Can we do a pseudopsychoanalysis of why people would use their full face photos as avatars (or worse as gravatars)?

this could be mine:




I have searched the web high and low for dr H's and it's a toss up between this:




and this:



I've even seen some of them here in the forum.

I'm really just wondering why people do this or would you do this (if you haven't already)? And if you see this kind of avatar, would it influence how you perceive this person (what the heck were they thinking? ) or how you're going to 'deal' with them?

if someone uses this mugshot or looks like him you should marry him immediately

hobglobin on Mon Jul 16 19:56:42 2012 said:

if it only looks like him...well, never mind...just look at those glasses....

do you see the 50 billions $ behind the glasses?

hobglobin on Mon Jul 16 20:10:21 2012 said:

well, only if Melinda will allow democratic sharing ....

you can ask for a grant from their foundation

anyway back to your topic:
I guess most are facebook users or addicts and used to post their private stuff and photos...that's modern life, though weird for the FB-outcasts

Well, I used to have my picture as an avatar on another forum, but people didnt take me serious and thought I was crazy, so after a while I figured it had to be my picture.. So I stopped using it, altough, they still think I am crazy... so perhaps it was not the picture that did it...







On a serious note:
Two things to say
1) its all part of the "facebook" generation...
If you look what kind of pictures they put online.. for everyone to see...
And many of the so called "hot" pictures are just there to get attention.. The weird thing is that many people have so many "friends" online that they really think they "have friends".
Altough, I think this has always been part of youngesters and I think (esp) in the USA its important to belong to a certain "group" ,the popular ones, the atlethes etc.. and FB etc plays a role in it.. the "hotter" you are on FB, the more you belong to a certain group.
(but this is not really what you asked about the avatars)

2) you have the real "nerds", that want to "show" everyone how they are.. they have their life on the net...
But there is another group: certain people (professors, sellers from big companies etc) they use their picture because it shows who they are..
Its part of their identity/profession.. And its important ( or can be) that if you (for example) are the head engineer of a company that sells something, that you show your picture on the company website/forum.
Of course, these people will not use their pictures on every website, but mostly on the website for work/university etc.

pito on Tue Jul 31 20:22:55 2012 said:

well, you look a little bit like a hammered Harry Potter .....after losing his eye glasses of course...

I wonder if a registration via facebook automatically leads to a mugshot here....and hopefully it's not leading to a need to register without nickname but your real name somewhen...i.e. bioforum becomes like fb a social platform and your profile and the posts are a kind of your "business card" (just like research gate)

hobglobin on Thu Aug 2 15:49:37 2012 said:

Yeah, research gate.. Its good.. but the fact that you need to use your real name is not 100% ok.. (altough, you can give a fake name).
On the other hand: by using real names, it becomes more "real" , people tend to "believe" in real persons on a website rather then a more anonymous forum.