Social concerns that need to be addressed have arisen as a result of the development of social media. One may claim that this emerging technology affects how individuals conduct both online and offline since it serves as a major venue for social interaction. The author Rachel Lowry describes how young people struggle to maintain two identities in their social lives in her piece, 'Stranding online and offline profiles, millennials strive for identity.' The most significant development is that online profiles are now important for many things, including employment. 

Due to this quality, social media is a significant societal issue that has garnered the attention of several academics. The majority of Lowry's piece is made up of comments and thoughts about the effects of social media, particularly the challenges associated with preserving a consistent identity. On the other hand, it might be claimed that the author's views are supported by the wide use of evidence in the form of both primary replies and expert opinion, including the involvement from researchers.

Personality Crisis

The fundamental assertion stated by the author—that millennials must constantly exchange identities—is hinted at by the article's title. A situation like this is referred to as an identity crisis, which suggests that the young people involved are unsure of who they really are. In order to prove that online identities are distinct from real ones, Lowry relied on personal accounts from individuals as well as a book written by Van den Bergh. The fundamental reason for this situation is that millennials were born with the desire to write and accomplish success tales.

Their everyday struggle is focused on locating ways to represent oneself online because of these important criteria. Those who cannot discover true or authentic tales to tell are forced to invent false tales. Because the identities formed via such techniques are unreal, many people claim that they can only truly be themselves alone.

Evaluation

The next section will explore how the authenticity defense and the identity crisis claim are related. However, the piece is successful in demonstrating how different online and offline identities are and how having to alternate between the two may lead to identity crises.

Researchers could view Lowry's depiction of a behavioral issue as a cognitive problem that all social media users share. Researchers define the identity crisis as the state in which people are unable to define, view, or define their identity. Personal identity is contextually framed, according to Arfini et al., which implies that social networking sites have produced an environment for which people's identities must adapt (193). In this sentence, the term 'adapt' refers to a situation in which a change in circumstance results in a change in identity. The scientific literature therefore supports Lowry's theories on drifting between online and offline profiles.

The international social environment facilitated by influencers could potentially be the cause of the identity problem. According to Alishahi et al., social media causes identity crises because people are less likely to be aware of their identity components, such as religion, race, language, culture, and ethnicity, as a result of the globalization of communications,  The function of influencers has been examined by academics, who find that hybrid identities have been constructed in an effort to fit into online networks (Ayish and AlNajjar 27). A sense of group membership is implied by the idea of identity. Therefore, Lowry's piece omits to acknowledge the fact that social media has generated a multicultural online community that is global in scope.

Because influencers now have a chance to set the standard, diversity has the effect of forcing everyone who has to participate to conform to new standards and create new identities. The difficulty arises when such online personas do not translate to the physical world and media consumers are forced to create new personas appropriate to the physical environment. However, the essay backs up its argument and offers examples from actual life to back up its assertion that the subject is going through an identity crisis.