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Cited by 95Impact of Technology on AdolescentsIdentity, Memory, and TherapyMedia and Digital Communication

Identity development in the digital context

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Soh, Serena, Talaifar, Sanaz, Harari, Gabriella M.·2024·Social and Personality Psychology Compass
DOI 10.1111/spc3.12940
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Abstract

Digital media is ubiquitous in adolescence and young adulthood. These are key developmental periods when people explore who they are and who they want to become. However, researchers have yet to fully understand digital media's role in shaping identity and its development. We build on prior work conceptualizing identity development as a contextually embedded process to describe how identity influences and is influenced by one's digital context. We propose a systematic framework for investigating the relationships between identity and digital environments (i.e., mediums and platforms, which vary according to their content and affordances) through four mechanisms: selection (i.e., choosing or avoiding digital environments), manipulation (i.e., intentionally altering or changing digital environments), evocation (i.e., unintentionally eliciting responses from digital environments), and application (i.e., integrating or applying experiences from digital environments). To conclude, we outline future directions for research that may clarify how identity development unfolds in the digital context.

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  • The way individuals encode, curate, and retrieve external information might change across the lifespan, possibly in line with processes of identity formation and identity development.

    “the way individuals encode, curate, and retrieve external information might change across the lifespan, possibly in line with processes of identity formation and identity development (cf.Davis & Weinstein, 2017;Manago, 2015;Soh et al., 2024).”

    From Understanding Autobiographical Memory in the Digital Age: The AMEDIA-Model (2024) · cites this paper as Soh et al., 2024

    The Introduction and §2.3.2 (Manipulation) connect identity development with how young people select digital environments and present information about themselves. The paper does not establish that encoding or retrieving external information changes across the lifespan; its focus is adolescence and young adulthood, so the broader lifespan and information-processing parts are unsupported. (LLM, conf=0.83)

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Cited by

Sorted by citations

Authors
Soh, S., Talaifar, S., & Harari, G. M.
Affiliations
  • Stanford University (US)
  • Imperial College London (GB)
Corresponding author
Soh, Serena
ORCID
Venue
Social and Personality Psychology Compass
Publisher
Wiley
Published
2024-02
Volume
18
Issue
2
ISSN
1751-9004 (ISSN-L)
DOI
10.1111/spc3.12940
OpenAlex
W4391849324
Cited by
95
References
22
Citations by year
2026: 62 · 2025: 25 · 2024: 7 · 2019: 1
FWCI
49.47
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
Social and Personality Psychology Compass (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Impact of Technology on Adolescents
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Developmental and Educational Psychology › Identity, Memory, and Therapy
  • Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Computer Networks and Communications › Media and Digital Communication
Keywords
identity construction, digital media, adolescents, early adulthood, digital environment, social networking sites, affordances, selection, manipulation, evocation, applications, self-presentation

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