed his name back their attention to the program didn't come back ....... it was gone and the relationship to engaging with the program was lost. Changing your Identity or having multiple identities online has a similar affect. I am not saying that everyone will be affected by the Identity change in the same way but most will without you even being aware of your cannibalising your own Identity.  

This is just a little insight into how we need to be aware and manage our identity online in the Social Media world.