That tagging was annoying: An extension of expectancy violation theory to impression management on social network sites

Built on expectancy violation theory, this study investigated how individuals respond to face-threatening information (FTI) on Facebook. We compared how external contingencies of self-worth (CSW; staking self-worth on others’ evaluations) influenced negative affect and remediation between publicly and privately exchanged FTI. Participants were exposed to two putative pieces of FTI concerning their academic performance and morality from an acquaintance provided either publicly or privately. Results (N = 204) show that external CSW only predicted negative affect in the public condition, and negative affect mediated the impact of external CSW on remediation only when FTI concerning morality was public. Our findings suggest that impression management online is a function of self-esteem, the subject, and publicness of FTI. •Sending FTI on Facebook is a negative expectancy violation.•External CSW increased negative affect only when exposed to public FTI.•External CSW motivated remediation of public, academic FTI.•Mediation effect via negative affect was found for public, morality FTI.•Boundaries of impression management on Facebook are discussed.