Social Media Appearance: How Instagram Is Used to Construct, Express and Represent Individuals' Identities

This paper examines the construction and representation of a social media appearance on Instagram. Through content chosen to post and shared on social media individuals construct a virtual identity. Posted content demonstrates the worldview, lifestyle or group belongingness. Choosing what to post, what information to share and give access to, what perspective and sides of life to showcase builds a social identity, image and persona. This research focuses on undergraduate and postgraduate students in Moscow and Brussels and sets out to find the differences and contrasts between identity construction through a digital glass lens and Instagram as a medium for that expression and presentation. The purpose of the research will be achieved through a combination of content analysis and in-depth semi-structured interviews with elements of online ethnography. The exploratory character of this research based on concepts of self, self-disclosure, self-presentation, privacy, conspicuous and symbolic consumption and existing work on social media (and Instagram in particular) should give a deeper insight into the construction of virtual identities of students in two different countries, and in practical terms identify patterns, reasons and motivations of posting for students, seeking to create a certain image or appearance in the virtual space - on Instagram.