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RE: Social Chameleons – Taking Communication to Another Level
In less strict way of speaking, I think that society impose mandatory social camouflage on us, meaning that all of us have to be social chameleons to some extent, to be able to fit into the environment and fulfill social norms and standards of behavior. However, speaking of people who are constantly pretending that they are something they're not just to please/manipulate others, I think that such people suffer more from anxiety/depression than those who are just being themselves, because they live in constant fear of their true personalities being revealed and rejection.
I disagree with the idea that being a social chameleon has either a manipulation or anxiety behind it. I consider myself a social chameleon, which stems from the fact that I have many different interests. In my life, I have been able to explore a wide number of topics from which I pull from to best relate to the person I am speaking with. My behaviors are always genuine, since they come directly from my personal experiences, but they are tailored in order to explore any given topic at its fullest with the person a group. There are many topics that I can approach from different angles. For example, if I am talking to a scientist about my research, I will most likely focus on the science instead of my spiritual studies, even if they both cover the same topic. That being said, I will mention things from my spiritual studies that apply, because you never know if it could open to a wider conversation.
Most of the people have different interests and are able to engage in conversations covering differing topics. The term "social chameleon" refers to ability to adopt variety of behaviours depending on social environment, regardless of your true personality/character.
Do you have a reference for that definition? Because from what I have read, which has not been a ton, but a fair amount, I don't find a negative connotation to the term. From the way you are phrasing it, it seems that all "social chameleons" hide their true selves, while the studies I read say that in some cases they are phony, but in others they are people that know has to navigate the environment by tuning in to the people in it. You could think they are phony because you only see one facet and can't understand the whole, not because they are necessarily hiding it or aren't aware of their true selves.
You are missing the self-monitoring part in this picture. Although I understand your point. Studies have been done to examine the role of anxiety, social rejection and conformation in self-monitoring and there is no significant correlation between them and self-monitoring.