Why Do People Sometimes Wear an Anonymous Mask? Motivations for Seeking Anonymity Online.

Anonymous environments are more accessible than ever. As such, it is important to understand not only how anonymity can change human behavior but also why people are motivated to seek anonymity in online spaces. In four studies, we investigated differences in motivations for seeking anonymity online and their associations with related dispositional factors and online behavior. We found that some people were motivated to seek anonymity to self-express or behave toxically. Both motivations to seek anonymity were associated with low self-concept clarity and high Machiavellianism but differed in their relation to traits such as self-consciousness and psychopathy. Further analyses suggested that people selectively engage in behaviors in anonymous online environments, in line with the specific gratifications they seek through anonymity. We conclude that people seek anonymity to pursue self- or other-related goals that are otherwise more difficult or costly to pursue when identifiable.

An old problem revisited: How sensitive is time-based prospective memory to age-related differences?

Prospective memory (PM) tasks that impose strong demands on strategic monitoring decline more in late adulthood relative to tasks dependent on more automatic cue detection processes. This finding has proven robust to numerous manipulations, with one exception: time-based PM. However, conventional time-based tasks may inadvertently present time-related yet still event-based cues. At the same time, prior studies have failed to consider whether time-based age differences vary according to the degree of deliberate strategic processing required to access these cues. In this study, 53 younger and 40 older participants completed three time-based PM conditions in which a response had to be executed when a sand timer completed a cycle. In one condition, this timer could only be accessed by explicit, deliberate monitoring (by pressing a specific key), in a second, it could also be accessed more perfunctorily (simply by altering ones' visual focus)-and in the third, could not be accessed at all (forcing participants to rely solely on internal temporal estimation processes). Negative age differences emerged in both conditions where participants were able to access the timer, but not in the condition where the timer was hidden. These data provide novel evidence of age-related preservation in at least some aspects of the temporal processing required to support time-based PM. They also suggest that younger and older adults can and do engage in monitoring when given this option, but that only the former group may be able to benefit, even when this monitoring can be conducted relatively perfunctorily. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).