:: cough ::
1.) Tell me a little about yourself.
Out of work computer geek
2.) How do you typically address mail to a married couple?
First names
3.) How do you put your return address on mail?
First initial followed by last name
4.) What are your age, gender, and marital status?
49, male, married
1.) Tell me a little about yourself.
Computer Programmer with two degrees, one a useless BA the other in computing.
2.) How do you typically address mail to a married couple?
Mr & Mrs <man’s initial> <surname>
3.) How do you put your return address on mail?
Don’t do that in the UK.
I guess if I had to then I’d just put my name and address, ie:
Arch Trout
12 blah blah st
etc etc
No title.
4.) What are your age, gender, and marital status?
28 Male Engaged
Sorry, I wanted to get everything totaled up and all the info broken down by demographics before I explained the theory, but the thread mushroomed so fast that I couldn’t keep track of who I’d counted already and who I hadn’t. I was trying to let it die down and do everything at once, but then I got really busy, and then I got really lazy, and you know how it goes.
Basically, my theory is that there are two basic types of responses to the “tell me about yourself” question. There’s the individual-focused answer, and the relationship-focused answer, i.e, “I’m a mechanic who raises pygmy goats for fun and profit” vs. “I’m married and have two beautiful children.” The more relationship focused a person’s answer is, the more likely they are to perceive others in terms of their relationships, thus the question about how you identify married couples. Furthermore, women are more likely to give relationship-focused answers than men, and older people are more likely to be relationship-focused than younger people.
How well the data fits the theory, I have no idea. I took one look at the rapidly-mounting pile of replies the day after starting the thread, hyperventilated, went to work, and haven’t been back since. It may take me a while to get all the data sorted, since I’ve got a lot going on in the next week or so, but I’ll get it done eventually.
1.) Tell me a little about yourself.
I’m part Scottish, a little ol’ hick from Western KS who is now living in the ‘big city,’ short, left-handed, English degree (frustrated novelist), critter-lover.
2.) How do you typically address mail to a married couple?
If she changed her name, First Name & Other First Name Last Name, and if she didn’t, whichever of the couple I know best comes first, like Jane Doe & John Smith.
3.) How do you put your return address on mail?
Mostly I just slap on one of our mailing labels, which has my name on the first line(Kat Doe Smith) and his on the second (Mr. Kat Smith).
4.) What are your age, gender, and marital status?
35, female, married
Hm. Well, normally I would answer “Tell me about yourself” by saying “I’m 37, married, etc. . . .” but since you asked for that in #4, I deliberately answered #1 differently to avoid redundancy. I wonder if anyone else did the same thing.
Scarlett, I also answered my questions in a way that each answer was influenced by the others. So, hmmmm.
Surveys are famously hard to construct without introducing bias; the OP has an interesting concept (and which I agree with), but there are some difficulties with determining the answer to the OP.
Culturally, I have found that USA (male) natives are very tied into identifying themselves by their occupation; this may or may not be true for females. But in Europe, people often find it rude to inquire about one’s occupation and are hesitant to do so themselves. Does this also vary within various ethnic groups and geographical areas within the USA? How about with age groups? Are there other non-personality variables to be considered?
Personally, I am quite hesitant to reveal too much about myself personally in the internet. If I really did a true description of myself…interests and so forth… in #1, there might be a number of Dopers who would know who I was in real life, (and I wouldn’t want that)…I have a very distinct blend of things that would identify me to anyone who is involved in certain occupations/interests.
Please don’t think that I am raining on the OP’s parade; the questions and answers make for interesting reading. And all of us were entertained by trying to figure out what the “theory” was behind the OP’s questions…and we had fun learing a bit about each other. That’s what the Board is all about.
Maybe if we developed a longer list of questions to enable us to eliminate some variables…grin.