Okay, pencils down. Time for the results of my daft little poll (whee, Excel is fun!):
Drumroll please... 
The purple-y blue columns are your guesses about me, and the reddish-purple columns are what you said about yourselves.
So, ten out of sixteen guessed my hair was brown, and the other six were equally divided amongst blonde, red and black. And you're right - it is. Dark brown, in case you're interested* (although at other times it has been pink, red, purple, black, and blonde). Thirteen out of those sixteen also have brown hair, with two redheads, and one blonde. None of you had black hair.
So what does that tell me? In all honesty, not that much - sixteen people isn't really a broad cross-section of society. It's made even more selective by the fact that you're all internet users, who're interested in livejournal (and therefore, arguably, writing), and Stargate (none of my non-Stargate friends answered, but they all know me in real life, so that'd be cheating), and the smaller details (similar sense of humour? interest in stick figure drawing? *g*) that meant you friended me. A lot of people have said they pretty much took a guess, because they'd never previously considered what hair colour I might have. Which I'm glad about - I'd find it a bit weird if you had. *g*
One conclusion for the overwhelming choice of brown hair, and the fact that you were right, might be that our section of the internet (being English-speaking, and therefore mainly the US, Canada, Australia and UK) is predominantly white - as is the audience for sci fi (okay, I can't cite that as a fact, but I'm sure I've seen surveys). And brown is the commonest hair colour for white people (unless you're nordic, but most of you probably know I'm from the UK and not Sweden, Denmark, etc). So there was a statistically good chance that I'd be brunette, and that most of my flist would be, too. It does make me feel like I'm being a little insular. Then again, I did mean for this journal to be mainly about my Stargate stuff. Hm.
Basically, what I was wondering about was whether people would choose a colour that mirrored their own.
![[profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kalquessaput her finger on exactly what I was wondering about, in the comments - "As far as ethnocentrism goes, I think I'm not so much ethnocentric as egocentric. People I meet online, fictional characters, anyone I meet that doesn't come with a visual component, I automatically assume to be just like me."
I think that's what I do. I don't have an image in my head of any of you, exactly - but I have noticed that when someone mentions that they have blonde hair, say, I'm slightly surprised. So, did people mirror?
- Of the two who guessed 'blonde', neither said they're blonde.
- Of the two who guessed 'red', neither said they had red hair (although
majorsamfan later said in comments that she's sort of mid-way between red and blonde). - Of the two who guessed 'black', neither said they had black hair.
- Of the ten who guessed 'brown', eight said they had brown hair (although one of those was me, so I could see the results - so properly speaking it's nine guessing brown, and seven stating they have brown hair. And
vickyocean later said in comments that her hair has been both blonde and brown, and is now red - which concurs with my other Big Theory: labels are meaningless. *g*) So, minus my input, that's eight people choosing a different colour to theirs, and seven choosing the same. Which doesn't really prove my theory. Blast. This is why I'm not a scientist. I want to be proven right. :)
So there you go. Does it say anything, other than that I have too much time on my hands? You decide.
Also, the Geek!Sam / MacGyver OTP story is surprisingly popular. Whee!
ETA: Because it's Friday. This is my favourite ever animation series. Totally kid-friendly, but be warned, it's a full episode, so it's around 9 mins long.
* I don't really fancy posting a picture, in the end - I don't mind you lot seeing me, but the internet is bigger than that, and I find the idea of a picture of me floating around a bit creepy. And I didn't want to flock this post.
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Comments
I think your study falls down in that it is
1) too small a sample size
2) I think your measure, hair colour is too subjective. Perhaps eye colour might be a better choice?
3) We do already know a little bit about you ;).
but i still think you have some interesting results there I do!
And I am a TOTAL geek. Oh yes.
I was trying to see if... well, if you meet someone in real life and they look totally unlike you, you wouldn't necessarily (at first glance) assume you have anything in common. You might well change your mind, and find you have loads in common, but that'd probably be your first, instinctive reaction. (I think.)
Whereas this way around, we know we've got stuff in common, but you don't know what I look like (unless you're stalking me *g*), so I wanted to see if people would choose something the same as them. Which... well, slightly less than half did, so I didn't really prove my theory. Although, with more people, I'd be interested to see what happens. It'd need to be a large group of people who know me through the internet, though - and I don't think I get out and about in lj enough for that.
Eye colour... hm. It might work. It'd be interesting to see if results would be more varied or more polarised, or if they'd be about the same. The trouble with eye colour is that I can't decide what mine are, and I know a lot of other people who can't, either. There seems to be confusion between blue/grey, brown/hazel/green, blue/green, brown/black... so it'd be harder to judge with the small sample of people I'd get on lj.
*geeks out on statistics*
Hm. Wonder what else I could have chosen...
When I first started participating in online forums and stuff I almost always assumed everyone was a guy and I was very surprised when someone turned out to be a woman. Now it's the opposite.
I'm sure I read some interesting article about the high percentage of women writing fanfic... I must track it down.
And maybe it's because we don't especially form an idea of a face at all - it's more like we're a collection of thoughts (some of them including images of things we like - not just words, but pictures), talking to one another. (Man, I sound like a hippy.)
See, for example, I'd probably be quite different in real life. I'm mostly a lot less talkative, and I'm terrible with jokes - unless I'm really on form, it takes me ages to get them, and I can't tell them... But on here, I think the general consensus is that I'm kinda funny. The opportunity to think about the words I read or write - and to edit them - turns me into a slightly different person. I'm better at expressing myself in writing than I am in speech.
I'm pretty talkative in real life, but only once I know people. I see the same thing online, but I'm actually *less* likely to comment on something here or write a random journal entry because I constantly edit myself. I am very aware that the words I write are much more durable than the words I say.
As far as your study goes, I did automatically assume you'd have brown hair, although I really don't think it was particularly related to *my* brown hair--I just knew that brown stood a pretty chance of being right. ;-)
And now that I'm getting to meet people, at D*Con and elsewhere, I'm remarkably nervous about my physical appearance, even though I know that people already like me based on who I am.
Sigh.
Hmm, interesting that you say you're less likely to comment because of that editing thing. I do that too - but I'm still more likely to say something than I would in real life. I guess I'm less concerned with the durability of it, 'cause of the (relative) anonymity.
And that's the trouble with that tiny survey - y'all are too intelligent, you know there's a good chance it'll be brown hair. :)
I was thinking about the internal editor, and I said I was less likely to comment--but your response made me think about it again. I was thinking that maybe I'm much the same in RL after all. I tend to not say anything to start with until I have a sense of the crowd, but I do generally speak up...eventually. I might be a little more outgoing online.
Wee our too smart four ewe.
I love homonyms. And English in general.
Yep. Because maybe they'll meet in person and decide that, actually, they don't anything to do with me and...yeah. That crazy mix of "OMG excited!" and "Ack! What if it all goes wrong?"
There's a lot of institutional prejudice involved in the way Jesus is often portrayed as white, too, and if someone grows up with those pictures around, they're going to have that image in their head (as I do, having gone to a church school when I was a kid). But yeah - I can see how it'd work that way, too.
*ducks*
Height next?
Well, I'm not going to do one again for a while. This one nearly killed me. Or nearly killed my computer, due to how close I came to shoving it out the window.
Pepper - that intelligent, amusing and witty personification on LJ. Not to mention eloquent...
*fears ducking isn't enough, runs for her life*