Social Identity Model of Deindividuation Effects - Cognitive SIDE

Cognitive SIDE

Group immersion and anonymity have cognitive consequences that affect the relative salience of personal and social identities. These factors do not produce a loss of self as proposed by deindividuation theory. Rather, anonymity and immersion in the group can enhance the salience of social identity and thereby depersonalize social perceptions of others and the self. SIDE argues this occurs principally because (visual) anonymity obscures individual features and interpersonal differences. As a result of the decreased visibility of the individual within anonymous groups, the process of depersonalization is accentuated, and cognitive efforts to perceive the group as an entity are amplified. Provided that there is some basis to perceive self and others as members of one group, anonymity therefore enhances the salience of the shared social identity. The net result is that people will tend to perceive self and others in terms of stereotypic group features, and are influenced accordingly (Postmes, Spears, & Lea, 1998).

It is important to note that anonymity does not automatically or mechanically influence the salience of social identities. An individual can be identified in such a way that it promotes a more individuated person-perception or alternatively that it promotes a stronger social categorization. In a few instances, making the individual more identifiable may strengthen social categorization. This may happen particularly in contexts within which these social categories are potentially meaningful and therefore accessible, and when group memberships are visually clearly identifiable (as is the case for gender, certain racial characteristics, disabilities, etc., see Spears, Postmes, Lea, & Wolbert, 2002).

SIDE thus describes the cognitive process by which the salience of social identity is affected by the absence or presence of individuating information. It is important to note that this process can only operate to the extent that some sense of groupness exists from the outset. If individuals interact anonymously in the absence of any specific social identity or group boundaries, anonymity would have the reverse effect of accentuating one’s isolation from the group or by further obscuring group boundaries (e.g., Lea & Spears, 1991; Postmes, Spears, Sakhel & De Groot, 2001). Juxtaposing the two possibilities, anonymity in the group either has the effect of amplifying a shared social identity that, however rudimentary, is already in place, or it can amplify the individual independence which exists in contexts in which no shared identity is available. The latter process, whereby anonymity provides the opportunities for people to express and develop identities independent of the social influence of the group, is further elaborated in the Strategic SIDE.