AO1 - Effects of Absence of Gating

• Ftf relationships in the modern world can experience many gates that can affect the early development of a relationship between two people

  • Gates could include physical attractiveness, social anxiety and stammers
• Benefits of absence of gating:

  • The effect of absence of gating is that relationships can progress to a point where self-disclosure can occur, away from superficial and distracting features
  • This encourages virtual relationships to reach a deeper level a lot quicker than ftf relationships as people focus on what is being said rather than what the other looks like
• Drawbacks of absence of gating:

  • Absence of gating can lead to individuals creating an online image that they would not be able to uphold in ftf relationships, for example, an introvert can express themself as an extrovert or a man could present themselves as a woman
  • This can lead to untrue self-disclosure in virtual relationships as people can freely create any kind of avatar to represent themselves in a virtual reality