Boundary Regulation in Social Media

Fred Stutzman and Woodrow Hartzog

School of Information and Library ScienceSchool of Journalism and Mass Communication

UNC-Chapel Hill

Boundary Regulation in Social Media

(Lenhart 2009)

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

ContextPrivacy

Disclosure

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Managing Contexts

• Friendster

• “Burners, gay men and bloggers”

• Myspace

• Teens and mirror profiles

(boyd, 2006 & 2007) http://www.flickr.com/photos/foxgrrl/3676857198/

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Managing Contexts

• Presence of multiple social groups

• Behavioral Strategies

• Mental Strategies

• “Least Common Denominator”

(Lampinen et. al., 2009)

http://bit.ly/yS8yI

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Context Tension• Connections across

status and power boundaries

• Propriety, work/family

• Inadvertent disclosures leading to harms

(Skeels and Grudin, 2009)

http://bit.ly/6HTDB

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Conceptions of Privacy

• Privacy as selective control (Altman, 1975)

• Privacy as information practice (Dourish & Anderson, 2006)

• Privacy as boundary management (Petronio, 2002)

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

CPM

• Communications Privacy Management

• Rule Development

• Boundary Coordination

• Boundary Turbulence

(Petronio, 2002)

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Study Goals

• Why are motives for using multiple profiles?

• What strategies to people employ in managing multiple profiles?

• Is this an effective strategy?

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Method

• Criteria: multiple profiles on one social media site

• Twenty in-depth interviews, Summer 2009

• In-person/phone/Skype

• Analyzed using grounded theory

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Respondents• Six in their 20’s, Seven

in their 30’s, Six in their 40’s, and one was 57

• Twelve females, eight males

• Respondents from US (NC, VA, GA, CA, FL) and UK

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Motives

•Privacy

•Identity

•Utility

•Proprietyhttp://www.flickr.com/photos/gi/435888435/

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Privacy• Control of access to the self;

withdrawal from public domain

• Safety

• Confidentiality

“I know some young kids who tweeted ‘I’m going to lunch at so and so’ and they came back to their apartment and they had been robbed...”

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Privacy

• For many respondents, multiple profiles:

• Functioned as shield, protecting identifiable information

• Enabled content production

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Identity

• Multiple profiles allowed for establishment of distinct identities (personal/professional)

[Created second Facebook profile so] “I could be all about business” [On personal profile] “could be a place where I have opinions, where I express personal stuff.”

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Utility• Multiple profiles enable:

• Accomplishment of promotional and collaborative goals

• Catering to specific audiences at specific times

• Not having to apologize for off-topic posts

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Utility• Segment volume of disclosure

• Offer differing information streams (topic/interest)

“If somebody on my personal Twitter says ‘oh gosh you are inundating me with too many updates,’ I will tell them that they can follow my public profile that I update substantially less”

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Propriety

• Multiple profiles used to manage conformity to norms and customs

• Befriending the boss or parent

[On the personal profile] “when my boss pops up and Facebook tells me ‘we think you should be friends,’ I don’t say yes because she’s my boss.”

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Forms of Regulation

• Multiple identities in a single space

• Single account, highly segmented privacy controls

• Segmentation by site

• Different social media for different audiences

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Axes of Regulation

• Regulation by linkage

• Regulation by concealment

http://www.flickr.com/photos/thosch66/270060125/

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Linkages

• Links to the identity

"I have two different identities, I have a personal one. [and] one geared towards my professional stuff, there's not much personal information there. But, I do have a separate Flickr account, I have separate Twitter accounts, I have separate Myspace pages”

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Linkages

• Regulation by linked interconnections

“But I don’t try and hide the fact that I’m one or the other. You know in my [personal] bio, I say something about [my business twitter]. So its not like I’m trying to hide my two different identities.”

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Concealment

• Three genres identified

• Pseudonymity

• Practical Obscurity

• Obscure name variants, non-disclosure of identity

• Transparent Separations

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Concealment

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Evaluation

• Do these techniques provide privacy?

“The thing going into it is I don’t put anything out there that I wouldn’t want everybody to know”

“I have to be careful about - that I say something that's generic enough”

“I’m very conscious of the fact I am basically speaking to an open mic”

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Evaluation

• Is the process burdensome?

• High burden: Number of accounts maintained, large number of contacts

• High burden: Degree of linkage disassociation

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Evaluation

• Technical strategies

• Most participants reported “bleedover”

• Segmenting by device

• Segmenting by time and location

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Implications

• Multiple profile maintenance consistent with the theoretical provisions of Altman and Petronio

• Process reduces potential harms, and encourages disclosures

• Represents a reaction to limitations inherent in sites

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Thank you!

Fred Stutzman: fred.stutzman@unc.edu@fstutzmanhttp://fredstutzman.com

Woodrow Hartzogwhartzog@email.unc.edu@hartzoghttp://ssrn.com/author=1107005

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Axis of Linkages

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Pseudonymity

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Practical Obscurity

Fred Stutzman, fred.stutzman@unc.edu

Transparent Separations