The desire to impress others serves as a major motivational goal in human behavior
Empirical studies consistently demonstrate that impression management and the desire to influence how others perceive us serve as powerful motivational forces across a wide range of human behaviors, including interpersonal communication, social media use, and consumer choices.
The claim states that the desire to impress others serves as a major motivational goal in human behavior. This is a specific, testable psychological hypothesis. Multiple retrieved papers explicitly investigate impression management (the academic term for the desire to influence how others perceive one) and show its pervasive role in driving social, online, and consumer behaviors. Since all relevant papers support the importance of impression management as a motivational mechanism and none refute it, the verdict is SUPPORTED.
Tsfira Grebelsky-Lichtman, Ziv Adato, Shira Traeger. Extending Impression Management Theory: The Need for Privacy vs. the Need to Express Information on Instant Messaging Apps. 2020. https://doi.org/10.11114/smc.v8i1.4853
Paper [0] highlights that impression management is a central assertion in interpersonal communication and digital social behavior.
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Sun Z, Yuan M, Xuan H, Ni W, Zhang L. Influence of Social Crowding on Rumor Refutation: The Mediating Effect of Impression Management and Social Connectedness.. 2026. https://doi.org/10.3390/bs16050803
Paper [1] demonstrates that impression management acts as a key psychological mediator influencing individual social behavior.
Li Z, Zhang X. Communal narcissism and internet altruistic behavior of Chinese college student: A moderated mediating effect.. 2026. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0342680
Paper [2] establishes that impression management constructs and narcissistic tendencies significantly drive online prosocial and altruistic behaviors.
Meng X, Cai X, Li J. Combating cyberbullying with transparency: unveiling the impact of IP location disclosure on cyberbullying in Chinese social media.. 2025. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-025-29047-6
Paper [3] shows that transparency measures increase impression management motivation, which subsequently alters cyberbullying behavior.
Wang Y, Wu H, Wang Y. From clicks to contributions: how environmental identity and impression management shape university students' organizational citizenship behavior for the environment.. 2026. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2026.1823830
Paper [4] indicates that impression management motivation moderates how environmental identity translates into organizational citizenship behaviors.
Chang K, Uhm JP, Lee HW. Esports in-game consumption across generations: Integrating motivated reasoning theory and the theory of planned behavior.. 2026. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0348355
Paper [5] confirms that self-presentation and impression motivations are positively associated with consumer attitudes, intentions, and purchasing behavior.
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