The Elderly's Self-presentation And Interpersonal Interaction On WeChat

Although the elderly are not the mainstream group of social media use,with the arrival of the aging society,social media penetrates into the elderly group,the proportion of the elderly using social media has greatly increased,and their social media use habits are gradually attracting attention.According to The Internet Life Research Report for Middle-aged and Old People,the elderly not only regard WeChat as an instant messaging tool,but also as an interactive platform to understand and communicate with each other,giving rise to a new way of interaction.Different from the past,social networks have changed the elderly group's self presentation form and social interaction structure However,the unique self-presentation strategies and interpersonal interaction methods in social networks have brought new impacts and challenges to the elderly people who are accustomed to traditional way of socialization.This study adopts in-depth interviews with the elderly over 60 years old in Chaozhou,Guangdong as the informant.Combining theories from journalism and communication,psychology and sociology,investigate the elderly by Based on the self-presentation and social interaction on WeChat,this paper attempts to analyze the basic situation of the elderly using WeChat,the behavior and characteristics of the impression management and interpersonal-communication among the elderly on WeChat platform and their experience of WeChat social networking.Through in-depth interviews with 27 old people of different gender,age,and occupation in the time span of six months,it was found that most elderly people are willing to extend and enhance the interpersonal relationship in reality through self-presentation and interpersonal interaction on WeChat network.Older women were more active than older men in using WeChat for self-presentation and interpersonal interaction.On the one hand,interpersonal interaction in WeChat is based on self-presentation.The elderly would present a positive and relaxed self-image by releasing information and communicating with others on the WeChat platform.On the other hand,the elderly people strengthened the communication and exchanges with the outside world through WeChat so as to build good interpersonal relationships with others.However,for the elderly,their media socialization is more of a kind of time passing and emotional recreation.Instead of expanding their social circle through WeChat,they tend to communicate information and exchange sentiments in their “circle of acquaintances”.In addition,the elderly are facing thefollowing problems in WeChat interaction: Old people are addicted to WeChat interaction and easily dilute interpersonal communication in real life;The elderly have the functional operation obstacles of WeChat social software;due to homogeneous and false information on the WeChat platform,the elderly are suspicious and worried about the security of using WeChat interaction.The author believes that government,the corporate and the elderly should share the responsibilities of improving old people's socialization experience via WeChat.