If It’s Ok That Your Mom Can See It, You Can Publish It– on Suitable Behavior in Social Media

Abstract

Aims: The goal of this paper is to understand suitable behavior in social media, by first investigating the purpose of social media, followed by the various ways people use social media, and finally the boundaries for suitable behavior on social media. Study Procedures: This study adopts a qualitative approach. Questionnaires written for open-ended responses were administered to a sample of 90 university students at a Finnish university. Content analysis was used to interpret diverse responses pertaining to participants’ perceptions of social media. Results: Our findings highlight how important users consider the impressions of themselves in the eyes of others on social media, and that these impressions should apply not only to the current moment, but also with an eye to the future. Self-reactiveness was an important factor in establishing suitable social media behavior. Conclusions: Discussing behavior and especially moral behavior in social media can improve one’s understanding in practice, as it is rapidly becoming an important part of everyone’s daily life.