Impression Management Blog Post

 Hello again bloggers,

After this week's unit on Impression Management I have a good deal of thoughts and reflections I would like to share with you guys regarding this naturally occurring phenomenon. First I'd like to define Impression Management as it was defined to us in class this week.  According to the Stamp reading this week Impression Management is defined as "the process by which individuals attempt to control others’ perceptions, is pervasive in social interaction" (Stamp 2005). To sum up this definition in my own words, I'd say impression management is when an individual attempts to share parts of themselves with another that they believe will be perceived as favorable/likable. There are three main reason that were covered in the reading as to why we exhibit such behavior. A desire for social acceptance, a desire to maintain & develop relationships, and finally the desire to experiment with one's identity.

Personally I don't really believe in the promotion of impression management online when it comes to the social world. I do believe that one should use discretion when deciding what personal information they are willing to have on the internet. However, in terms of using impression management to hide the true characteristics/personality of oneself self, with their intentions being to deceive others, I believe to be an inappropriate use of impression management. I do believe that impression management to be very necessary when applied in a professional setting. Some examples are, but not limited to, dressing up for job interviews, using professional etiquette during interview (no cursing or slang), vetting online profiles  to ensure employers don't find any nefarious content, and meeting the parents for the first time of course.

I am not going to pretend I haven't engaged in some degree of impression management at a social level while growing up during the dawn of the social media age. I feel as if it can be especially difficult for individuals trapped in the bubble that is high school. Being a generally shy person in my early high school days and transfering to a high school out of my area, I desperately wanted to fit in as much as possible. I would pretend I liked things because others did and I was always very careful to listen to carefully to what popular kids thought were cool so I could replicated it and become part of the in group. However, once I emerged from high school I felt as if all the pressures to fit in and manage who I was to the people I was constantly around (through no choice of my own) to be a waste of time and energy. I realized this because after graduating and escaping that "bubble", I realized that there are too many people in this world that will accept you for you without wanting you to change your true-self. You just gotta be patient enough to not give in and conform to what is socially acceptable/expected, while never giving up hope that someone out there will be willing to accept all of you, for you!