#COUPLEGOALS: A SELF-PRESENTATION PERSPECTIVE ON ONLINE PUBLIC DISPLAYS OF AFFECTION VS OFFLINE ROMANCE

Abstract

Despite the increasing role that social network sites (SNS) have come to play in the facilitation of interpersonal relationships today, there has been a lack of existing scholarship on how and why individuals use SNSs to share about their relationships with others on SNSs. This study investigates what motivates individuals to do so, and whether their portrayals are reflective of their actual relationships, through an application of Goffman’s (1959) self-presentation theory. Twenty-one qualitative indepth interviews conducted with individuals in romantic relationships aged between 18-34 years old revealed several potent findings. Instagram was found to be the main social media platform used to publicise romantic relationships online, and seven key motivations emerged from the study: to (1) show appreciation, (2) commemorate special events, (3) update others, (4) store memories, (5) appease partner, (6) seek social validation and (7) spontaneity. Overall, individuals’ online presentations of their relationships consisted of mainly positive information, and findings indicated that participants’ online presentations of the relationship were generally true to the quality of their actual relationships – save for some inaccuracies. Participants’ strategic exclusions of the more undesirable aspects of their relationships were often found to be unrelated to explicit intentions to deceive audiences.