THESIS 10:0 r‘ OLIBRARY M‘Chigan State niversity This is to certify that the thesis entitled DECEPTIVE SELF-PRESENTATION AN EXAMINATION OF LYING FOR SAVING FACE IN FTF AND CMC CONTEXTS presented by Siyue Li has been accepted towards fulfillment of the requirements for the Master of Arts degree in Communication / ‘ é \__.. x . D Major Professor’s Signature Aw; I C} ZOIO Date MSU is an Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity Employer PLACE IN RETURN BOX to remove this checkout from your record. TO AVOID FINES return on or before date due. MAY BE RECALLED with earlier due date if requested. DATE DUE DATE DUE DATE DUE 5/08 KIProj/Achres/CIRCIDateDue.indd DECEPTIVE SELF-PRESENTATION AN EXAMINATION OF LYING FOR SAVING FACE IN FTP AND CMC CONTEXTS Bv .4 Siyue Li A THESIS Submitted to Michigan State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of MASTER OF ARTS Communication 2010 ABSTRACT DECEPTIVE SELF-PRESENTATION AN EXAMINATION OF LYING FOR SAVING FACE IN FTF AND CMC CONTEXTS By Siyue Li The current study examined the effect ofmedia modality on lying behaviors for saving face. It was predicted that people would be less likely to lie for face in face-to-face communication because they believe that their lies can be immediately detected based on nonverbal deceptive cues and these cues are more abundant in face-to-face communication than instant messaging. Further. it was predicted that the relationship between media modality and lying for face would be moderated by trait self-esteem. The results showed no significant influence ofmedia modality and trait self esteem on deception for saving face. Across modalities, lying was infrequent. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS First and foremost I would like to express my heartfelt thanks to my academic advisor, Dr. Timothy Levine, who has guided and supported me with his patience and expertise throughout my thesis, especially when the outcome looked bleak. Without his -full support, the thesis would not have been completed. Besides thesis, I would also like to thank him for enlightening me to be a good researcher. I am grateful to Dr. Joseph Walther, who not only provided insightful opinions on my thesis, but also offered me the laboratory for research. Although his class was the most difficult I have ever taken, it benefited me the most.I also want to appreciate another committee member, Dr. Nicole Ellison. who always gave me helpful guidance and information throughout my thesis. I am especially thankful to my husband for his great support and confidence in me. His determination and dedication to research inspired me to pursuit an academic career. I deeply appreciate my parents overseas for their unconditional love and sacrifice. Were it not for their support, my graduate study would not have been possible. I would also like to thank my parents-in-law, for their continuous encouragement and moral support. I want to extend a sincere thanks to my dear friends, Angela Yu, Austin Lee, Sophia Li, J ,ian Rui, and J unyan Tang, for their great assistance on my study and daily life. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF TABLES .............................................................................................................. v Introduction......................................................- ................................................................... 1 Literature Review ............................................................................................................... 5 Self-presentation, Saving Face, and Deception .............................................................. 5 People Believe in Deceptive Cues ................................................................................ 11 Deception in FtF versus CMC ...................................................................................... 13 Self-esteem and Deception for Face ............................................................................. 16 Method .............................................................................................................................. 19 Overview ....................................................................................................................... 19 Participants .................................................................................................................... 19 Procedure ...................................................................................................................... 20 Measures ....................................................................................................................... 22 Manipulation check ....................................................................................................... 23 Results ............................................................................................................................... 25 Lie in FtF versus CMC ................................................................................................. 25 Self-esteem and Lying for Saving Face ........................................................................ 25 Self-reported Honesty ................................................................................................... 26 Social Attractiveness and Lies ...................................................................................... 26 Searching in CMC ........................................................................................................ 27 Discussion ......................................................................................................................... 28 Implications of the results ............................................................................................. 28 Limitations and Future Research .................................................................................. 31 APPENDICES .................................................................................................................. 34 Appendix A. Questionnaire of Self-esteem .................................................................. 35 Appendix B. Questionnaire of Social Attractiveness ................................................... 36 Appendix C. CONSENT FORM .................................................................................. 38 Appendix D. Checklist .................................................................................................. 40 Appendix E. Debriefing Form ...................................................................................... 41 Appendix F. Data Tables .............................................................................................. 45 REFERENCES ................................................................................................................. 49 iv LIST OF TABLES Table 1 Two Dimensions of Desirable Self-Presentation ................................................ 8 Table 2. Within-subjects Design ..................................................................................... 22 Table 3. Lying frequency across media .......................................................................... 45 Table 4. Lying in FtF versus C MC (code ambiguous cases as missing data) ................ 45 Table 5. Lying in FtF versus CMC (Code ambiguous cases as honesty) ....................... 46 Table 6. Lying in FtF versus C MC (Code ambiguous cases as lies) .............................. 46 Table 7. Self-esteem in Deception (Code ambiguous cases as missing data) ................ 47 Table 8. Self-esteem in Deception (Code ambiguous cases as honesty) ........................ 47 Table-9. Self-esteem in Deception (Code ambiguous cases as lies) ............................... 47 Table 10. Discrepancy between Observation and Self-reported Honesty ........................ 48 Introduction People engage in self-presentation in everyday life. When an employee enters the supervisors office, she may pull up her hair and smile. When a man dates an attractive woman for the first time. he tries to act gentle. humorous, and smart. Parents tell their children to be polite to their classmates and to apologize for misbehaviors. Political candidates pay intensive attention to their appearances and behaviors in order to make a competent impression on voters. In general, self-presentation is a common and important pattern of behaviors. pervading every corner of society and social life. There exists a rich tradition of research on self-presentation. Goffman‘s (1959) classic “the presentation ofsclf‘in every/cry life " suggested that people are motivated to convey a desirable self-presentation in front ofothers. It is well documented that people are sensitive to others’ evaluations of them thus they devote great effort to create desirable self-presentations (e.g.. Leary & Kowalski. I990; Schlenker, 2003). Nevertheless, people may find themselves in self-presentation predicaments in which events contradict the images they have claimed or desire (Leary, I996; Schlenker, 1980). Under these circumstances. people typically try to save their face and avoid losing face. Saving face is a ubiquitous self-presentation activity. It has a crucial function of avoiding embarrassment. which is an a\ ersive emotion highly associated with face. Saving face is a goal that can be achieved by either honest behavior or deception, depending on the specific context. Saving face has been long recognized as a motive underlying deception (DePaulo et al.. 2003; Turner. Edgley. & Olmstead. I975). While deception, too. is a part of daily life (DePaulo, Kashy. Kirkendol, Wyer, & Epstein, 1996), people are reluctant to tell lies unless the truth poses obstacles for goal attainment (Levine, Kim, & Hamel, 2010‘). Further. deception involves the interplay between motivation and context. That is. even when people are motivated to lie for their face, they are more likely to deceive others in a context where they perceive deception is unlikely to be detected because being caught in a lie would harm face. Deception functions to save face only when it is successful. Self-presentation is ubiquitous in everyday life and not confined in face-to-face communication (FtF), especially given the current technology revolution. Due to the popularization of the intemet. more and more people are engaging in computer-mediated communication (CMC). which serves to supplement face-to-face communication. Since deception is an everyday phenomenon, it is not surprising that people tend to lie online as well (Hancock, Thom-Santelli, & Ritchie, 2004). However, the different design features that characterize F tF and CMC may affect the likelihood of deception. Hancock et al. (2004) offered the first study to examine the effect of communication technology on the production of deceptive messages. They proposed a feature-based model to examined three design features (i.e.. synchronicity. recordability. and copresence) of a media. According to the model, the more synchronous and distributed, but less recordable a medium is, the greater the chance that people lie in that medium. The results were consistent with their model: people are most likely to lie over the phone, followed by face-to-face and instant messaging. and last email. While this study provided insight into the intersection of CMC and deception. little is known about the impact of motives (e.g., saving face) on deception across media. This is critical because people always lie for a I\) reason (Levine et al., 2010). More recently. Whitty and C arville (2008) did the first study to examine the influence of motives (i.e.. self-serving lies vs. other-oriented lies) on deception across media (i.e.. FtF, phone. Email). The frequency of telling self-serving lies across media decreases from email. phone, to face-to-face communication. The results have indicated that people are likely to feel more comfortable and less guilty to lie in a more distributed media. Besides categorizing deception motives into self-serving lies and other-oriented lies as proposed by Hample (1980). there are Other ways to classify deception motives. For instance, Turner, Edgley, and Olmstead (1975) put deception motives into five categories, including I) to save face. 2) to manage relationships. 3) to exploit, 4) to avoid tension/conflict, and 5) to control situations. Importantly. saving face was the most frequently given reason for deception. Considering the commonality ofdeception for saving face, it is important and interesting to know how people lie to save face across media. The current study initiates an experiment to examine how people spontaneously lie for their face in FtF and CMC. Further. it is important to advance the methodological approaches to investigating deception across different media. To date. the most popular method in studies of deception frequency is using liars‘ self-report (e.g., DePaulo et al., 1996, Hancock et al., 2004). For example, in DePaulo et al.‘s study (1996) of daily lies, participants were asked to record all of their social interactions and lies within a period of seven days for analysis. Hancock et al. (2004) used a similar method to examine deception across media. Researchers recognize that “the reliance on self-report methods is an important limitation for deception research in general. as it involves asking b.) participants to be honest about lying" (Toma. Hancock. & Ellison, 2008, p.1024). Recently, researchers have started doing laboratory experiments in which people are spontaneously motivated to tell lies (e.g.. Levine et al., 2010). For example. subjects were asked to participate in a trivia game and given an opportunity to cheat for monetary gain. They were subsequently interrogated about cheating. Such research designs offer the control of experiments combined with ecological advantages of field research. So far, no study in deception design across media has been done in a way of observing spontaneous lies in laboratory experiments. The current study has the potential to fill the gap by initiating an empirical study to examine spontaneous lies across media. Literature Review Self-presentation, Saving F ace. and Deception Self-presentation is defined as the attempt to control self-relevant images before real or imagined audiences (Schlenker, 1980). Scientific interest in self-presentation can be traced to Goffman (1959). He used a theatrical metaphor to explain the self- presentation in everyday life. An interaction is regarded as a performance, shaped by actor, audience, and the social setting. An individual performs different social roles in front of the audience, providing others with impressions that are consonant with the desired goals of the actor. “When an individual appears in the presence of others, there will usually be some reason for him to mobilize his activity so that it will convey an impression to others which it is in his interests to convey" (Goffman, 1959, p. 4). Through self-presentation. an actor tries to convey a desirable impression to the audience. Self-presentation. however. is not always a conscious activity. Leary (1997) proposed a continuum of impression monitoring that explains the extent to which people are aware of their impressions perceived by the audience. One extreme of the continuum is impression oblivion. At this level, people are completely unaware of how they are being perceived by others. The second level is preattentive impression scanning, at which people are able to monitor others” reactions while they devote their conscious attention to other issues. People typically process much information regarding their impressions without consciousness. Once impression-relevant information is detected, people tend to switch attention towards self-presentation. The third level is impression awareness, which means people are consciously aware of what others are thinking about them. Most ' deliberate self-presentation occurs under circumstances of conscious impression monitoring. The forth level. named impression focus. is the other extreme. At this level, all of the person’s attention is focusing on others‘ impression of him or her and creating a desirable impression in front ofthe audience. In fact. rarely does either of the extremes happen in daily life. Most of the time. people engage in self-presentation at a preattentive level (Leary, 1996; Leary & Kowalski. 1990). People are motivated to manage self-presentation when impression-relevant cues are detected. When this happens. they are deliberately attuned to what others might be thinking about them, and mobilize their activities toward creating right images. At a general level, the motive of managing self-presentation is the same as all human behaviors, which is to maximize expected rewards and minimize expected punishments (Schlenker, 1980). In a more specific way. the motives of self-presentation can be classified into different categories. According to Leary (1996), there are three interrelated but distinct motives of self-presentation. namely interpersonal influence, constructing and maintaining the self, and emotion regulation. The motive of interpersonal influence means that people influence others' behaviors toward them by making certain impressions on others. Through interpersonal influence, people aim to optimize their outcomes in life. The second motive is to construct and maintain the self. This motive differs from the first one because it focuses on the self rather than interpersonal impacts. There are three sub-categories underlying this motive. First, self-presentation is associated with self-esteem. Failure in self-presentation often lowers self-esteem, whereas success in self-presentation often bolsters self-esteem. Second, self-presentation helps people to develop and maintain personal identities. For instance, a freshman in a workplace always wears suits to look more professional. Third. self-presentation is becoming an ingrained habit, so people usually do it without consciousness. The last motive is emotion regulation, which is reflected in two ways: reducing negative emotions and providing positive emotions. For example. by merely telling others something about self, a person can reduce negative feelings. From a transactional view, self-presentation occurs in a social context consisting of an actor, an audience, and a social situation (Schlenker, 1985, 2003). A desirable self- presentation depends on not only the actor. but also the audience and the situation. Actors may put themselves into the place of their audience to imagine the likely responses from the audience and regulate their self-presentations accordingly. According to Schlenker (2003), two features define the desirability of a self-presentation, namely benefits and believability. First, a desirable self-presentation is regarded as beneficial to the extent that the actor thinks that it facilitates the goal attainment. The goals are the same as the motives mentioned previously in the paper (i.e.. interpersonal influence, constructing and maintaining the self, and emotion regulation). The more the goal is achieved, the more beneficial the self-presentation is. Second, self-presentation should be perceived as believable in that evidence can be accurately and credibly presented to the audience. People cannot simply claim something to increase the expected rewards without considering the accuracy of their claims. Because people who are known to lie for their own benefits are not liked by others, people hesitate to engage in deceptive self- presentations. However, when the contradictory information is less likely to be discovered. people can maximize desired outcomes. For instance, Sclenker (1975) found that under public performance conditions. self-presentations were consistent with subjects’ expectations of actual performance because future events could invalidate a too boastful self-presentational stance. Nevertheless, under anonymous conditions where future events posed no threat to self-presentations, people presented. themselves more favorably regardless of actual performance. That is. as long as the claims are perceived as believable by an audience. an actor tends to maximize the benefits. Although a believable self-presentation is usually honest and reliable, the perceived believability does not always represent the truth. Truth is an objective dimension whereas believability is a subjective one. There are four types of combination derived from the two dimensions: truth and believability (Table 1). Type I is telling a believable truth. In this type, the truth is believed by the audience. Type II is telling a believable lie. Under such circumstances. the deceptive self-presentation is perceived as truthful by the audience. In other words, the audience believes a lie. Type III is telling an unbelievable truth. In this case, the truth is regarded as a lie by the audience. Type IV is telling an unbelievable lie to the extent that the lie is detected by the audience. Table 1 Two Dimensions of Desirable Self-Presentation Truth Lie Believable Type I Type II Unbelievable Type 111 Type IV Despite great effort to make a desirable self-presentation, people are sometimes entangled into self-presentation predicaments. Self-presentation predicaments occur when events threaten the impressions people are trying to make (Leary, 1996; Schlenker, 1980). A person is in a predicament when a beneficial and believable self-presentation cannot be fulfilled simultaneously. Since a lie is likely to be viewed as believable as long as the 8 audience does not have reasons to discredit it. people may motivated to engage in deception to convey a desirable self-presentation in specific contexts. That is. people are likely to tell a believable lie to optimize the benefits. Face is a concept encompassed by self-presentation (Miller, 2001). Goffman defined face as “the positive social value a person effectively claims for himself by the line others assume he has taken during a particular contact. Face is an image of self delineated in terms of approved social attributes” (Goffman. 1955. p. 213). People strive to present themselves in a socially desirable way in front of the audience. They typically want to be seen as attractive. responsible. smart, and so forth (e.g., Schlenker & Leary, 1982). Face can be saved or lost (Goffman. 1955). Saving face means to avoid being disgraced or humiliated. Losing face means to be humiliated or losing one's credit. good name, or reputation. When a face is threatened by contradictory verbal or nonverbal communication. the actor is trapped in a self-presentation predicament at the risk of losing face. In such situations. saving face is an effective means to maintain a desirable self-presentation. Scholars have noted that the motive to save face is a powerful, pervasive force that underlies diverse domains of social behavior (Sabini, Siepmann, & Stein, 2001 ). People save face because they want to avoid embarrassment. which is an emotional state of awkward and abashment after receiving an unwanted evaluation from real or imagined audiences (Miller, 2001). People typically fear embarrassment because they usually care about what others are thinking about them. Miller (2001 l summarized several reasons to explain the fear of embarrassment. First, embarrassment is intrinsically aversive. The emotion itself is uncomfortable and annoying. and we are highly aware that it is associated with some misbehavior. Second. almost everyone experienced embarrassing moments of being laughed at when one was young. Such negative cognition associated with embarrassment has been engrained ever since. Third. the imagined negative outcomes exacerbate people’s fear towards embarrassment. On one hand. we are likely to think that others are judging us more harshly than they really do. On the other hand, people rarely notice that their embarrassment has a function of mollifying and reassuring their audiences rather than exacerbating the situation. Finally. people are usually aware of self-presentation to avoid potentially embarrassed predicament whereas they are oblivious to others’ embarrassing moments. Thus, people may think they fear embarrassment more than others do. Due to the fear of embarrassment, people attempt to save face and avoid losing face, which means that they try to behave in ways that do not make undesired impressions (Leary, 1996). However. there are situations that honesty puts people into self—presentation predicaments to the extent that they may not be able to achieve desirable outcomes. When the truth is problematic and makes the person to lose face, a person is motivated to engage in deceptive self-presentation to save face and avoid embarrassment. In fact, saving face has been long recognized as an important motive of deception (Levine et al., 2010; Turner. Edgley. & Olmstead. 1975). Turner et al. (1975) found that protecting one‘s face was an important and frequent reason for deception given by people. In their study, 27.7% of the deceptive messages were designed to save face. Therefore, lying for saving face is not unusual in daily life. 10 People Believe in Deceptive Cues Self-presentation behaviors can be divided into two parts: the expression an actor gives, and the expression he gives off (Goffman, 1959). The former one involves “verbal symbols or their substitutes” which the actor uses consciously to convey the information, being chiefly his verbal assertions (Goffman. 1959, p.2). The latter is the nonverbal form of communication (e.g., gestures. facial expressions) that accompanies verbal communication. While the former is always intentional. the latter may or may not be intentional. Many scholars are interested in nonverbal cues given off in deception detection research. A consensus among researchers in this field is that “people are statistically significantly better than chance. but only slightly more so. at detecting deception” (Levine & Kim, 2009). Bond and DePaulo (2006) synthesized research results from 206 documents and 24,483 judges to analyze the accuracy of deception judgments. When people attempted to discriminate lies from truths in real time without aids or training. they only achieved an average of 54% correct lie-truth judgments. Nevertheless, it is well documented that people believe in deceptive cues (Bond & The Global Deception Research Team. 2006; Zuckerman. Koestner, & Driver, 1981). Zuckerman et al. (1981) found that eighteen different behaviors were perceived to be associated with deception. such as averting gaze. touching themselves, moving their feet and legs, shifting their posture, and so forth. Bond (2006) led a global deception research team to study deception stereotype worldwide. In study one, participants were asked to answer an open-ended question “How can you tell when people are lying?” In study two, participants filled out a questionnaire about behaviors associated with deception. A ll wildly shared stereotype among people across two studies was that the liar averted gaze. In the first study. 63.7% of the participants mentioned gaze aversion as a way to detect lies, which was also the most accessible answer. Among participants who mentioned gaze aversion, 43.9% mentioned it first. Consistent with study one, over 70% of the participants thought that liars avoid eye contact in the questionnaire. Besides gaze aversion, many other nonverbal cues (e. g., shifting posture. self-touch. and hand gestures) were in people’s stereotype. Why do people believe in deceptive cues even they do not reflect observation of deceptive behaviors? One explanation could be inferred from deception literature. Deception is distinct from truth because the former is illegitimate and needs justification (Levine et al., 2010; DePaulo et al., 2003). While people tell lies, there is a discrepancy between what they believe and what they say but not believe. In this case, they feel more anxious and less pleasant (DePaulo et al.. 2003). which may lead them to worry about giving off unwanted deceptive cues. Bond and The Global Deception Research Team (2006) suggested another possible explanation that belief in these cues evolved to discourage lies. The stereotypes of deceptive cues were derived from a social norm that liars should be shamed and feel bad. Once these stereotypes were established, they were passed down generation after generation. Nevertheless, this is an untestable speculation. Regardless of the reason. it is clear that people worldwide believe that nonverbal cues are powerful and efficient in deception detection. Given that people share the belief of deceptive cues worldwide, liars should be concerned about being caught by these deceptive cues. People tend to evaluate the consequences of honesty and dishonesty before making a decision of lying or not. For the type of saving face lies, it serves as a means to achieve the goal of saving face and avoid losing face in a specific situation. However. if a lie is caught. the liar may be entangled into a more severe self-presentation predicament to the extent that face is lost eventually rather than being saved. As Goffman (1959) suggested. when these disruptive events (contradict, discredit, or otherwise throw doubt upon this projection) occur, the interaction itself may come to a confused and embarrassed halt. Not only does the deceptive self-presentation produce embarrassment for the deceiver. but it also creates a similar state for the one who has been deceived and then detects the lie. Therefore, people typically behave honestly unless honesty keeps people from achieving goals. While deception is typically in people‘s social repertories as a possible strategy to achieve goals, it is usually the last strategy to use (Levine et al.. 2010). Deception in F tF versus CMC Deception is a ubiquitous phenomenon across media. not is merely confined in FtF. Due to the different design features ofdifferent media. however, deception may differ across media. Researchers have begun to investigate the impact of design features aross media on lying behavior (Hancock et al., 2004; Whitty & Carville, 2008). Hancock et al. (2004) proposed a feature-based model, examing the influence of three design features (i.e., synchronicity. recordability. and copresence) on deception across media (i.e., FtF, IM, Email, and phone). Synchronicity refers to the speed of message exchange which is supported by the medium (Carl son. George. Burgoon, Adkins. & White, 2004). Because most lies are unplanned and spontaneously occur in real-time interaction (DePaulo et al., 1996; McCornack. 1997). synchronous media may increase the opportunity to lie. Reeordabilitv refers to the ability of a medium to store messages and 13 allow participants to subsequently access and analyze these messages (Carlson et al., 2004). A higher degree of recordability minimizes deception potential by enlarging opportunities for receivers to review and scrutinize deceivers‘ messages. In order to avoid being caught, speakers may choose to lie less frequently in recordable media than in recordless media (Hancock et al.. 2004). Copresenee means that communicators share the same physical space. A medium in which communicators are copresnt may constrain deception involving information that is contradicted by physical settings. Based on the analysis of three design features across media. Hancock and his colleagues (2004) proposed that people were most likely to lie over the phone, then face-to-face and instant messaging. and last email. Although the hypothesis was supported in their study, some limitations cannot be ignored. First. the study relied on liars’ self-reports to examine the lies, which was based on an intuitive assumption that people are honest about lying. Second, deception motives were not specified in this study (e. g.. saving face). This is critical because people always lie for a reason (Levine et al., 2010). More recently, some scholars start taking into account the motives in deception studies across media. Whitty and Carville (2008) did a survey to examine self-serving lies and other-oriented lies told across media (i.e., F tF . phone. Email). They found that people are most likely to tell self-serving lies in Email. This was followed by over the phone. and the fewest self-serving lies were told face-to-face. The result has suggested copresence plays a more important role in lying behavior than Hancock et al. (2004) thought, at least in self-serving lies. Perhaps then copresence should be given more weight than other features. such as recordability. at least for certain types of lies. However, the validity of results is questionable because the results were obtained based l4 on subjects’ projections of their behaviors in deception-eliciting situations. rather than spontaneous responses. In the current study, two media (face-to-face communication and instant messaging) are chosen to examine lying behaviors. Because most lies are spontaneous ones occurring in real time communication (DePaulo et al., 1996; McCornack, 1997). choosing two synchronous media better reflects this reality. While F tF and instant messaging share some similarities. they differ to a large extent. Besides recordability. they also differ in the dimension of cue multiplicity. which is resulted from physical distribution and copresence. Cue multiplicity means the number of information channels that a medium simultaneously supports (Carlson et al., 2004). There are three kinds of cues: verbal cues, nonverbal cues, and contextual cues (Calson et al., 2004). Verbal cues are comprised of language style and message content. Nonverbal cues involves auditory. visual, spatial and temporal behavior accompanying veberbal messages. Contextual cues are factors associated with the context of the communication events. While face-to-face communication contains all kinds of cues, instant messaging is alway limited in exchanging verbal cues and rules out most nonverbal cues and contexutal cues (Culnan & Markus, 1987). For instance. in the modality of instant messaging. people are unable to see the partner‘s facial expression and body movement. While people are motivated to lie for saving face. they are less likely to engage in deceptive self—presentation in a situation where lies are more likely to be detected through nonverbal cues. Nonverbal cues are absent in instant messaging, but are abundant in FtF. F urther. recordability is believed to be less important than distribution when people tell self-serving lies such as lying for one‘s own face (Whitty & Carville, 2008). Therefore, the following hypothesis is proposed: H1: people are less likely to lie for saving face in face-to-face communication versus instant messaging. I Self-esteem and Deception/or Face As previously mentioned. embarrassment stems from people's concern about others” evaluations of them (Miller. 2001). In other words, people feel embarrassed because they are sensitive to social evaluations from the audience. Although virtually all the people attempt to avoid embarrassment and save face. not all people are equally motivated to engage in these self-presentation activities. People who pay relatively more attention to social evaluations should care much about how others view them and tend to be more motivated to save face. Conversely. those who care less about social evaluations will have lower motivation to save face. It is well documented that interpersonal evaluation is highly associated with self- esteem (Leary & Baumeister, 2000; Leary et al.. 2003; Lemay & Ashmore, 2006).Self— esteem refers to an individual‘s subjective evaluation or appraisal of his or her own worth (Sedikides & Gregg 2003). which is comprised of two parts: trait self-esteem and state self-esteem (James. 1890). Trait self-esteem is a stable level of self-esteem which is independent of contingencies. It is correlated with how people think they are generally evaluated by others. State self-esteem refers to the fluctuations of one’s self-esteem depending on one‘s objective circumstances or achievement. which is affected by others’ evaluations within a specific context. ' H1 presumes people think they detect lies via nonverbal cues. But CMC allows fact checking. lfpeople realize this, logic predicts the differences in the opposite. l6 According to the sociemeter perspective. self-esteem has a function of monitoring interpersonal evaluations. The lowered self-esteem from negative evaluations warns an individual about threats to social inclusion and motivates him to reaffirm one’s connections with other people (Leary & Baumeister. 2000; Lemay & Ashmore. 2006). Although many people may insist that their feelings about themselves are not affected by others“ evaluations, empirical studies find that their state self-esteem is affected by social approval or disapproval (Leary et al.. 2003). Lemay and Ashmore (2006) extended the sociemeter perspective by examining the relationship between social approval and trait self-esteem. Their research indicates that people with low trait self-esteem are more constantly aware of social evaluations because of repeated experience of negative social evaluations. But for people with high trait self-esteem, they pay less attention to others‘ evaluations and “are typically oblivious to the effect of social rejection on self-esteem" because they chronically feel valued by others (Lemay & Ashmore. 2006. p. 126). Considering the high correlation between saving face and sensitivity of social evaluations. people with lower trait self- esteem will be more likely to engage in saving face activities because they are more aware of others‘ evaluations. Nevertheless, when the goal of saving face can be accomplished by deception, people weigh the consequences of deception versus telling the truth before making a decision. It was previously argued that people typically think liars are more likely to be caught immediately in face-to-face communication than instant messaging due to an abundance of nonverbal cues in the former modality. Thus. even people with low trait self-esteem may hesitate to lie in face-to-face communication. People with high trait self- 17 esteem generally care less about others' evaluations. and thereby engage in fewer face saving activities. Therefore. the different context between instant messaging and face—to- face communication will create less significant differences in their self-presentations. Consequently. H2: Trait self-esteem moderates the relationship between the frequency of lying for saving face and media. The lower the trait self-esteem, the greater the chance of lying for saving face in instant messaging than in FtF. The higher the trait self esteem, the smaller the chance of lying for saving face across media. 18 Method Overview This experiment was designed to examine the differences in telling lies for saving face across media. in FtF versus instant messaging. In order to examine the spontaneous lies, subjects were put into a natural setting of interaction with an international student. Moreover, because trait self-esteem is highly associated with the motive of saving face. whether self-esteem moderates the relationship between the likelihood of lying for face and media was also examined in the study. Participants Subjects were 1 10 undergraduate students from several communication classes in a large mid-westem university. They participated in the study for research or extra credit. The data from five participants were invalid because confederates failed to ask them about the designed face threatening questions. These data were deleted. Therefore, the data were from 105 participants (age M = 20.36. SD = 3.09, 56.2% female). Most of the participants were US. citizens (98.1%) and Caucasians (65.7%). Thirty-five percent of the participants were Communication majors. Among all the subjects, 53 participants (age M = 20.57, SD = 4.03. 61.2% female) were randomly assigned to FtF condition. All of the participants in FtF were US. citizens. and 62.26% of them were Caucasians. Almost half of them were communication majors (43.4%). There were 52 participants (age M = 20.15, SD = 1.67. 48.1% female) randomly assigned to CMC condition. Most of them were US. citizens (96.2%) and Caucasians (69.2%). One quarter of the participants was communication majors (26.9%). The confederates were four international students in higher grades from the same university. Two confederates were males and the other 19 two were females. All confederates in the experiment were blind to the research hypotheses. Procedure All the subjects were informed that the study was about intercultural communication and the research examined the way in which American students interact with international students. The confederate was hidden from the subject before interaction because they could not meet each other in CMC condition. Upon arrival to the lab the subject was led by an experimenter into a small room to sign a consent form. Then s/he was asked to fill out a questionnaire containing trait self—esteem items. To induce an expectation of future interaction. the subject was told that there would be a follow-up interview after several weeks because the researchers were interested in whether people could keep in touch after the initial chat. If both the subject and his/her partner could attend the interview. each one could get 20 dollars as reward. In fact. there were no follow-up interviews after the initial chat. According to Leary (1996), people typically care less about self-presentation in one-shot interactions with strangers than in long-term interactions. A one-shot interaction usually has a low association with important goal attainment whereas repeated interactions drive people to make much connection between their impression and important goals. Walther (1994) found that the anticipation of future interaction is a potent predictor of relational communication across media. Therefore, the anticipation of future interaction may motivate subjects to concern more about self- presentation. Communication mode was an independent groups factor in the design. Each subject was randomly assigned to an instant messaging or F tF condition. In the instant messaging condition, the subject and the confederate were separated in two rooms. Each room contained a computer that had intemet access. a computer desk, and a chair. They were asked to use AIM to chat. Those who did not have accounts were asked to register for new accounts. In the FtF condition, both the subject and the confederate were led into the same room, with two chairs and a table. A clock was on the table for the confederate to control time. According to social information processing theory (Walther, 1992; 1996), communicators in CMC are going to develop social relationships, just like in FtF. However, each message in C MC typically carries less social information than in FtF because of the absence of nonverbal cues in the former. Thus it takes much longer to develop interpersonal relationship in C MC than in FtF. In order to make equivalent opportunities to develop social relationship across the two conditions, different time periods was assigned for the two conditions. FtF lasted for ten minutes and instant messaging communication for thirty minutes. three times the amount of time given to FtF communicators. A subsequent analysis of the conversation determined that communication in CMC (M = 31.03 mins. SD = 4.37 mins) was 2.52 times longer than that in FtF (M=12.32 mins. SD = 2.45 mins). Face threatening inducement was a repeated factor in the design. Each subject was assigned to both conditions (face-threatening situation vs. no face-threatening situation). In the no face-threatening situation. the confederate asked the subject:”Do you know about the movie Avatar?” Because Avatar is a well-know movie shown recently, most of the subjects, if not all, should know about this movie. Therefore, this was a non- face-threatening situation for the majority of the subjects and they were not expected to lie for saving face. In the face threatening situation, subjects were asked about a fake popular movie “YXZ”. In FtF condition. the confederate would initiate the topic of movie after about nine minutes. According to the one to three ratio of FtF to CMC, the confederate would initiate the topic at about twenty-seven minute. A subsequent analysis of the interaction determined that the time of asking Avatar in CMC (M =25.4 mins. SD = 6.75 mins) was 2.85 times later than that in FtF (M: 8.85mins, SD = 3.18 mins). The time of asking YXZ in CMC (M = 27.15 mins. SD = 4.25 mins) was 2.86 times later than that in F tF (M = 9.5 mins. SD = 3.03 mins). The most important indicator was the time of asking YXZ, which was almost 3 times later in C MC than in FtF. The F tF was audio-recorded and the CMC was screen recorded. After completing the interaction. an experimenter temtinated the chat. The subject was asked to fill out a questionnaire in terms of the social attractiveness of the partner and rate their honesty in the previous interaction on a 10-point scale (1: totally deceptive; 10: totally honest) in the chat. Those who had said that they knew about the movie "YXZ” were also asked to fill out a checklist to detemtine the reason ofdoing so. Then. each subject was debriefed and thanked for their participation. Table 2. Within-subjects Design Medium FtF IM Motive Avatar-YXZ YXZ-Avatar Measures Honesty. Subjects who said they did not know the fake movie were rated as honest. Subjects who said they knew the movie were rated as deceptive. Those who used ambiguous phrases (e.g., probably) were coded as ambiguous. 22 Trait selfiesteem. .Rosenberg‘s (1965) ten item self-esteem was used (M = 5.82, SD = .75, a é .82). Items included: 1) On the whole I am satisfied with myself; 2) At times I think that I am no good at all; 3) I feel that I have a number of good qualities; 4) I am able to do things as well as most other people: 5) I feel I do not have much to be proud of; 6) I certainly feel useless at times; 7) I feel that I am a person of worth, at least the equal of others; 8) I wish I could lta\ e more respect for myself; 9) All in all, I am inclined to feel that I am a failure; 10) I take a positive attitude toward myself. Unlike Rosenberg’s four rating scales (Strongly agree. agree, disagree, and strongly disagree), a 7-point Likert-scale (1: strongly disagree; 7: strongly agree) was used. The main difference was adding a neutral option in this study. Social attractiveness. Attraction of the confederates was measured as a control variable. The measurement was based on MeCroskey and McCain‘s (1974) scale of interpersonal attractiveness. including task. social. and physical attractiveness. Because no task was done in the current study and participants did not meet their partners in CMC. only social attractiveness was measured (M = 5.39. SD = .68. a = .80). A 7-point Likert- scale was used to analyze the 10 items. Manipulation check Participants who said that they knew about the fake movie were asked to fill out a checklist to determine the motivation of doing so. It was possible that a participant confused the fake movie with a real one. In this case, the participant did not lie even though s/he said knowing about the fake movie. Moreover, participants could lie for other reasons as well. There was a multiple-choice question on the checklist: why did you say that you knew about the movie YXZ. Three choices were offered: 1) saving face 2) I‘d Lu thought it was a real movie 3) others. please specify. Participants could choose more than one answer. Among ten participants who said that they knew about the movie YXZ, only one thought it was a real one. The other participant chose “others" and said that she wanted to keep the conversation going. which was also coded as saving face. A comparison indicated that participants who said that they knew about the movie were significantly more motivated by saving face than other reasons, 96(1) = 6.40. p = .02. Thus. the motive of saving face was manipulated successfully in the experiment. Results Lie in F tF versus CMC The first hypothesis predicted that people were more likely to lie for saving face in instant messaging than in FtF. Of the total subjects in the sample, 9.43% lied about knowing the movie "YXZ” in FtF. and 7.69% did in C MC . There were 9.43% ambiguous cases in FtF, which included those who nodded and used ambiguous phrases. In order to determine whether the ambiguous cases could make any difference, the ambiguous cases was coded in three ways: missing data, honesty, and lies sequentially. C hi-square tests were run three times based on the different ways of coding. Overall, the results indicated that there was no significant difference in lying for saving face between FtF and CMC. When the ambiguous cases were coded as missing data, )8 (1) = 0.23,p = .73. When they were coded as honesty. x2 (I) =1 0.10, p = 1.00. When the ambiguous cases were coded as lies, although the result was still nonsignificant, it shifted to the opposite direction of the hypothesis. 73(1) = 2.84. p = .09. That is, more people tended to lie for saving face in FtF than in C MC . Therefore. the first hypothesis was not supported. Self-esteem and Lying/or Saving Face The second hypothesis predicted that trait self-esteem moderates the relationship between the frequency of lying for saving face and media. The lower the trait self-esteem, the greater the chance of lying for saving face in instant messaging than in face-to-face communication. The higher the trait self-esteem. the smaller the chance of lying for saving face across media. A logistic regression indicated that there was no strong effect of trait self-esteem on the relationship between lying frequency for saving face and media. 25 When the ambiguous cases were coded as missing data. X?" (2) = 0.25, p = .88. When they were coded as honesty. x2 (2) = 0.13. p = .94. When they were coded as lies, )8 (2) = 2.94, p = .23. Therefore, the second hypothesis was not supported. SeIflreportea’ Honesty Previous research which relied on self-report to examine deception has an assumption that people are honest about their lies. If this is true, people who lied that they knew about the movie in the current. experiment should be honest about their lies in the self-report. All the liars should admit their lies. However, only 33.33% of the liars admitted they lied previously in the chat. Other liars rated themselves as totally honest in the previous chat. A chi-square indicated that most liars were not honest in self-report about deception. x2 (I) = 21.13. p = .004. Although only 8.75% of the participants were caught lied about the fake movie, 20% of the participants reported that they were not totally honest in the previous chat. In this case, at least 25.71% of the participants lied in the interaction, including the liars who lied about the movie and those who did not lie about the movie but indicated that they were not honest in the self-report. Social A ttractiveness and Lies Social attractiveness was measured as a control variable. As expected, there were no significant association between social attractiveness and lying for saving face. When the ambiguous cases were coded as missing data. 78(1) = 0.06, p = .81. When they were coded as honesty, 78(1) = 0.05, p = .83. When they were coded as lies, )8 (1) = 0.21. p = .65. Searching in Cit/C It was expected that some participants in C MC would search for the movie “YXZ” before response. Only two out of fifty-two participants in the experiment did that. 27 Discussion Implications of the results The current study examined the influence ofmedia modality on lying for saving face. It was also predicted that the relationship between media modality and lying for face was moderated by trait self-esteem. The results did not support either of the hypotheses. H1 predicted that people are more likely to lie for saving face in instant messaging than in face-to-faee communication because they are afraid of being caught by deceptive cues in FtF. The result indicated that there was no significant difference in terms of lying for saving face across media. There are several possibilities to explain the result. First, it is possible that people were not afraid of being caught, regardless of the media. Lying is an everyday phenomenon (DePaulo et al., 1996; Hancock et al., 2004, Serota, Levine, & Boster. 2010). Previous studies have found that most lies told are white lies, which do not have significant consequences. People put little effort into planning lies and do not worry much about the possibility of being caught (DePaulo et al., 1996). In this case, people are less likely to feel stressful about telling white lies and thereby rarely worry about giving off deceptive cues. Since being caught by deceptive cues is not a big concern to most liars, they do not act differently while telling lies for saving face across media. Second, it is possible that people think they are less likely to be caught in an initial interaction than in a meeting with a close partner. A partner in a close relationship is usually familiar with the liar’s nonverbal cues and thereby has greater chance to 28 discover a lie immediately. To contrast, it is difficult for people who initially meet to detect lies by deceptive cues. Therefore. people may be afraid of being detected by close partners, but not by new acquaintance. Despite of the nonsignificant findings regarding the first hypothesis, when the ambiguous cases were coded as lies, a tendency of more lies for saving face in FtF than in CMC was found, which was in the opposite direction of the hypothesis. One possibility is that people think the objective of saving face is more salient in FtF than in CMC because of cue multiplicity. In an initial interaction. people tend to deliver a desirable first impression (Goffman, 1956). When people first meet in FtF, they directly face each other and are required to immediately respond to their partners. Given the abundance of cues (i.e., verbal cues. nonverbal cues. and contextual cues) in FtF, the pressure from face- threatening questions may be exacerbated. Under such circumstances, people are likely to tell lies for saving face. Lies for saving face are typically white lies without high stakes. Therefore, liars do not worry much about being caught. Even if liars are caught, they will not face severe consequences. In C MC, however, people do not meet each other in person and have little concern about saving face in an initial interaction. Thus, they are less likely to sacrifice honesty for saving face. This may explain the tendency of more liars for saving face in FtF than in C MC in the current study. H2 predicted that trait self-esteem moderates the relationship between the frequency of lying for saving face and media. However, the current study found that trait self-esteem is not a factor moderating lying behaviors across media. It was predicted that some people with low trait self-esteem may desire for social approval and are motivated to lie for saving face. Nevertheless, it is equally possible that people with high trait self- esteem are confident that their lies will not be detected and thereby willing to lie for saving face. Therefore, trait self-esteem cannot be an important indicator of lying for saving face across media. Significant discrepancies between self-report and observation were found among liars in the study. The results suggested that most liars rated themselves as totally honest in the self-report. Two possibilities could be provided to interpret this finding. First, people have different perceptions of deception. Since lying about knowing a movie is a white lie, some people do not count it as a lie. In the current study, subjects were asked to rate their honesty on a 10-point scale (I. totally deceptive; 10, totally honest). Even if the liars did not regard it as a lie, it is unreasonable for them to rate themselves as totally honest. Therefore. this interpretation is not a persuasive explanation of the finding. The second interpretation is that liars tends to be deceptive in self-report. It is entirely possible that liars tell more lies to cover previous ones and rarely admit telling liars. If this is the case, the reliability of self-report in deception study is questionable. It is not unusual to find a low proportion of lying for saving face in the current study. Previous studies have found that students typically tell two lies per day on average (DePaulo et al., 1996'. Hancock et al.. 2004). but the results are misleading to the extent that most people do not lie in a single day and the majority of lies are told by a few prolific liars (Serota et al., 2010). Since subjects only interacted for 10 or 30 minutes in the current experiment, the low proportion of liar is understandable. Moreover. it is possible that the liars caught in the study are prolific liars whereas most of the participants who did not lie about the fake movie tell few lies in daily life. This assumption was partially evidenced in the study because most liars denied their lies in the 30 self-report. They might also tell other lies which could not be figured out based on the existed data. Limitations and Future Research Several limitations of the current study cannot be ignored. First, the situation might not be face threatening enough in the current study. Only a few people were caught lying for saving face. Because of the small proportion of liars, few significant results were found in the study. However. it is equally possible that the manipulation of face- threatening is effective. but most people tend to act honestly rather than lying for saving face, especially in a laboratory experiment. Second, the manipulation of anticipation of future interaction may be problematic in the study. Although participants were asked to keep in touch with their partners after the initial interaction. they might ignore this requirement since it was not compulsory. As a result, some participants did not have the actual anticipation and thereby not highly motivated to manage self-presentation. Third, the subjects are from a student sample. Previous studies have found that student samples differ from other samples in deception studies to some extent (DePaulo et al., 1996; Serota et al., 2010). The generalization of the results from a student sample to a whole population should be carefully considered. The current study examined lies between new acquaintances who are not close to each other in a relationship. In fact. relationships can be divided into different categories based on the relational closeness. A partner can be identified as a stranger, acquaintance, friend, parent, best friend, supervisor. and so on. Existing studies have noted that different relationships have an impact on lying behaviors (DePaulo & Kashy, 1998). 31 DePaulo and Kashy (1998) found that people felt more stressful before and after telling lies to partners with whom they interacted more frequently. Further, most college students did not think their partners in close relationship would believe the lies. In this case, they may feel more stressful to tell lies to close partners. Therefore, the closeness of relationship could be a new dimension to examine the lie for saving face across media. It is true that people engage in various face-saving activities every day; however the importance of saving face varies across cultures (Ting-Toomey, 1988). In individualistic cultures such as United States. an individual’s public self-presentation of face is consistent with his/her internal self. Presenting a true self is more important than saving face. Whereas in collectivistic cultures (e.g.. China and Japan), the selfis situational because it is shaped and maintained through a dynamic process of facework. People put great effort on protecting another‘s and own face. Therefore, an individual from a collectivistic culture strive more for a desirable face than one from an individualist culture. If the same study could be replicated in collectivist countries such as China, a cultural difference in terms oflying for saving face is likely to be found. This study further casts doubt on the reliability of self-report in deception studies. Currently, self-report is the most popular method in prevalence of deception research. A basic assumption of using this method is that people are honest about their lies. In this study, however, most liars denied their lies in self-report. Since the big discrepancy between self-report and observation. it is urgent to improve the methodology in deception research. One effective way is to do laboratory studies, in which some ground truths are established and certain lies can be easily detected. In the current study, the fake movie is a ground truth. So lies about the movie could be discovered. Another way is to improve Lu 1‘.) the validity of self-report. Tourangeau and Yan (2007) proposed four techniques to examine sensitive questions: self—administered questions, forgiving wording, randomized response techniques, and the bogus pipeline approach. Other scholars suggested that additional measures could be used in a same study to increase the accuracy of self-report (Fisher & Katz, 2000). In conclusion. this study examined the effect of media modality on lies for saving face across media. No significant difference of lying behavior across media was found. However, the results suggested that most liars were not honest about their lies in self-report. APPENDICES b) J}. Appendix A. Questionnaire of Self-esteem Instruction: This scale consists of ten statements in terms of self-esteem. Read each statement and mark the appropriate answer. indicating to what extent you feel this way right now. No. Item Strongly - Neutral Strongly Disagree — Agree 1 On the whole I am satisfied with myself 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 I 2 At times I think that I am no good at all 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 3 I feel that I have a number of good 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 qualities I am able to do things as well as most j a 4 other people 1 7 J 4 5 6 7 5 I feel I do not have much to be proud of l 2 3 4 5 6 7 6 I certainly feel useless at times 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 7 I feel that I am a person of worth. at least 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 the equal of others 8 I wrsh I could have more respect for 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 myself 9 All in all. I am inclined to feel that I am a 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 failure 10 I take a positive attitude toward myself 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 b) Ur Appendix B. Questionnaire ofSocial Attractiveness Instruction: This scale consists of ten statements in terms of social attractiveness. Read each statement and mark the appropriate answer, indicating to what extent you feel this way right now. No. Item Strongly - Neutral Strongly Disagree - Agree 1 I think he (she) could be a friend of mine 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 . m, .. , 3., . I .. .- 2 I would llle to have a friendly coat with 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 him (her) 3 It. would be difficult to meet and talk with 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 him (her) We could never establish a personal 4 friendship with each other 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 5 He (she)just wouldnt fit into my Circle 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 of friends 6 He (she) would be pleasant to be with l 2 3 4 5 6 7 7 I feel I know him (her) personally I 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 He (she) is personally offensive to me 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 9 I don't care ifI ever get to meet him (her) 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 10 I sometimes wrsh I were more like him 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 (her) How honest you were in this interaction with your partner? Rate yourself from 1 to 10 (I: totally deceptive; 10: totally honest) The following questions are about general information about you. You may skip any questions that are not relevant to you. 1. Your age: 2. Your gender: __ Male __ Female 36 3. Your citizenship _ US. citizen _ International (permanent resident) __ International (non-permanent resident) 4. Your ethnicity (check one): _ Caucasian __ Hispanic __ African American __ Pacific Islander __ Native American _ Mixed (please specify) __ Asian American _ Other (please specify) 5. Your major: Thank you for participating in this study. 37 Appendix C. CONSENT FORM Title of Study: Intercultural Communication in Face to Face and Computer-Mediated Communication Supervising Researcher: Dr. Timothy R. Levine. Dept. of Communication, Michigan State University Office: CAS 482, Phone: 432-1 124, e-mail: levinet@msu.edu Coordinating Researcher: Siyue Li, MA student. Dept. ofCommunication, Michigan State University Phone: 775-8154, e-mail: lisiyue@msu.edu Information We are interested in how different media influence people’s interaction with foreigners. This research has subjects interacting with an interactional student either face to face or in instant messaging. The aim of the communication is to develop interpersonal relationship with your partner. If you are assigned to a face-to-face condition, the interaction will be 10 minutes. If you are assigned to an instant messaging condition, the interaction will be 30 minutes. The difference of the interaction time is due to the difference of media (e.g., typing takes longer time than speaking). The total time required should be 40 minutes or less. Participation in this study is voluntary. and you may withdraw your consent to participate at any time without penalty. If you withdraw from the study, we will not use any materials or information from you in this or any subsequent research. Paiticipants may also refuse to answer any particular question on the survey. In order to protect your privacy. please do not check private information (e.g., e-mail, bank account) if you are assigned to chat online. The computer you use will be used by other people. Some subjects may face psychological risks. but there are potential benefits for society. There are no anticipated physical and financial risks associated with participation, however psychological consequences such as embarrassment, self-conscious, and/or temporary stress are possible. If you are uncomfortable being in the experiment at any time, please notify the researcher so that the procedure can be discontinued. The experiment will be ended immediately upon request. Referrals to University Counseling Services are available upon request. You will receive extra-credit or research credit in your class in exchange for your participation if your instructor has previously agreed to provide research or extra-credit. If you would receive research or extra-credit in exchange for your participation, you can get an equivalent amount of credit by doing an alternative research project should you choose not to participate in this study. If you have concerns or questions about this study, such as scientific issues, how to do any part of it, or to report an injury, please contact the researcher, Dr. Tim Levine or Siyue Li. If you have any questions or concerns about your role and rights as a research participant, would like to obtain information or offer input, or would like to register a complaint about this research study, you may contact, anonymously if you wish, the Michigan State University Human Research Protection Program at 517-355-2180, FAX 517-432-4503, or e-mail irb@msu.edu, or regular mail at: 207 Olds Hall, MSU, East Lansing, MI 48824 I volzmtarily agree to participate in this study. Print your name Your signature Date 39 Appendix D. Checklist Why did you say that you knew about the movie “YXZ" in the previous chat? A. To save face B. Thought it is a real movie C. Others (to specify) 40 Appendix E. Debriefing Form Debriefing for subjects in CMC condition Title of Study: Self-presentation in Face to Face and Computer Mediated Communication Subject Debriefin g Supervising Researcher: Dr. Timothy R. Levine. Dept. ofCommunication, Michigan State University Office: CAS 482, Phone: 432-1 124. e—mail: levinet@msu.edu https://wwvw.msu.edu/~levinet/ Coordinating Researcher: Siyue Li, Master student, Dept. of Communication, Michigan State University Phone: 775-8154. e-mail: lisiyue@msu.edu We are interested in how people manage self-presentation differently in face-to-face and computer-mediated communication. especially the difference face-saving actions across media. This study had research subjects like you interacting with an international confederate either in face-to-face communication or instant messaging. Your partner is a confederate who helps us to conduct the experiment. During the interaction, the confederate asked you about a fake movie see whether you would say you knew about the movie or not. You will not need to keep in touch with your partner and there will not be a follow-up interview. We told you that because we hoped you could have an anticipation of future interaction. which may facilitate desirable self-presentation. We couldn't tell you about the full purpose and research design at the beginning of the experiment because it may have changed the way you would have acted. The primary research questions focus on two issues. First, the study tests whether people are more likely to make deceptive statements for saving face online than in face-to-face communication. Second, the effect of self-esteem in telling lies across media is examined. During the course of this experiment. the computer you were using made a copy of everything that appeared on your screen — the chat, as well as anything you looked at or brought up before and during the chat. This information is important to our analysis of whether the discussion of the fake movie has been searched online, which may change the direction of the research hypothesis. We did not tell you we were copying your computing actions because it may have made you self-conscious, and we wanted to observe activities as normal as possible. In fairness, we would like to ask your permission now to store securely and analyze these data, for up to three years. If you agree, the recordings of your computer chats will be saved confidentially, to the maximum extent we legally can. If you do not agree to this, the session will be deleted and no record of it will remain. 41 PLEASE SIGN ONE OF THE OPTIONS BELOW Sign here to indicate you AGREE to the Sign here if you DISAGREE and you want storage and analysis of a record of your the record of your computing activity computing activities from this session. destroyed. Signature Signature Results of this research and copies of the final published reports can be from the lead research at the address above. Also, if you have concerns or questions about this study, such as scientific issues, how to do any part of it, or to report an injury, please contact the researcher list above. You may keep sheet for your information. Thanks for participating. Prof. Tim Levine Siyue Li Debriefing for subjects in face-to-face condition Title of Study: Self-presentation in Face to Face and Computer Mediated Communication Subject Debriefin g Supervising Researcher: Dr. Timothy R. Levine, Dept. of Communication, Michigan State University Office: CAS 482, Phone: 432-1 124, e-mail: levinet@msu.edu https://www.msu.edu/~levinet/ Coordinating Researcher: Siyue Li, Master student, Dept. of Communication, Michigan State University Phone: 775-8154. e-mail: lisiyue@msu.edu We are interested in how people manage self-presentation differently in face-to-face and computer-mediated communication. especially the difference face-saving actions across media. This study had research subjects like you interacting with an international confederate either in face-to-face communication or instant messaging. Your partner is a confederate who helps us to conduct the experiment. During the interaction, the confederate asked you about a fake movie see whether you would say you knew about the movie or not. You will not need to keep in touch with your partner and there will not be a follow-up interview. We told you that because we hoped you could have an anticipation of future interaction, which may facilitate desirable self-presentation. We couldn't tell you about the full purpose and research design at the beginning of the experiment because it may have changed the way you would have acted. The primary research questions focus on two issues. First, the study tests whether people are more likely to make deceptive statements for saving face online than in face-to-face communication. Second. the effect of self-esteem in telling lies across media is examined. The talk that you just had with the confederate was audio recorded. This information is important to our analysis of lying for saving face. Some participants’ reactions to the fake movie are ambiguous, so we need to code their answers based on the audio tape. We did not tell you we were recording your conversation because it may have made you self- conscious, and we wanted to observe activities as normal as possible. In fairness, we would like to ask your permission now to store securely and analyze these data, for up to three years. If you agree, the audio recordings of your conversation will be saved confidentially, to the maximum extent we legally can. If you do not agree to this, the session will be deleted and no record of it will remain. PLEASE SIGN ONE OF THE OPTIONS BELOW Sign here to indicate you AGREE to the Sign here if you DISAGREE and you want storage and analysis of a audio record of the audio record of your conversation your conversation from this session. destroyed. Signature Signature Results of this research and copies of the final published reports can be from the lead research at the address above. Also, if you have concerns or questions about this study, such as scientific issues, how to do any part of it. or to report an injury, please contact the researcher list above. You may keep sheet for your information. Thanks for participating. Prof. Tim Levine Siyue Li 44 Appendix F. Data Tables Table 3. Lying frequency across media F tF C MC Total Honesty 43 48 91 Deception 5 4 9 Ambiguous cases 5 0 5 Total 53 52 105 Table 4. Lying in FtF versus CMC (code ambiguous cases as missing data) Asymp. Sig. (2- Exact Sig. Exact Sig. Value df sided) (2-sided) (1-sided) Pearson Chi-Square .2263 1 .634 .734 .449 Continuity Correctionb .016 1 .900 Likelihood Ratio .226 1 .634 .734 .449 Fisher's Exact Test .734 .449 Linear-b -Linear Y , .224C 1 .636 .734 .449 Assocration N of Valid Cases 100 a. 2 cells (50.0%) have expected count less than 5. The minimum expected count is 4.32. b. Computed only for a 2x2 table c. The standardized statistic is -.473. 45 Table 5. Lying in F tF versus CMC (Code ambiguous cases as honesty) Chi-Square Tests Asymp. Sig. (2- Exact Sig. Exact Sig. (1- Value df sided) (2-sided) sided) Pearson Chi-Square .102":1 1 .750 1.000 .512 Continuity Correctionb .000 1 1.000 Likelihood Ratio .102 1 .750 1.000 .512 F isher’s Exact Test 1.000 .512 Linear-by-Linear 0 Association .101 1 .751 1.000 .512 N of Valid Cases 105 a. 2 cells (50.0%) have expected count less than 5. The minimum expected count is 4.46. b. Computed only fora 2x2 table c. The standardized statistic is -.317. Table 6. Lying in FtF versus CMC (Code ambiguous cases as lies) Chi-Square Tests Asymp. Sig. Exact Sig. Exact Sig. Value df (2-sided) (2-sided) (1-sided) Pearson Chi-Square 2.8373 .092 .150 .080 {Continuity . b 1.952 .162 Correction Likelihood Ratio 2.922 .087 .150 .080 F isher's Exact Test .150 .080 Linear-by-Linear C _ , 2.810 .094 .150 .080 Assocration N of Valid Cases 105 a. 0 cells (0%) have expected count less than 5. The minimum expected count is 6.93. b. Computed only for a 2x2 table c. The standardized statistic is -1.676. 46 Omnibus Tests of Model Coefficients Table 7. Self-esteem in Deception (Code ambiguous cases as missing data) Chi-square df Sig. Step 1 Step .250 .882 Block .250 .882 Model .250 .882 Omnibus Tests of Model Coefficients Table 8. Self-esteem in Deception (Code ambiguous cases as honesty) Chi-square df Sig. Step 1 Step .125 .939 Block .125 .939 Model .125 .939 Omnibus Tests of Model Coefficients Table 9. Self-esteem in Deception (Code ambiguous cases as lies) Chi-square df Sig. Step 1 Step 2.939 .230 Block 2.939 .230 Model 2.939 .230 . 47 Table 10. Discrepancy between Observation and Self-reported Honesty Self-rated Honesty Observed N Expected N Residual 0 6 8.7 -2.7 1 3 .3 2.7 Total 9 Test Statistics SelfratedHonesty Chi-Square 21.134a df 1 Asymp. Sig. .000 Exact Sig. .004 Point Probability .004 a. 1 cells (50.0%) have expected frequencies less than 5. 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