Self-Presentation Strategies as a Factor of Lecturer's Personality Perception by Students in Online Interaction at a Media Lecture

Abstract

The present reseach featured the effect of the self-presentation strategies used by lecturers on the socio-psychological interpretation of their personality by students at media lectures. The research objective was to define self-presentation strategies that help shape a role model behavior which could be adopted by the students in conditions of direct lecturer – audience interaction. The study focused on two contexts of online interaction. Students in the test group were offered a public media lecture and an out-of-class media lecture given by lecturers they had never seen before. After that, the students were asked to describe the lecrurers using the polar profile technique. Both descriptions showed that the maximum convergence of the image of the lecturer with the reference role model resulted from the strategies of self-aggrandizement and attractive behavior. The strategies of evasion (for women) and power (for men) deviated significantly from the reference role model. These types of behavior had a negative impact on perception. Students gave them lower scores for professional qualities. Public media lectures also demonstrated several significant negative shifts in the lecturer's personality assessment that did not depend on the self-presentation strategies.

Keywords

• social perception
• online education
• teacher – student interaction
• personality interpretation
• first impression