MySpace can bring shy kids out of their shells

Jasmin Aline Persch • E-mail

When Jessica Kellen was 12 years old, she met a boy on MySpace who said he was 17.

She had pretended to be 16, which allowed her to sneak past the site's rule that members have to be at least 14. Jessica, who's 14 now, describes her sixth-grade self as a "really shy kid." Conversing with a stranger on MySpace about the boy's family farm, parents and adolescent drama came easier than doing so with people she knew. And the virtual friendship helped boost her self-esteem in the real world — allowing her to make more friends at school.

“If I can do this on the Internet, why can't I do this in person?” realized Jessica, who lives in Centennial, Colo.

MySpace anxiety
While horrifying headlines tie MySpace to teen suicide, violence — and especially sexual predators, research tells another story. Larry D. Rosen, a psychology professor at California State University, Dominguez Hills, found that only 12 percent of teenagers actually rendezvous offline with an online friend in his recent survey of 482 teens. That finding jibes with similar nationwide studies.

The kids most at risk for encountering trouble on MySpace are the ones who are looking for it, Rosen said in an interview.

“But they would be the same kids going out there looking for it offline,” he said.

In his recent parenting book “Me, MySpace and I,” Rosen says that parents’  MySpace anxiety likely arises from their lack of understanding of what teens actually do on the social-networking site. A third of parents have never glimpsed their teen’s MySpace page — and three-fourths do so less than once a month, according to his research.

And what parents might not know about MySpace is that it can actually help their kids. Bolstered by interviews of more than 1,000 parents and 2,500 teens, Rosen’s research shows that the oft-stigmatized site can foster adolescent pursuits of true identity, friendship — and validation.

“Overall, based on my extensive research, the impact of the MySpace lifestyle on child and adolescent development has been positive,” Rosen writes in his book. “It has provided a safe forum for expressing feelings and appears to enhance relationships and psychological well-being.”

MySpace eases adolescence?
Rosen maintains that MySpace eases the coming-of-age process. About 80 percent of 12- to 17-year-olds log on weekly, according to Rosen's book.

Being social, the purpose of the site, is crucial to developing an identity. Adolescents adjust their behavior — and images — to positive and negative interactions with their peers. Rosen writes in his book that social flops, which can crush kids’ self-confidence, are easier to shrug off, and social successes are easier to achieve on MySpace. That’s especially helpful for socially challenged kids who forgo or flunk these trial-and-error personality tests in real life.

“Shy teens felt less shy and more honest online, which led to the accumulation of more MySpace friends and enhanced self-esteem,” Rosen writes.

Same goes for kids who struggle to fit in at school.

Skye Doran's MySpace page Skye Doran, entering her "Emo" phase, found the social life she never had in the real world on MySpace.

Skye Doran from Gresham, Ore., was a self-declared nerd in elementary school. In eighth grade, Skye went Goth, a subculture associated with anger, black accoutrements and Marilyn Manson. Then, her sophomore year, she turned “Emo,” a newer subculture tied to softcore punk bands like AFI and Hawthorne Heights, skin-tight jeans and long side-swept bangs draped over much of the face.

Today, Skye is 19 and describes herself as a Christian and a "skater chick who doesn't skate." She now mostly uses MySpace to meet people who live in Oregon and who could develop into real-life friends. But when Skye joined at 14, she made many out-of-state MySpace “friends,” who didn’t know or judge her, and who composed the social life that had never existed in Oregon.

MySpace “meant I had people to talk to,” she said. “It meant I could for sure associate with people who didn’t have a lot of friends.”

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