Virtually You

Whether sharing photos or following financial markets, we spend a shocking amount of time online. Virtually You offers a penetrating examination of the insidious effects of the Internet on our personalities-online and off. The Internet can enhance well-being but Elias Aboujaoude has spent years treating patients whose lives have been profoundly disturbed by it. Part of the danger lies in how the Internet allows us to act with exaggerated confidence, sexiness and charisma. This self, which Aboujaoude dubs our "e-personality", manifests itself in every curt e-mail we send, Facebook "friend" we make and "buy now" button we click. Too potent to be confined online, e-personality traits seep offline, making us impatient, unfocused and urge-driven. The first scrutiny of the virtual world's transformative power on our psychology, Virtually You shows how life is being reconfigured in the image of a chat room and how our identity increasingly resembles that of our avatar.