QUESTION 3 Case Study: Social Media Overshare Maya, a first-year university student in Kuala Lumpur, often shares personal details on social media about her studies, relationships, and finances. Her friends worry she is sharing too much. Later, Maya notices that some classmates and even a professor treat her differently. This makes her start to question if posting too much personal information online was a mistake. Based on the above case study, answer the following: (a) Use the Communication Privacy Management (CPM) Theory to explain Maya’s situation. Describe how Maya handled her private information and how this may have caused the problems she faced. (15 marks) (b) Based on CPM Theory, propose three (3) strategies that Maya could use to better manage her private information on social media. (15 marks) [TOTAL 30 MARKS]

Question

QUESTION 3  Case Study: Social Media Overshare Maya, a first-year university student in Kuala Lumpur, often shares personal details on social media about her studies, relationships, and finances. Her friends worry she is sharing too much. Later, Maya notices that some classmates and even a professor treat her differently. This makes her start to question if posting too much personal information online was a mistake. Based on the above case study, answer the following: (a) Use the Communication Privacy Management (CPM) Theory to explain Maya’s situation. Describe how Maya handled her private information and how this may have caused the problems she faced. (15 marks) (b) Based on CPM Theory, propose three (3) strategies that Maya could use to better manage her private information on social media. (15 marks) [TOTAL 30 MARKS]

BlackTom AI · Accepted Answer

This item presents a case about privacy management on social media and asks you to apply CPM theory to Maya’s situation, as well as to propose management strategies. Since no explicit multiple-choice options are provided in the prompt, I will walk through the CPM reasoning step by step and then suggest three CPM-aligned strategies.

First, recall the core ideas of Communication Privacy Management (CPM) theory. CPM posits that people believe they own their private information and thus establish boundary rules to control who can access it. These boundaries are negotiated with others (boundary coordination) and can become permeable or turbulent if others violate or reinterpret them. When boundaries are too loose or poorly managed, boundary turbulence occurs, leading to issues like others learning private details or misinterpreting the intent behind disclosures.

Applying CPM to Maya’s case:
- Ownership and control: Maya treats her personal information (studies, relationships, finances) as private to some extent because she posts it online, which transforms it into information she believes she can manage. However, by sharing details broadly, she is expanding the permeability of her privacy boundary beyond her intended audience.
- Boundary diffusion and permeability: Maya’s private information becomes accessible to classmates and a professor, indicating that her boundary is more permeable than she might have intended. The audience (peers, instructors) is larger and more influential than she anticipated, which can change how others interpret and react to her disclosures.
- Boundary linkage and coordination: Other people involved in Maya’s posts (e.g., friends or classmates whose details might appear in photos or stories) are not always given control over the framing or consent around their own information. This lack of shared boundary management can lead to discomfort or perceived violations from those individuals, generating social friction.
- Boundary turbulence and outcomes: The result is that Maya experiences differential treatment from classmates and a professor, which she interprets as negative consequences of oversharing. This is consistent with CPM predictions: when audiences react to disclosed information in unexpected ways, communication privacy management fails to protect the original owner from negative social outcomes.

Now, analyze why the given CPM-based description might be construed as either accurate or incomplete:
- Accurate aspects: The emphasis on boundary management, audience selection, and the potential for others to react differently aligns with CPM’s core premises. The idea that weak boundaries lead to unintended access and consequences matches CPM’s predictions about boundary turbulence.
- Potential gaps: The student explanation could be strengthened by explicitly detailing the three CPM components (ownership, boundary, and permeability), and by addressing how Maya could re-negotiate boundaries with specific audiences (e.g., close friends, classmates, instructors) to reduce turbulence.

Regarding the three CPM-based strategies to manage private information on social media, here are three concrete options with rationale:
1) Establish explicit audience-boundary rules before posting: Maya could decide which content is appropriate for public, friends-only, or restricted audiences, and adhere to these rules consistently. This helps reduce boundary permeability by aligning her intended boundaries with actual audience exposure.
2) Use platform privacy features and audience lists to enforce boundaries: Enabling features like friend lists, close friends, or custom audience settings limits who can view certain posts. Regularly auditing privacy settings and conducting periodic privacy checks would keep the boundary rules current as her network changes.
3) Practice proactive boundary coordination with others who appear in posts: Before posting content that involves other people (e.g., photos, mentions), Maya should seek consent or at least inform the involved individuals about the intended audience and potential reach. This reduces boundary turbulence by aligning expectations and obtaining shared privacy boundaries when necessary.

In sum, the CPM framework helps explain why Maya’s broad sharing may have led to unexpected social consequences: her privacy boundaries were too permeable for her intended audience, and there was insufficient boundary coordination with others involved. The recommended CPM-based strategies focus on tightening audience boundaries, leveraging platform tools to enforce those boundaries, and engaging others in privacy negotiations to minimize turbulence.

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