Self-presentation Research Articles

Corporate hypocrisy and ESG rating divergence

AbstractWe draw upon impression management theory and cognitive dissonance theory to examine whether or not corporate hypocrisy triggers substantial environmental, social, and governance (ESG) rating divergence and to further investigate the influence channels of cognitive dissonance and impression management. In addition, our study explores the moderating role of media coverage with different emotional biases in shaping the relationship between corporate hypocrisy and ESG rating divergence. By utilizing a comprehensive dataset comprising 3562 Chinese listed companies and 25,898 firm‐year observations from 2010 to 2022, findings reveal that hypocritical firms exhibit significantly large ESG rating divergence. In particular, these firms induce cognitive dissonance among rating agencies, resulting in rating disparities, which are further magnified when using impression management through the selective disclosure of negative information or symbolic promotion of positive information. Furthermore, positive media coverage weakens the positive association between corporate hypocrisy and ESG rating divergence, whereas negative media coverage strengthens this relationship. Lastly, we find that the impact of corporate hypocrisy on ESG rating divergence is more pronounced for companies with higher average ESG scores, lower long‐term charitable involvement, and lower information opacity. These findings withstand various sensitivity tests utilizing alternative measures for rating divergence and corporate hypocrisy, as well as different sample compositions. Our conclusions remain robust even after addressing endogeneity concerns using a two‐stage least squares regression model.

Does symbolic AI-related disclosure influence CEO promotion? Evidence from state-owned enterprises in China

ABSTRACT This paper considers firms’ artificial intelligence (AI)-related discretionary disclosure to examine whether symbolic communications of AI influences a CEO’s chance of career advancement in Chinese state-owned enterprises (SOEs). We find a positive relationship between symbolic AI disclosure and the possibility of managers getting promoted. Our main finding is more salient when a firm’s achievement of policy goals is more crucial, its financial performance is relatively poor, and a manager has more urgent promotion needs. Results imply that CEOs engage in impression management via managerial discretionary disclosure to strengthen organizational legitimacy and build a favourable impression, which may increase their probability of getting promoted.

How was That for You?: Gender, Aftercare and Impression Management in BDSM

ABSTRACT Existing research finds that people’s perspectives on sexual interactions shift with time and new experiences. Despite this, little empirical work has explored the role that communication following a sexual interaction plays in partners’ perceptions of each other and the sexual interaction. This study began to address this gap by applying impression management theory and gender performance theory to analyze 40 interviews with BDSM (Bondage/discipline, Dominance/submission, Sadism, Masochism) practitioners who “top,” or enact a dominant role, about a community-held practice called “aftercare.” Participants were U.S. residents, ages 23-65, and included 14 cisgender women, 19 cisgender men, 2 transgender women and 5 non-binary individuals. Findings showed practitioners used aftercare to manage the impression they leave on their partners, the wider BDSM community, and themselves. Further, data revealed gender differences in how BDSM practitioners understood and articulated aftercare. Overall, these findings offer an empirical example of impression management in erotic interactions and the role that gender plays in this process.

Emotion regulation motives in adolescence shape regulatory strategy use.

Emotion regulation (ER) motives (i.e., the reasons individuals regulate their emotions) are key factors influencing the development of adolescents' ER abilities. However, age- and gender-related trends in adolescents' ER motives, as well as their impact on the use of ER strategies, remain unclear. We recruited 5629 participants from two schools in Southwest China (M = 15.18, SD = 1.73; 45.11% male) to complete the Emotion Regulation Goals Scale and the Emotion Regulation Questionnaire. Linear and polynomial regression analyses were conducted to examine age- and gender-related differences in ER motive patterns. We then tested whether different patterns of ER motives were also associated with participants' habitual use of two common ER strategies. This study revealed nonlinear and diverse age-related differences in adolescents' contra-hedonic and pro-social motives, with notable fluctuations in contra-hedonic motives. Boys exhibited higher levels of contra-hedonic motives, while girls showed higher levels of performance motives. Moreover, ER motives were significantly and broadly associated with individuals' habitual use of reappraisal and suppression. More specifically, pro-hedonic motives were associated with greater use of reappraisal, while contra-hedonic motives were linked to higher levels of suppression. Furthermore, instrumental motives (i.e., performance, pro-social, and impression management) were positively related to both reappraisal and suppression. These findings enhance our understanding of how adolescents' ER motives vary by age and gender, as well as the crucial role different ER motives play in shaping patterns of ER strategy use.

The Impression Management Consequences of Hiding Effort Among Adolescents: The Mediating Role of Authenticity.

Hiding effort has become prevalent among adolescents; however, whether this behavior benefits or harms their social impression remains unclear. The study explored whether hiding effort is an effective impression management strategy to obtain high popularity, likeability, interpersonal trust, and cooperation intention from peers. Using hypothetical scenarios, Study 1 (N = 243) found that hiding effort led to lower popularity, likeability, interpersonal trust, and cooperation intention among adolescents. Study 2 (N = 176) replicated the findings of Study 1 and found that the hiding-effort adolescents did not realize these negative consequences. Furthermore, Study 2 revealed that authenticity mediated the effect of hiding effort on popularity, likeability, interpersonal trust, and cooperation intention. The findings provided theoretical and practical implications for educators and adolescents. Educators should foster environments where effort and authenticity are rewarded. Adolescents should understand the cost of hiding efforts from peers.

CSR awarding: A test of social reputation and impression management

CSR awarding: A test of social reputation and impression management

Auditor Perceptions, Reactions, and Responses to PCAOB Inspection Feedback

ABSTRACT Guided by the performance feedback literature, we study PCAOB inspections as a nonstandard feedback event. We use an experiential questionnaire to collect and analyze perceptions, reactions, and responses to inspection feedback from 120 partners and managers subject to a recent PCAOB inspection. Despite varying perceptions, we find on average auditors perceive strong firm support but also that firms acquiesce to inspectors. Generally, the feedback source, inspectors, are perceived as professional, organized, and knowledgeable and auditors agree with the feedback message, perceiving it as consistent and well reasoned. We observe a range of auditor reactions (satisfaction with and motivated to use inspection feedback), responses at the engagement level (improvements to audit quality and inspection risk or impression management), and individual responses. Multivariate analyses show more positive feedback perceptions improve reactions, which enhance desirability of responses and are robust to considering the inspection outcome, offering insights for refining inspection interactions and processes.

Exploring gender stereotypes in financial reporting: An aspect-level sentiment analysis using big data and deep learning

This study delves into the intricate interplay between gender stereotypes and financial reporting through an aspect-level sentiment analysis approach. Leveraging Big Data comprising 129,251 human face images extracted from 2085 financial reports in Chile, and employing Deep Learning techniques, we uncover the underlying factors influencing the representation of women in financial reports. Our findings reveal that gender stereotypes, combined with external economic factors, significantly shape the portrayal of women in financial reports, overshadowing intentional efforts by companies to influence stakeholder perceptions of financial performance. Notably, economic expansion periods correlate with a decline in women's representation, while economic instability amplifies their portrayal. Furthermore, the financial inclusion of women positively correlates with their presence in financial report images. Our results underscore a bias in image selection within financial reports, diverging from the neutrality principles advocated by the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB). This pioneering study, combining Big Data and Deep Learning, contributes to gender stereotype literature, financial report soft information research, and business impression management research.

Increasing efficacy to reduce state anxiety: An application of the self-presentation theory of social anxiety

Increasing efficacy to reduce state anxiety: An application of the self-presentation theory of social anxiety

Managing ignorance to preserve anti-doping cosmology – the case of contamination

ABSTRACT This article addresses contamination within anti-doping as a scientifically complex and politically critical source of ignorance, representing a threat to the World Anti-Doping Agency’s (WADA) credibility. Contamination can be described as any situation in which athletes come in contact with prohibited substances through their environment, without their fault, and is an unknown looming over athletes and anti-doping organisations alike. Dealing with contamination is a vital stake for WADA as the phenomenon jeopardises institutional features of anti-doping, including the strict liability principle whereby athletes are deemed responsible for whatever is present in their body. Building on studies of ignorance in organisations, this article draws from frame analysis to apprehend WADA’s policy response to contamination. Through WADA Minutes and other releases over the period 2000–2023, we analyse how WADA handles and justifies shifts in its framing of contamination towards its global audiences. Our results show that organisational attitude towards ignorance is a dynamic process. This process intertwines with the organisation’s need to maintain its credibility, especially where elucidating the issue threatens components constitutive of its community’s cosmology as defined by Goffman. The concept of ‘frame consistency’ illuminates how this requires the organisation to retain the community’s trust by convincing them that its framing remains coherent over time and that the policy issue can be mastered without undermining the system’s overarching principles. To achieve these goals, WADA mobilises techniques of impression management, also relying on the institutions of science and the law as guardians of its cosmology.

Managing impressions: performance and identity in police leadership in the pandemic

ABSTRACT Critical leadership scholars have long recognised leadership as performative and reveal the symbolic, presentational and ritual aspects of leadership practice as meaning-making. This perspective, however, is neglected in mainstream understanding of police leadership. Drawing on Goffman’s dramaturgical framework and a qualitative study of policing leaders in the UK, this paper explores performativity and police leadership in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. Removed from occupational symbols of the police station and performing leadership work exclusively in the home environment, the findings show that police leaders used the uniform as part of a strategy of impression management to construct front and back stage regions in the domestic sphere. In frontstage settings, the uniform was used to represent occupational authority and reinforce a sense of shared, professional identity and purpose, despite the physical separation between leaders and their staff. Alongside this, police leaders constructed and maintained backstage spaces for preparatory and reparative work, even within the home-working setting. The findings challenge traditional conceptualisations of the backstage as physical, boundaried space of the police station and instead reveal backstage space as fluid, dynamic and imagined. As police constabularies consider the impact of remote-working practices on the police workplace, the preservation of backstage spaces for police leaders during the COVID-19 pandemic reveals the value and necessity this backstage work in police leadership.

From plate to post: how foodstagramming enriches tourist satisfaction and creates memorable experiences in culinary tourism

ABSTRACT The study explores how dining environment attributes affect foodstagramming engagement, the impact of foodstagramming on tourists’ satisfaction, and the formation of memorable experiences. A total of 627 valid questionnaires were analysed employing SEM-PLS Warp8 to evaluate the proposed model. The study's findings demonstrate that the dining environment significantly influences the behaviour of tourists. This behaviour partially mediates the interaction between the dining environment, tourists’ satisfaction, and memorable culinary experiences. Additionally, it demonstrated that the overall culinary experiences of memorable tourists act as a mediator between the phenomenon of foodstagramming and the satisfaction of tourists. The research concludes by providing theoretical and practical implications, as well as suggestions for future research directions. This study integrates the theories of social cognitive, self-presentation, uses and gratifications theory, and nostalgia and memory to interpret the fascinating complex foodstagramming phenomenon. Restaurant managers should invest in the training of chefs to create visually stunning dishes and enhance the dining environment to encourage foodstagramming behaviour.

The current state of affairs in infidelity research: A systematic review and meta‐analysis of romantic infidelity prevalence and its moderators

AbstractIn this systematic review and meta‐analysis, researchers' operationalizations of romantic infidelity and the techniques that they employed to measure it were surveyed along with the demographic characteristics of their respondent samples. A meta‐analytic synthesis of infidelity prevalence estimates and their moderators is provided. The APA PsycINFO, PubMed, ISI Web of Science, and ERIC databases were searched for peer‐reviewed, English‐language studies reporting infidelity prevalence rates that were published as of September 2022. Weighted aggregate estimates of different forms of infidelity were calculated and the moderating effects of certain methodological variables on these estimates were examined. Study‐level risk of bias was assessed using the Appraisal tool for Cross‐Sectional Studies (AXIS). A total of 305 studies met the inclusion criteria, with an aggregate sample size of 508,241 respondents across 47 countries. Multiple forms of infidelity were identified, with sexual infidelity receiving the most research attention and many studies lacking clear infidelity operationalization. Anonymous data collection and convenience sampling were found to result in greater report of sexual, but not emotional, infidelity. The findings indicate that nonsexual forms of infidelity remain underexplored. Additionally, operational ambiguity and sample demographic homogeneity are widespread in the existing infidelity research literature. Research practices in this field raise concern regarding the effects of impression management, self‐selection, and response biases.

Самооценка преподавателя вуза в контексте современных медиа

Self-esteem and personal development depend on the social context. This article describes this correlation, within which personality affects the professional success. Such an impact is manifested in the work of a modern university educator, both in the media space and beyond. The social role of the teacher changes together with public relations: today, it is part of cultural capital and information economy. The professional self-esteem of a university educator, expressed in managerial metrics, determines their performance. The metrics can reveal a social interaction between the specialist and the society, where the specialist exchanges skills for reward, which affects the self-esteem and further interaction. The work of a university educator depends on the presence of the student as an actor, formal requirements of the university administration, and the ability to meet the students’ need for personal contact under standardization and mass production of information. The article gives university teaching personnel some recommendations on maintaining self-esteem connected with the development of emotional intelligence, impression management, and identification. The recommendations are supported by media presence cases.

Exploring the links between type and content of virtual background use during videoconferencing and videoconference fatigue.

The popularity of remote working in recent years has led to a rise in the use of videoconferencing tools. However, these communication tools have also given rise to a phenomenon known as videoconference fatigue (VF). Using the limited capacity model of motivated mediated message processing and impression management theory as the theoretical framework, this study explores how different types and content of virtual backgrounds in videoconferencing influence people's VF and well-being. A survey of 610 users of videoconferencing tools revealed significant variations in the content and type of virtual backgrounds used during videoconferences. Our findings highlight three main points: first, there is a significant relationship between the use of virtual backgrounds and VF; second, pairwise comparisons showed that the type of virtual background significantly influences the amount of VF experienced by users; third, the content of virtual backgrounds also significantly impacts the level of VF experienced by users. These results suggest that careful selection of virtual backgrounds can mitigate VF and improve user well-being. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Impression management in the boardroom: How CEO facial trustworthiness influences turnover risk

This paper examines the effect of perceived trustworthiness on the turnover of Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) and its moderating role in the relationship between firm performance and CEO turnover. We employ a unique dataset comprising headshots of male CEOs in US-listed firms from 2010 to 2019 and a machine learning-based facial landmark detector to construct a composite facial trustworthiness index. Our results show that CEOs exhibiting high facial trustworthiness experience a lower turnover risk. We also find that facial trustworthiness strongly influences the link between firm performance and CEO turnover. Well-performing executives have a lower risk of being dismissed from their positions, and the dismissal risk is even lower among CEOs perceived as having a high facial trustworthiness. Conversely, underperforming CEOs are more likely to be dismissed, and the dismissal probability is greater among CEOs who have been perceived as being highly trustworthy. Our findings are consistent with the predictions of the expectancy violation theory, which posits that trustworthy-looking executives are more likely to be punished if they do not live up to the expectations held by the board of directors.

Investigating feelings of imposterism in first-year medical student narratives.

Imposter phenomenon (IP), feeling as if a person does not belong, has been reported in medical students at various rates. In medical literature, this phenomenon has often been defined as a 'syndrome', but other studies have described it as a dynamic experience that can have various impacts on different people at different time points. Although studies have linked IP with other phenomena such as burnout in residents and physicians, no studies have examined its aetiology nor how these feelings are experienced by medical students. With the use of social identity theory as a framework, the authors analysed 233 reflective essays for elements of IP across eight cohorts of medical students from two institutions. Students responded to a prompt that asked: 'What was one part of your identity that you thought you would have to change in order to become a physician?' Included reflections were analysed using the framework method. Elements of IP were identified in 121 reflections (52%) and were categorised into three major themes: (1) Comparing oneself to an idealised image of a medical student, (2) Comparing oneself to an idealised image of a physician and (3) Concerns about presentation of self to others. Each theme contained two or more sub-themes. Commonly, students discussed how their own personality traits, experiences, backgrounds and identities cast doubt on their sense of belonging in medicine. The results of this study were consistent across both institutions, suggesting that imposter feelings are common among all first-year medical students. However, the extent of the impact of these feelings on their identity formation depends on the individual lived experiences of students and the context in which these feelings arise. Encouraging reflective journaling and sharing of stories from all stages of education can normalise imposter feelings during the development of the professional identity as a physician.

Exploring impression management through eye-tracking: A study on the influence of photographs in financial reporting

The objective of financial reporting is to provide decision-useful information for a wide range of existing and potential stakeholders. However, the lack of regulation regarding the use of visual imagery may enable companies to engage in impression management and subtly influence the reader’s judgments through careful selection of images and how they obfuscate or clarify information. This study utilizes eye-tracking technology to experimentally examine how non-explanatory photographs influence the performance judgments of non-professional investors comprising business students and auditors. Participants were exposed to an excerpt of the management summary of a fictitious company’s annual report. The findings suggest while a non-explanatory photograph attracts attention in a text-image combination, the information search process and performance-related judgments are free of influences from the photograph. This implies other photographic attributes, such as triggering emotional influences or providing explanatory information, may be more relevant for impression management in influencing judgments over attentional influences.

A - 60 Validity of Caregiver Reported Behavioral Symptoms in Autism Spectrum Disorder Evaluations

Abstract Objective Informant report of a child’s behavior is an important component of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) evaluations. Informant-report measures with symptom validity scales are crucial to identifying invalid reporting of symptoms. This study examined the prevalence of, and characteristics associated with caregiver-report symptom validity (SVT) failure in an ASD evaluation clinic. Method Particpants were 212 youth, 6 to 18 years old (Mage = 11.5, 79.7% white, 91% non-Hispanic) whose caregivers completed a Conners, 3rd Edition, Adaptive Behavior Assessment System (ABAS) 2nd or 3rd Edition, and Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL) as part of a multidisciplinary autism evaluation. Results Rates of symptom validity failure, specifically negative impression (z = −3.338, p < 0.001) and inconsistency (z = −2.051, p = 0.04) were significantly higher in this sample compared to the Conners, 3rd edition general population normative sample. Elevated negative impression index was associated with lower scores on the ABAS Social index (r = 0.152, p = 0.028) and higher scores on the CBCL Withdrawn scale (r = −0.285, p < 0.001). Those with an elevated negative impression index were more likely to not receive an ASD diagnosis [Χ2 = 8.116, p = 0.006]. Conclusion Caregiver report in children seeking diagnostic clarification for ASD is more likely to raise concerns for validity of reported behavioral symptoms than in the general population. Negative impression management is associated with lower likelihood of clinical ASD diagnosis, perhaps suggestive of caregiver motivation to obtain ASD diagnosis for non-autistic children. These findings support consideration of SVT failure when examining caregiver-reported behavioral symptoms.

Making Sense of Political Images on Instagram: Analysing the Online Image and Impression Management of World Leaders versus Belgian Politicians. A Comparison of Two Case Studies

Making Sense of Political Images on Instagram: Analysing the Online Image and Impression Management of World Leaders versus Belgian Politicians. A Comparison of Two Case Studies