The study’s objective was to explore older adults’ (aged 65 or older) descriptions of behavior related to multitasking with traditional and newer media/information and communication technologies (ICTs) and perceived benefits of such behavior, along with older adults’ preference for research methods used to study their multitasking behaviors. Employing common media-use measures that heavily rely on self-reporting in populations of older adults is challenging, especially given that patterns of media/ICT use are becoming increasingly complex. Cumulatively, people spend more time using media than they are aware of because of the tendency to use some forms of media simultaneously. As cognitive ability deteriorates with age, self-reported recollection of complex patterns of media/ICT use, such as multitasking, among older adults increases the threat to data accuracy.Research Design and Methods:  Twenty-eight community-dwelling older adults in a Midwestern U.S. state participated in in-depth interviews (average length was 40 minutes) to discuss their use of traditional and newer media/technologies in combination with other activities and outline methods researchers should use to study such behaviors.Participants reported they engaged in multitasking behaviors similar to those of younger generations, with the difference in the higher extent of using traditional media and ICTs. They talked about multitasking with radio and television for “background noise” as being a rewarding experience. They perceived the effects of multitasking to be detrimental to attention and performance and attributed this media-use habit to individual psychological and demographic differences. They preferred ethnographic observation and keeping a paper-and-pencil diary as research methods to study multitasking among their peers. Data-logging methods were less popular because they raised privacy concerns among interviewees.Different types of traditional and newer media and technologies could be used differently in situations that require older adults to focus, relax, or be efficient. The findings suggest that future researchers strive for a compromise between data access and data accuracy when they select a research method to study media use among older adults. Older adults, who have been multitasking with traditional media  for decades, are incorporating newer forms of ICTs  as part of these behaviors; and, despite understanding that multitasking creates distractions and increases the chances of making errors or missing information, they associate media/ICT multitasking with task enjoyment, task focus and productivity, loneliness management, and keeping up with the news. Study participants are less ready to participate in data-logging media multitasking research and preferred keeping a time diary and participant observation.The world of media and information and communication technologies (ICTs) is constantly evolving. Falling behind on updating technology-use skills can be detrimental to one’s personal, professional, and social life, especially among older adults (aged 65 and older), who generally exhibit slower rates of technology adoption . Older aNew media and ICT devices are portable, allowing them to be used in various locales  and social settings . Over the past three decades, scholars have investigated multitasking when at least one of the tasks is media/ICT-related. The tasks can be simultaneous, implying concurrent exposure and/or actions , or they can require frequent motor and/or attentional switching  . NotablyAlthough media/ICT multitasking behaviors have been widely studied in populations of young adults and children e.g., , few schIn this study, we examined older adults’ accounts of multitasking with media and ICTs to determine the characteristic patterns and perceived effects of this behavior in this population. Study participants shared their perceptions of research methods to measure media-use behaviors, indicating the ones they would be most comfortable with. Our results shed light on the role of traditional and new media in lives of our older adult participants  that can be used to inform development and implementation of future research strategies to investigate reducing negative effects of age-related changes. The present study also provides a basis for developing methodological guidelines to measure complex media-use behaviors in the population of older adults in the United States.Media and ICT use is associated with a great number of emotional and cognitive benefits, both observed and perceived, including increased satisfaction of communication, social interaction, information, and entertainment needs; greater psychological well-being; higher self-reported quality of life; and higher life efficiency among older adults . IncreasMedia/ICT use has been shown to provide cognitive stimulation to older adults. Engagement in cognitive and leisure activities that involve traditional media use  is negatively associated with cognitive decline and developing dementia, specifically, Alzheimer’s disease . In the Older U.S. adults are increasingly using new media technologies, such as the Internet, smartphones, tablet computers, and social media . Sixty-sAlthough the rates of new media/ICT use are increasing among older adults, they are relatively low compared with those for all U.S. adults . DespiteOlder adults are heavy users of television. More than 85% of U.S. adults aged 65+ watched television on an average weekday and weekend in 2016, which indicated a higher viewership compared with overall rates for the U.S. population . Two in Radio listenership for older adults was lower than for the average adult U.S. population in 2016, with 61% listening to radio in general and 48% doing so while driving. Fifteen percent of those aged 65+ were subscribed to Sirius satellite radio in 2016, which was higher than the percentage for the U.S. population as a whole .Earlier researchers e.g.,  found thMedia use is often combined with other activities. In studies that measure frequency of media use, accounting for, as well as distinguishing between, sole-media use and media multitasking provides greater accuracy. This distinction is important because different levels of frequency of sole- and shared-media use may be associated with different levels of cognitive stimulation. Evidence derived from studies with younger adults, while inconclusive , suggestAlthough we know that older adults multitask with media and slowly adopt new ICTs, there is a dearth of evidence to understand the effects of this behavior on their cognitive and emotional health. Does constant distraction created by media/ICTs negatively affect cognition on a long-term basis? How effective is purposeful, focused multitasking within one medium ? Does muIn summary, older U.S. adults have been shown to be heavier users of traditional media and slower adopters of new media and ICTs. Given that only fragmented data from academic research and industry are available with regard to these adults’ media- and ICT-related multitasking behaviors, first, we asked:RQ1: What are the patterns of multitasking with traditional and new media and ICTs among in-depth interview participants who are U.S. adults aged 65 and older?Our qualitative investigation of media and ICT multitasking among older adults went beyond identifying the patterns as we strived to understand additional meanings that older adults associate with this behavior.RQ2: What are the associations and meanings that older adults ascribe to the behavior of media and ICT multitasking?Applied and academic research in the field of media and ICTs is often based on survey and diary self-report measures of media use for which participants estimate frequency of media/device use, time spent with a medium/program/device, and attention paid to mediated content, among other variables . Most coOver the past three decades, developments in tracking technologies have yielded less-biased methods of data collection rooted in data logging, ranging from Nielsen’s “peoplemeters” that track basic television viewing patterns  to mobilApp-tracking and screen-capturing software is available to researchers at low cost, yet its systematic use is still in the infancy phase e.g., . It is aRQ3: What methods would our in-depth interview participants who are U.S. adults aged 65 and older prefer for researchers to use to capture their complex media- and ICT-related multitasking behaviors?N > 3,500; 9% are adults older than 51). Convenience sampling strategies were used: we distributed flyers at the senior center and sent an electronic announcement through the online recruitment system. Participant selection criterion (being 65 years of age or older) was clearly communicated in the flyer and announcement. Potential participants were asked to contact researchers by phone to learn more about the study and, if they agreed to participate, schedule the time of an interview. The interviews were conducted at locations convenient to the participants, including participants’ homes, the senior center, and the university campus. The recruitment was based on voluntary participation. All participants who contacted the researchers were willing to participate in the study, but two had to cancel interview appointments due to changes in their schedules. Initially, we planned to interview 30 older adults, but because data collection reached the point of saturation, with participants providing similar insights on the topic, the decision was made to stop recruiting and interviewing.We conducted semi-structured, face-to-face interviews with 28 older adults who were 65 years of age or older see . The parAll materials and study procedures were approved by the Institutional Review Board at a large Midwestern U.S. university, where we conducted this study. Each participant was given time to read the consent form. The option of not participating was provided. After participants signed the consent form, we began the interview. Participants could withdraw from the interview at any time and choose to not answer any question. No participants refused to answer questions or stopped participation. Each interviewee received $20 in compensation for participation.Each interview lasted, on average, for 40 min. Each participant was asked a predetermined set of open-ended questions about their use of traditional media and new media, and the ways in which they multitask with media. Traditional and new media categories were clearly defined by listing types of media and devices each category comprised. Examples of traditional media/technologies included newspapers, magazines, books, radio, television, and landline phones. Examples of new media included Internet-enabled, computer-based, and mobile devices, such as desktop, laptop, and tablet computers; e-readers; mobile phones ; and video games. The question about media multitasking started with the following definition: “It often happens that we use media while doing something else. We call this behavior media multitasking….” To avoid confusion, we used the general term “media” to refer to both mass media, such as television, as well as ICT devices, such as smartphones and tablet computers. We asked participants whether our definitions were clear throughout the interview to ensure understanding. At the end of the procedure, participants shared their ideas about innovative methods that researchers could use in the future to measure media use and media multitasking in their age group. They were probed to share their thoughts about participant and digital camera observation, keeping a diary, and having tracking (data-logging) software installed on electronic devices. The interviews combined observation and informal information sharing, and participants were encouraged to share their opinions and thoughts.We recorded the interviews with the permission of participants. Data anonymity and confidentiality were guaranteed. An online service was used to transcribe de-identified interview audio files. We used an inductive approach to analyze the transcripts and performed exploratory thematic analysis to identify common patterns and ideas that were later combined into several themes.Two researchers iteratively analyzed the transcripts, meeting regularly to ensure consistency in their coding of the transcribed materials. Transcript coding led to the identification of 51 patterns and ideas that were combined into larger categories (codes) after extensive discussion. The codes served as the basis to form themes. We selected multiple quotes corresponding to each pattern and idea. We then aggregated the quotes for each code. The quotes most representative of each theme were picked per agreement of all researchers.N = 28); listening to radio at home and while driving (N = 24); and reading newspapers (N = 23), magazines (N = 21), and books (N = 18). Most commonly used new media and ICTs were cell phones (N = 19), desktop computers (N = 18), or laptop computers (N = 15). Ten participants used tablet computers, and seven had smartphones. Participants used new media devices to play preinstalled games , shop and search online, and use social media. Fifteen participants used at least one social media platform, Facebook being the most popular one. The most popular media multitasking pairs included television–print media, television–computer, television–cell phone, and computer–cell phone.Participants’ most common traditional media- and ICT-use behaviors included watching television (N = 7) and phone calling (N = 7), and five suggested they would do it by E-mail. Half of the interviewees (N = 14) agreed on more precise but more intrusive media-use tracking methods, such as cameras installed in participants’ homes (mostly living rooms and kitchens) and software installed on electronic devices, mostly desktop computers.Eighteen participants agreed to “host” a researcher for several hours a day in the course of a week (participant observation), and 18 participants suggested that filling out a paper-and-pencil diary two to five times a day in a week would be a convenient way to measure their media use. Only one-quarter of participants agreed to answer diary questions by phone texting . Some participants referred to television as a medium to listen to rather than to watch. Having radio or television in the background was perceived to help complete primary tasks efficiently and “save time.” Music, for example, could make it feel “easier to maintain the pace required” . On one hand, multitasking was driven by procrastination and the perception that dull activities became easier, quicker, and more pleasant when paired with a media task.I’m doing some needlepoint project which I find, frankly, boring but I promised somebody I’d do it for them. And so, I put the TV on as a background noise for that. Participant 21 On the other hand, some interviewees engaged in multitasking because they wanted to prolong the enjoyment with their favorite habits, that is, double the pleasure from simultaneous tasks. For instance, the love of music motivated several participants to listen to CDs and radio in their cars and even acquire new media devices and services, such as iPods and satellite radio, to make music available at any time and location.When activities were perceived as physically and cognitively exhausting, using media and ICTs helped participants “stay on track.” First, they would turn on a specific type of music to play simultaneously with a demanding task for “a calming effect” . Second, they would take a break for an entertaining media activity  to “clear mind” and “sort of relax” .Additional reasons for keeping media on were avoiding silence or undesirable noise, escaping boredom, and managing loneliness.A lot of times in one day I’ll be sewing and cooking and watching TV, intermittently back and forth or on the computer. […] It’s a matter of trying to keep busy and not go stir crazy for me…. Well one of the reasons I do here is because living alone is maddening when there’s no other voices and I have the TV on for my basic company. It’s my friend. Participant 6 Multitasking with traditional electronic media provided a connection with the world. Television and radio were kept on as if participants feared to miss important information. Many participants admitted that although they kept television and radio on for most of the day, they did not watch or listen to these media and got busy with other things instead. Only when something “relevant” caught their attention did they stop or reduce other activities to a minimum to focus on electronic media content.I’ll make breakfast, I’m reading the newspaper, I’ve got the TV on in the other room to the news loud enough that if I hear something that tweaks my interest I can pop around the edge of the fireplace and take a look from the kitchen to see what the issue is that they’re bringing up, so I operate very much that way. Participant 13 At the same time, participants said they were overwhelmed by the amount of irrelevant “boring” and “annoying” content. Thus, multitasking with media and ICTs was driven not only by the need to monitor important and relevant information but also by the need to avoid worthless information. Sources of such information varied from radio and television to overly talkative friends and family on the phone. Interviewees said they turned to print media and books when they wanted to avoid advertisements and other irrelevant content from electronic media.‘Cause frankly I find most TV shows pretty boring. Participant 21 When the ads come on, I pick up a book…. I do not like most of the ads on television. Participant 22 Avoiding undesirable content in traditional media motivated participants to use new ICTs .Participants did not extensively multitask with print media. Using newspapers was associated with pleasant relaxation and time allocated for oneself. Participants mentioned relaxing and slow-pace activities that did not interfere with the joy of reading, such as taking a bath, drinking coffee in the morning, or listening to music. Furthermore, participants indicated a clear preference for print media over any type of new digital equivalents. They preferred having a paper product in hand over the efficiency of electronic information processing.I love reading in the Nook, but I think I prefer a book, the printed book. I love to have a book in hand with print. ...I don’t know. There’s just something about that. Participant 11 Several interviewees said they tried to avoid multitasking with media and ICTs, and a few denied engaging in it. This behavior, for example, contradicted one participant’s beliefs about mindfulness and positive effects of focusing on one task . Media/ICTs, in this participant’s opinion, created constant “unhealthy” distraction. Distraction entailed cognitive costs and negative consequences. Among the most commonly mentioned consequences was the lack of concentration on one activity that led to potentially poor task performance, making errors, and missing information.If I’m watching [TV] while I’m doing crocheting, then I can’t concentrate on the program that’s going on the TV and then I miss a lot of it. Participant 24 Another negative outcome was a danger to one’s life—whether it was related to losing control over one’s own body or suffering consequences from someone else’s multitasking.If you multitask, you’re much less effective… […] Yeah, you’re just not as accurate…. Especially, if I’m trying to do too many things at once. It’s easier to make a mistake, it’s easier to trip and fall. Participant 6 When I see policemen multitasking turning left-hand corners, on the phone, going through almost red lights, I’m not happy, folks. Participant 26 Participants suggested that differences in media- and ICT-related multitasking behavior and the perceived effects occurred not only because of the types of tasks individuals complete and media structural features but also because of personal characteristics of multitaskers. Some interviewees focused on their individual psychological characteristics to explain why they multitask with media/ICTs. A few of them attributed the inability to “sit still” to “short attention span.” One participant suggested that the decision to multitask comes automatically, without thinking, through “a sixth sense” .I don’t like to waste time. […] I cannot stand to be doing nothing creative or purposeful, so I do it. […] I can sit there and cut out skeletons [for crafts] and different things, or fix up a gift for my granddaughter while I’m [watching television].... Participant 14 Interview statements of predominantly male participants revealed that gender was another perceived personal characteristic connected to media use and multitasking. Female spouses were often described as technologically savvy . Male interviewees claimed that their female spouses were heavier multitaskers than they were. While they tended to be skeptical of copying their wives’ multitasking habits, they expressed eagerness to accept help from their partners to learn about new ICTs.A few participants “blamed” difficulties in multitasking on their age. They referred to their “before-the-retirement” experiences at work where they said they used to multitask much more frequently. When productivity was a required outcome and things had to be done, multitasking helped. For some, multitasking was perceived to be necessary to focus or make a job more exciting, and for others, it was associated with job-related stress. Discussing age, participants compared beliefs about media and ICT use “now and then” as well as expressed little understanding of younger generations perceived to be digital media and multitasking natives.I remember as a child, my father telling us that we couldn’t listen to the radio when we were in the car because it was too big of a distraction. So that shows you how things have changed. Participant 10 I don’t get it. And then all these kids, walking around, they don’t even hear trucks or cars or anything. They walk out in front of them. Participant 18 Participants expressed skepticism toward digital camera and participant observation methods to measure media/ICT use and multitasking, which was mostly related to the issue of data “objectivity.” They suggested that awareness of a camera  or a researcher’s presence in the home would alter the behaviors of residents and require time to forget about the fact of being watched.So I can’t make breakfast in my underwear anymore? Participant 2 I don’t think it would be real because […] the person would be performing…. Participant 4 I feel I have been spied upon…. Participant 5 Another overwhelmingly popular response to the question about observation methods was related to participants giving little value to their life routines. They often described their everyday existence as “not interesting” and “boring” and concluded that observation data would be of little value to researchers.What about if we wanted to come in your home and observe you, like I mentioned, somebody coming in for a few hours a day for several days? InterviewerI might have to pay you for that. Participant 1 You’d sit there and watch me watch television most of the time. There wouldn’t necessarily be anything to see […] I’d be sitting there saying “Are you bored? What are you really getting out of this?” Participant 16 Other thoughts about observation methods dealt with concerns related to space limitations and time commitments. For example, cameras couldn’t be installed all over the house, and researchers would have to arrange certain times for observation to ensure participants were not busy. The limitations of observational methods could be overcome, according to participants, by installing “far more reliable” data-logging software on personal devices to track usage  or by asking participants to self-report their media- and ICT-use behaviors.Although data-logging methods could provide precise information about media and technology use, an overwhelming number of interviewees called this method, along with digital camera observation, invasive. Participants used terms like “intrusion,” “Big Brother,” “reality TV,” “spying,” and “threat to security” to describe their privacy concerns. Being private, being used to living alone, and feeling uncomfortable were listed as reasons for not allowing data collection via camera and tracking software.Home is home. That’s where it stays. Participant 20 People can hack your things. You know? […] I think part of it is growing up in New York. I’m the kind of person who locks their car everywhere. My door is always locked. Participant 23 Participants who were worried about privacy preferred to use a time diary method, which they described to be the least invasive. A few said they would agree to digital observation and data-logging software installation if they could view the footage before researchers do and turn off the “surveillance” at any time.There was an agreement that participation in studies that use invasive methods of data collection should earn a higher compensation compared with that for less invasive studies. Two participants pointed out that they would agree to participate in an “intrusive” study if they were interested in it and clearly understood its goal.Participants perceived in-person observation and keeping a paper-and-pencil diary as “comfortable” methods of data collection. They suggested taking into consideration a number of factors. Agreement to a participant observation study was not a unilateral decision and required consulting other members of the household, mostly partners and children. In addition, it required a time commitment because participants, especially those who were retired, had busy schedules.One thing I’m finding is seniors are never home. They’re out and about. Participant 15 Keeping a time diary was considered a good solution to the time commitment issue. Yet some participants called them “boring” , “schedule restricting” , “too detailed” , and leading to a memory bias .The older adults who were part of this study used a wide spectrum of traditional media and ICTs and multitasked with them. Although research with bigger samples of older adults with different socioeconomic and cultural backgrounds should be conducted in the future to support this conclusion, we suggest that it is too early to discard older media/ICT forms when studying multitasking. Whereas contemporary media-use research is focused on older adults’ adoption of newer ICTs, traditional media/technologies, such as print, radio, music, and television, remains widely used sources of information and enjoyment for participants in this study. Given that new ICT use in older adults is positively associated with higher education, higher income, good health, and belonging to their society’s racial or ethnic majority , all of Our participants showed a great loyalty to print media. They tended to read newspapers, magazines, and books in a low-distraction setting that allowed them to focus on printed content. Print media use, even when combined with other activities, was often perceived as the primary task. This finding has an important practical implication with regard to communicating mediated messages to older individuals similar to those in our sample. To reach this demographic group, it is crucial to continue using newspapers as a key medium to place targeted messages.Although print media may have a high cognitive value for some older adults, radio, music, and television are used for background noise. This finding mirrors the results of other researchers . The cogOne interesting finding of this study supported in previous literature  was thatOur study offers qualitative evidence that media multitasking is an intergenerational behavior. Most of our interviewees, who were from 65 to 90 years old, said that they had been multitasking with media for decades. Many of the participants expressed awareness of potentially negative effects of multitasking and possible cognitive bias that comes with it. Yet they found themselves “doing that anyway” . One participant  described multitasking as a biological, “animalistic” need. When to multitask and when to stop is decided intuitively, using a sixth sense, and depends on the nature and difficulty of a task and the nature of mediated content  rather than the device/technology itself. These findings echo the results of qualitative research with members of younger generations (college students) that suggests that while younger adults understand the pitfalls of multitasking, they continue to multitask and find positive rewards in doing it .Some participants explained that the habit to multitask depended on personality, gender, and age. Although numerous studies have explored relationships between these factors and multitasking behavior, these previous studies mostly focused on younger adults and general populations e.g., . AdditioThe findings of the present study dispel the myth that older adults do not multitask with media and ICTs. We suggest that they do, but they mostly engage in concurrent activities using traditional media. The challenge for researchers is in grasping the patterns of these complex multitasking activities. As cognitive ability deteriorates with age and complex media-use behaviors impose an additional cognitive burden that makes recollection of these behaviors less accurate, researchers are challenged with identifying a method of data collection acceptable to participants that does not negatively affect data quality. The first step in this direction is to ask the multitaskers themselves how they think media- and ICT-related multitasking activities should be studied in their age group. Our participants suggested that participant (noncamera) observation and keeping paper-and-pencil diary would be the most acceptable methods to use to study complex media use. They resorted to choosing older, more familiar, methods . Choosing between less accurate methods of data collection, such as observation and diary keeping, and intrusive data-logging methods, the interviewees clearly preferred the former. The fear of compromising privacy was greater than the enthusiasm for “objective” science. Additional obstacles mentioned were fatigue of the participants (diary), space limitations (observation), and time commitment .Some ways to overcome these obstacles included (1) showing footage of recorded data to a participant for edits and the opportunity to withdraw before releasing the data to the researcher, (2) paying extra to reimburse for “invasion,” (3) obtaining consent from all members of household about conducting the study, (4) giving more time flexibility in scheduling research sessions with participants, and (5) assuring confidentiality of any collected data.Limitations of this work include limited sample size and the homogeneity of the sample. The size of the sample is less of a challenge because we reached the point of saturation during the latest in-depth interviews. We, however, acknowledge that saturation could have been reached because the sample was homogeneous. The results are limited to a group of white U.S. participants who are more likely to be affluent and familiar with newer technologies. Additionally, our participants represented a small geographical area, which was only one of many midsized media markets in the United States. The same interviews should be conducted in the future in other media markets to ensure the diversity of findings. Sample homogeneity and constrained geographic area limitations are especially relevant to the findings related to multitasking research methods because expectations for compensation of study participation may differ from one geographical region to the other, based on lifestyle, overall income levels, and cost of living. Finally, although the qualitative nature of this work enabled us to collect multifaceted information from our participants, quantitative studies with large, representative samples are warranted.


N = 156) in multiple nations with comparable security procedure . Such procedures position people in multiple ways . Where respondents felt recognized, they experienced the security procedures positively, actively assisted in the screening process (engaged participation), and did not adapt their behaviors. Where respondents felt misrecognized, they experienced surveillance negatively, were alienated, and responded by either accommodating their behavior to avoid scrutiny, seeking to disrupt the process, or else withdrawing from screening sites. In misrecognition, the strategies that are open to the subject are incompatible with autonomy, if autonomy is defined solely in terms of volition. Accordingly, the concept of autonomy needs to be analyzed on two levels: in terms of the subject’s ability freely to determine their own sense of self, as well as the actor’s ability freely to enact selfhood.This paper critiques and extends the notion of autonomy by examining how common autonomy definitions construct selfhood, with the support of an analysis of airport surveillance experiences. In psychology, autonomy is (1) often oriented around volition and action rather than the-self-that-acts and (2) the-self-that-acts is construed in singular terms. This neglects the multiple, context-variable self: while others may confirm our self-definitions (recognition), identity claims may also be rejected (misrecognition). The autonomy critique is sustained through an ethnographic analysis of airport security accounts ( Surveillance is a pervasive part of the contemporary world . It is eThe Circle The role of selfhood in autonomy, by problematizing ‘self’ and ‘autonomy’;(2)The experience of others perceiving self-definitions that are consonant (recognition) or dissonant (misrecognition) with our own;(3)How people respond and behave after recognition/misrecognition;(4)The analytical implications for autonomy under conditions of recognition/misrecognition.As demonstrated in the analysis, airport surveillance observes people and then sorts them into categories. It defines them as ‘safe’ or ‘dangerous,’ as ‘one of us’ or as an ‘enemy to us.’ Both are concerned with recognition and may lead people to feel misrecognized. What does this mean to those under scrutiny, and what does it tell us about autonomy?As intimated, the prevailing psychological autonomy literature has under-theorized selfhood. For instance, Self-Determination theorists define the self as “the psychological manifestation and extension of the organizational properties common to all living things , p. 214.First, although the research that investigates action, like Self-Determination Theory, implies that multiple selves are possible e.g., , it is nThis inattention to the multiple self and social practice is not unique. Much of the psychological literature conceives of selfhood as singular and context-independent. A constant, ‘core’ self is assumed to remain unchanged between situations and across time, which is not the case cf. . Even th1Second, the autonomy literature has not been explicit about how selfhood relates to context, and whether it varies as a consequence of context. Instead, context is addressed in the delimited sense of whether it is controlling or autonomy supportive e.g., . HoweverThis, in turn has implications for understanding action. Linking action to the self without explicitly relating selfhood to context inevitably compromises the ability to theorize autonomy. Conceptually integrating the context-variable self into how autonomy is defined presents a solution.The notion of the variable self has acquired prominence in psychology through the social identity tradition , and morBut this is not all. A variable self reading of the social world also reveals a critical blind spot in psychology research design, which has implications for how the previous autonomy literature should be analytically understood. While the ways in which we are constrained by others is acknowledged in principle in psychology, it is often ignored in practice in a domain where experiments are the dominant research method.As Other researchers, however, have shown clearly that it is better to regard identity as a claim rather than a choice . WhetherThe rift between imposed and accepted self-definitions can be understood through the concepts recognition and misrecognition. To be clear, the term ‘self-definition’ describes both imposed (hetero self-definition) and self-generated (auto self-definition) categories that are used to label parts of the self-complex. Self-definitions are phenomenological and can be observed directly . Therefore, they should not be confused with self concepts, which are “hypothetical cognitive structure[s] which cannot be observed directly ,” or selRecognition occurs when an auto self-definition is acknowledged, reinforced, or accepted by others. Here, there is consonance between how I see myself and how you see me. Misrecognition occurs when these two diverge: the auto self-definition is either denied or else given a different value or meaning by others. It is instead a hetero self-definition, rather than an auto self-definition.Recognition and misrecognition have important consequences. This can be seen clearly in work conducted by Blackwood and colleagues, who explored how Muslims see themselves as Scottish but are treated as ‘other’ when passing through airports. These participants experienced their Muslim identity as conferring respectability, but others treated it as a sign of danger , 2015.So, misrecognition can be a painful experience. But it’s not simply unpleasant. It may impact negatively on relations between the misrecognized and those who commit misrecognition, because it can have profound effects on the ways in which people feel able to communicate and act . If peopIn either case, simply acting on their auto self-definition is no longer an option. So, recognition is arguably essential to autonomy recognized self thus presents clear implications for autonomy, in terms of both experience and perception.In order to examine these issues, the domain of surveillance is ideal. Perhaps the clearest example of this in contemporary society is at the airport. Here, surveillance is both ubiquitous and explicit. We are watched, scanned, processed, sorted as we pass through passport control, customs, and airport security checkpoints. These classify us into different categories at different points , the organization responsible for conducting airport screening in the United States, said in a recent training manual, “all standard pat-down searches must be conducted by a [Transportation Security Officer] of the same gender. An individual’s gender is what s added] , p. 13.”Pat-downs are just one of many possible situations where misrecognition may occur, and gender is just one of many possible identity dimensions along which misrecognition is possible. Previous recognition/misrecognition research looked at cultural identity , militarThe present study was not limited to any specific category or any specific aspect of the airport experience. The sample was oriented around ‘air travelers’ generally What are the forms of recognition and misrecognition experienced at airports?(2)How do people experience these forms of recognition and misrecognition?(3)How do people respond to different forms of recognition and misrecognition?The analysis of these three questions leads to a fourth, which the findings suggest, and which is drawn together explicitly in the discussion. This relates to the central concern of this paper. That is, what are the implications of recognition/misrecognition for understanding autonomy?N = 39F; N = 19M) provided airport security checkpoint experiences. This sample was a mix of students (N = 34) and non-students (N = 24) who reported multiple nationalities and places of residence. They ranged in age from 19 to 66 (median 25), and 68% (N = 40) had completed a Bachelor’s degree.Fifty-eight participants  self-categorized as White/Caucasian (N = 36);2 others reported Asian (N = 1), Asian Indian (N = 1 from North India), Caucasian and American Indian (N = 1), Chinese (N = 1), German and Cuban (N = 1), Latin American (N = 1), Scottish and Indian (N = 1), Taiwanese (N = 1), Vietnamese (N = 1) in this category. One person said ‘British,’ one provided ‘Scottish,’ and three did not provide this information.Nearly two thirds (N = 8) to provide race/ethnicity when she collected data in Latvia. A local research associate explained this question would not be a pertinent descriptor for participants who lived there. First language was requested as a proxy, as this indicates local majority (Latvian first language) or minority (Russian first language) group membership . More detail on all of these categories can be viewed in the The first author did not ask participants . Of the two people who reported airport security avoidance, one provided six accounts that occurred before the screening process introduced body scanners. Most  participants reported two accounts . Some participants, however, talked about experiences in summary. Therefore, it would be accurate to say that this dataset refers to N > 156 airport security experiences.This study’s unit of analysis was airport security experience accounts (N = 71) and the United States (N = 58). Most sites checked identification and bodies, processed luggage, and questioned travelers . Reported airport security procedures were comparable across these sites in terms of general categories , though there were differences in terms of specific procedure.Most (83%) of these surveillance experiences took place in Europe , but kept the broad strokes similar . More information about these data can be found in the N = 20) and structured diaries (N = 109)3 that asked travelers to report and reflect on their airport security experiences. Diversity sampling (in terms of participants and airport site) directed initial data collection, in order to explore security screening with limited preconceptions . Theoretical sampling guided subsequent data collection, in order to explore initial themes, flesh out and saturate analytical categories, and challenge developing category fit.The first author pulled these surveillance accounts from minimally structured interviews . Ethics approval for the first round of data collection was provided by the Department of Sociology at Cambridge. The School of Psychology and Neuroscience at St Andrews granted ethics approval for subsequent data collection.In both the diaries and interviews, the first author asked participants to narrate screening encounters at airports and then reflect on them. Where necessary, she asked follow-up questions in order to clarify those answers. She recorded and transcribed most interviews. In cases where recording was not possible, she transcribed and paraphrased quotes during or immediately after interviews, and then wrote detailed notes soon after the interview ended.N = 12; one interview included two participants) included participants recruited after travel . Interviewees were found through word of mouth and opportunistic meetings. The first author explained her interest in surveillance with the term “travel security experiences,” and let participants talk about what they found important. Each interview was tailored to the participant’s specific context and communicative preferences. Some participants shared what they were interested in starting with in advance. Those who did not provide a topic received prompts .The first sample’s interviews (N = 36) were recruited in advance of travel. This occurred through a call for participants issued to two British University email lists in December 2011, through conversation , and through participants sharing the study others (February–April 2012). At total of 79 people received diaries (response rate = 45.6%). One person, a military member, had participated in an interview in 2010, and was also asked to provide diaries during travel in 2012 due to theoretical sampling.For the second sample, participants , and N = 5 follow-up interviews (one interview included two participants). Most of the latter included people whose diaries either needed clarification or included characteristics otherwise unique to the dataset. One participant was not comfortable with writing but still wished to participate, so the first author read her the diary questions, recorded her responses, and asked follow-up questions immediately, as this participant knew the interviewer and used shorthand like “you know how I am” that needed explicit clarification.This procedure resulted in Participants were asked to fill out their diaries as soon as possible after travel. Diaries were used to balance the retrospective interviews; at the time of data collection, there was no way to know whether there would be analytically relevant differences in terms of how people reflected on their security experiences retrospectively or soon after travel. In addition, having multiple, mixed-method samples facilitated balance: using both diaries and interviews addressed the risk of over-sampling memorable outlier encounters, and facilitated a search for divergent cases.N = 12 participants; N = 14 airport security experiences: Min = 1, Median = 1, Max = 2). This included retrospective diaries from students at a university in Latvia (N = 8) and retrospective interviews from an opportunistic sample N = 4. Two of these participants took part in the 2010 interviews: one was interviewed again because she socially shared a different type of experience, and the other was asked to reflect back on the following statement she reported in 2010, as it was germane to the developing analysis:In order to confirm the quality of the dataset, the first author also collected a third sample .”This framing was still entirely familiar to her in terms of how she usually experienced airport security . The 7-year-gap between collecting the initial account in 2010 and the follow-up questions in 2017 presented no challenge in terms of reflection because this framing was still relevant to her contemporary experience.All of the data collection conducted outside of the first two waves was undertaken to challenge, and then ensure, thematic and theoretical saturation . The firThis analysis is centered on the experience and consequences of recognition and misrecognition during surveillance at airports. Like N = 156) were analyzed in two stages. The preliminary adaptive thematic analysis procedure , and another analyzed 10 of the initial diaries (N = 101) and all the thematic codes for those data. The interviews and diaries were all randomly selected, except in the case of the 2010 interviews, wherein one was specifically included due to the second coder’s expertise in disability studies.4 In most cases, everyone independently agreed; where analyses diverged, we then converged on a common analysis through critical discussion.Qualitative analysis validation is a contentious topic  and cultivated theoretical sensitivity, meaning she immersed herself in the topic and questioned her assumptions. For example, she interviewed a former airport dispatcher, examined media  that referenced airport screening, observed airport checkpoints during travel, researched airport security laws, procedure, and technology, and explored other forms of surveillance  and other surveillance experiences shared by people who knew she was a surveillance-interested researcher . She also discussed the developing analysis with the second author, accessible participants, and other interested parties  in order to challenge findings in terms of both theory and experience. In this way, the analysis should be read as deliberately collaborative.N = 8). She used those observations, and the observations of others (including the second author), to field-test the emerging analysis.Finally, both authors experienced airport security as travelers, observed it analytically as researchers, and at turns, experienced it from both perspectives at once. We aimed to make the impact of our status as air travelers an analytical strength. With regard to our positionality, that is, the way in which our own characteristics might impact the analysis, all we knew for sure in advance was the fact that our membership in the population of air travelers could either be a strength , or a weakness . Therefore, the first author recorded and reflected on her own airport security experiences for 1 year The different forms the concept takes;(2)The ways recognition/misrecognition are experienced;(3)The forms of action that occurred after these experiences.Participants described two distinct forms of recognition. In one, the traveler expressed a sense of being recognized in the screening process and mentioned that screeners openly communicated recognition (explicit recognition). In the other, the traveler expressed a sense of being recognized in the screening process, without indicating that screeners explicitly communicated recognition (implicit recognition).In explicit recognition, the screener sees travelers as they see themselves, and communicates this. Here are two manifestations: mutual acceptance of a shared social identity and mutual inclusion within a shared, common ingroup. A clear example of both concerns military personnel traveling in uniform.[sic] machine but notified me before doing so and were apologetic afterward. As I was waiting for the backpack to be cleared one of the TSA Agents approached me, thanked me for my service, and gave me a small gift pack of candy and crackers (photo attached).” The gift label said: “TogetherSecuringAmerica” and “Thank You From: OFFICERS of Cleveland Hopkins Airport,” and included the coat of arms of the United States (George (60M American) traveled through Cleveland Hopkins Airport (United States) in 2012. He reported a “very short wait to get to screeners – Went through the “First Class”/“Frequent Flyer” line as I was traveling in US Army military uniform. Gatekeeper TSA agent was warm and friendly and engaged me in brief conversation as she checked my military ID.…The agents did open my backpack after it passed through the X ray d States .George’s account and the snack gift show these TSA employees include themselves and military members together in a single group. These airport screeners construct the boundaries around the ‘group of people who secure America’ such that they include US military members (given that the label’s center image is the United States’ coat of arms), the Transportation Security Officers of Cleveland Hopkins Airport specifically, and the TSA as a whole (per the boldface text on the image’s left-hand side). What is more, they underscore their security-focused ingroup through their emphasis of the word ‘officers,’ which is an example of personnel terminology that is common both to the US military and the TSA.TogetherSecuringAmerica. Both the screeners and George structure their occupational self-understanding around keeping the surveillance-protected ingroup safe. The specific threat was not made explicit because it is understood, or expected to be understood, through shared sociocultural knowledge , who said that whenever she feels inconvenienced, or has to wait in line, she reminds herself that the screeners are just doing their job. She said this “helps me relate to them better. I think most people have had to do things they didn’t necessarily want to do, or enjoy doing, because of a job. I also realize that what they’re doing is considered necessary and designed to keep people, including those inconvenienced, safe.”Here, Catherine uses two types of sense-making that are germane to implicit recognition. First, she indicates screeners are included within the group of ‘most people’ who have had to do work they do not enjoy. This is a group to which she herself feels she belongs, and that, in her thinking, includes most people. Second, screeners are a part of the security apparatus, and Catherine considers their work necessary. It has a purpose, and that purpose is safety. The implied threat, while undefined, exists somewhere outside of the ingroup. Catherine implicitly includes herself amongst the people kept safe by surveillance.not a dangerous other, whomever they might be.Irina  does as well. She transited through an airport checkpoint in England while on a business trip. “I feel myself normal about it,” she said: “Because this is them work and this doings for our security.” The common, safe ‘us’ is not nationally bounded here, as it was for the screeners George encountered while in his US Army uniform. However, Irina does speak more specifically of the threatening outgroup. Irina agrees that the British airport security officers “have to check people that possibilities for the terrorism become less.” She makes the threat clear, but still does not define who is included the outgoup, beyond implied terrorists. Implicit recognition as a part of a common ingroup is an affirmation that one is The account of Minh Tinh , a Buddhist monk, demonstrates this evocatively. He also sees himself as part of the ‘common us’ along with the screeners, but he acknowledges that this may not be immediately apparent to security personnel. As Minh Tinh said, “I do dress unusually. I wear a long, brown robe over a shorter robe,” he said, “and my head is shaved, and yeah, I’m over six foot, and I’m a big man. So, physically, I can see how people would be apprehensive. And certainly I fit outside the mold.…So, prior to the TSA pre-check, I was always searched every time, my genitals felt and squeezed, and I had my butt felt and squeezed, and I was not particularly happy to have those intimate body parts touched in security.”But nevertheless Minh Tinh endorses this as part of realizing recognition, and he retains a highly positive view of the screeners as doing a difficult job to protect the common ingroup. “At the same time,” he said, “if it keeps us safer, I would certainly be willing to walk through the thing butt naked. I have no great modesty. But I just thought it was– My genitals are sort of private, and I prefer strangers not fondle them…. [But] if it does keep us safe, I’m not unwilling to go through that again.”The crucial term here is the ‘us’ in the last sentence. What Minh Tinh endures as an individual, he does for the benefit of others as a group member. This affirmative group relationship is reflected in his positive view of the screeners: “they,” he said, “the TSA, most of the staff, I believe, actually want to be friendly and kind, and people generally have been very nice and very pleasant to me. I’ve never seen anyone with an attitude. Even the few times where I’ve been touched very intimately, the person was like, ‘I’m sorry about that. We just have to make sure everything is safe.”’for people like them. In so far as there are others who want to attack ‘us’ and it is not clear who ‘they’ are, then everyone must be treated as suspicious in order to differentiate between the two. Implicit recognition is bound up with seeing the screening as a necessary part of incorporation to establish the traveler’s identity as ‘one of us.’ Here, it is a form of recognition in which travelers establish ingroup status with screeners, surveillance, and society as they exist together.The key element in implicit recognition is that the traveler feels screening is designed VeryGood. [sic] Best transit ever. Officers were warm and engaging. Part of this was my traveling in uniform, but I have traveled in uniform before when TSA was cold and unpleasant.…[This time], I felt appreciated, connected and had a good feeling ‘high.”’When asked how he felt about his military service-member recognition screening experience, George said, “5This was not just a matter of having been given a gift refer to . “Rememb[sic] way to know the origin of the gift), but the way that it was delivered: personally, with eye contact and obvious emotional connection made the expression very meaningful, and memorable, for me.” The gift itself was symbolic, and made significant through George’s sense of connection with the security screeners in that moment.The gift, George said, “was an unexpected, unsolicited and free expression of goodwill on the part of the TSA staff. Unlike some gifts  there could not be any explanation other than goodwill. That made it especially meaningful. The cynic might say that it was merely part of a bureaucratic scheme to curry favor with the public , for instance, who positions the security staff as strangers. She recounts how having her bag searched made her feel “generally uneasy, despite the fact that I had nothing to hide and nothing illegal. Probably uncomfortable due to a sense that my privacy was being invaded by strangers peering into my bags.”While some, like Maria, found airport surveillance uncomfortable, this scrutiny is a necessary precursor to implicit recognition. However onerous it might seem, it confirms ingroup membership. It follows from this that a lack of scrutiny might be more problematic than scrutiny. Without scrutiny, would it be difficult to discriminate ‘safe’ ingroup members from ‘dangerous’ outgroup members?[sic] screen or the scanner or the passengers for that matter .” Anne  concurs. She feels “that if they are going to search you they should do it in detail.” Trivial scrutiny that does not evoke recognition can be resented more than extreme scrutiny that does induce recognition.This is precisely what the findings show. Christiane  complains about security staff who “didn’t seem particularly interested in the x-ray All in all, recognition in both forms had a positive impact on experience. Explicit recognition created a highly positive experience of screening. Implicit recognition attenuated the negativity of scrutiny that might be invasive in other circumstances.At one level, it is arguable that recognition, either explicit or implicit, invoked no particular reaction. Neither Minh Tinh nor George, both of whom the analysis followed in some detail, did anything different after recognition. They did not report any changes to their actions after experiencing recognition. But the argument that recognition creates no reaction misses the point: while consequences normally mean change in psychology, reproduction is a meaningful response to a social encounter.The fact that these travelers would continue to go through security without changing their behavior in any particular way is significant given that, at least in the case of Minh Tinh, the way he was treated might, in other circumstances, lead one to expect some change. Remember, security screeners repeatedly touched intimate parts of his body. Minh Tinh didn’t like that, and wouldn’t accept this treatment from a stranger on the street. On the street, this would be an assault. At the airport, it was experienced in terms of ‘our’ safety. It was for the ‘common us,’ which made it bearable.So, there is more to recognition than unchanged behavior. Both respondents not only indicated a willingness to go through airport security again, they would willingly do more. George in particular emphasized this point. “I did not feel like I was an anonymous frammet on an assembly line being processed: powerless, preyed upon. I felt more like a willing participant for the common good.…The attitude of the entire team made me happy to willfully engage. If they had wanted to turn my socks inside out, I would have been ok.”The key point here is that George did not experience that security encounter as coercive or imposed. His actions were not mere compliance to an other’s will. They were an expression of what he wanted to do. If anything, after recognition, he was willing to accept more scrutiny. Like with Minh Tinh’s experience, context is critical. George accepts scrutiny at the airport for a common ingroup’s safety. While strangers invaded Maria’s bags, ingroup members opened George’s backpack. Scrutiny for the ingroup is, in George’s words, “ok.” Like Minh Tinh, he willfully engaged for the common good.But this is not all. Implicit recognition not only reincorporated travelers into a ‘safe’ ingroup, it facilitated category transition. Having experienced screening as a positive affirmation rather than an imposition, George was motivated to act in similarly supportive ways toward others.“The encounter,” he said, “‘made my day,’ and I felt like passing it on to someone else, in some way ‘paying it forward’ to another traveler. Frankly, the gift was a token that had little monetary value, but put me in a very good place for the rest of the day. I am sure that it positively affected the way that I interacted with other people for at least that time period.” Recognition not only encouraged travelers to keep doing the same thing, it also motivated participation and inspired a desire to incorporate others.Reactions to Misrecognition section.However, while recognition is associated with behavioral reproduction, engaged participation, reincorporation, and category transition, these are not given outcomes. First, one instance of recognition, even if profound, does not result in enduring participation. This is made clear when by returning to George’s observation that generally speaking, whether he travels in or out of uniform, he is “glad to get through without being hassled.” In fact, he usually tries to avoid unnecessarily engaging with screeners as a result of negative encounters, which is discussed with more depth in the Second, tensions arise when the recognized self-definition conflicts with an incongruent self-definition. Apple  said, “I really think that the guards that are more alert, or more strict-faced, are simply doing their jobs. And, I accept that, as part of the national security.…Though, hopefully we will live in a world that won’t be so, you know, so rigid and cautious.”Apple includes himself within a ‘common us’ like George, Catherine, Minh Tinh, and Irina. They all incorporate themselves into a surveillance-safe ingroup, and accept airport security on those grounds. As Apple’s account demonstrates, people have multiple self-definitions, some of which may come into conflict as they move through different contexts. Travelers can feel they are part of a surveillance-protected ingroup and experience that inclusion positively, but also reflect on that group membership from the position of a self-definition that has a bittersweet, not enthusiastic, acceptance of that ingroup status.Misrecognition, like recognition, takes numerous forms. The analysis covers two types. The first, misrecognition by commission, occurs when one is defined as X by others or social practice, but X is contrary to self-definitions. This is illustrated by example with a specific subtype, threat misrecognition, which happens when people are positioned as dangerous even though they feel they are a part of a safe, ‘common us.’The second form, misrecognition by omission, transpires when one is rejected as X, but X is consonant with self-definitions. This involves a sense that the screening process denies a self-definition, or denies its value. The examples demonstrate degraded national/racial categories and dehumanization. As with the recognition section, the analysis demonstrates different forms of misrecognition, shows how they are experienced, and finishes by discussing how people reacted.Sarah  traveled to Texas to attend baseball games with her daughter in early June 2002, soon after “they first started with the heightened security stuff.” It was her first time flying since 9/11. Screeners searched their luggage each time they crossed a checkpoint. “It was just a pain in the behind,” she said, “because we had to stop and open our big suitcases every time.”When asked to explain how she felt Sarah said, “nervous, I guess, would be a good way to describe it. Just wondering, you know, what’s going on. You know, ‘don’t look through my bags. I didn’t do anything.”’ Here, Sarah felt repeatedly categorized as a threat, when she categorizes herself as a non-threat. This was especially poignant because it was new experience for her. Being singled out felt personal. “Especially in the beginning of this, you felt more threatened personally, like they were singling you out as a bad person, that they needed to double check on.” Threat misrecognition personalizes surveillance. It makes it about scrutinizing you, rather than about protecting the ingroup.One way of thinking about threat misrecognition is that it is akin to implicit recognition, without confidence in the reincorporation process. The focus is on the moment of mistrust and scrutiny, without the belief that it will eventually lead to one being correctly accepted as a safe and respectable ingroup member. To travelers who experience misrecognition by commission, it may seem that the screening process is unable to properly determine who is genuinely ingroup and who is not. Lorna’s  account demonstrates this finding. She is a frequent business traveler, and prepares for screening to avoid problems.[sic] wear slip-on shoes, no belts, and carry no liquids.” In general, then, screening does not particularly bother Lorna. She accepts it as a way of protecting safety, even though she dislikes some aspects. “I do not like being frisked,” she said, “as it is a very close and personal search . Although I believe it important to be safe.” Most of her security experiences are, in her words, “pretty easy going, as I am so used to all of the security checks.”“I am very willing to take off most of my outer clothes,” she said, “empty my bags and help the process along. I make time for all this when I am at an airport and I have learned what to do and try to dress appropriately so that the search and strip off is not too much of a hassle for me. Eg [sic] dress/clothing and head gear.” The screeners conducted a body search on Lorna, but, she said, ignored the other woman.On one occasion screeners delayed Lorna for about 5 minutes. “No real time lost,” she said. What did annoy her about this particular incident  was that in her eyes, it demonstrated inadequate procedure. It involved “a woman behind me dressed in full muslim 6“In my book,” Lorna said, “she would have been the very person I would have searched if I had been security. The volumes of clothing and masked face appeared to make a mockery of all the security and searches we have to endure! Maybe she was searched in another room, but I didn’t see it. I asked myself why didn’t the security team conduct a similar search on her? I was not impressed at all! Now that makes me nervous…Muslims not undergoing the same checks as everyone else.”Because screeners don’t scrutinize someone she views as suspect, Lorna concludes that the security process cannot efficiently sort people into ‘safe ingroup’ or ‘dangerous outgroup’ categories. Thus, screening has no reintegrative function. It becomes useless intrusion.What is more, once Lorna feels people are scrutinized inconsistently, the choice of who to scrutinize is experienced as personal. It is a judgment of who is, and who is not, suspect. She thereby experiences it as misrecognition in both an absolute sense (why treat me as dangerous) and, even more acutely, in relative terms (why treat me as more dangerous than someone who [in her perspective] has far more reason to be placed in that category). Being treated as dangerous is not a necessary precursor for being recognized as safe. Instead, being treated as dangerous can misrecognize selfhood.Vik  is a graduate student studying in the United States. He catches at least two flights or more from his home base in India to his Midwestern university. “The worst experience I had was in London,” he said, referring to the time he transferred between flights soon after the liquid explosives plot that occurred in August 2006 . The air“Thing was,” he said, “at the Indian airport, we were not told those things would happen at the British airport. So, when we went to the London airport, they actually took…everybody’s cabin [luggage], and told it has to go to check-in. They gave everyone a small, thin bag; just put in your passport and documents, nothing else. I mean, you have some 300, 400 people, you give them something like that, the possibilities of losing stuff is pretty much high.”“Luckily,” he continued, “at that time, I carried a very thin bag, I mean, from India itself…. I did read in the papers, so I had some idea. So, I didn’t have that much issue [with my own luggage].” Instead, Vik’s problem was with how the London airport security personnel treated him and his fellow Indian nationals. “They literally treated us like some– In a very bad way. I mean, not as like, I don’t know what to say, the word, I don’t want to use a bad word, but I just felt that we were very treated like trash.”Vik also observed differences in how the airport treated Indian and European travelers. “Personally,” he said, “I didn’t feel like they really treated everyone– I don’t know, I mean, that’s, to me, it was kind of racist. In the [British] airport you also have the Europeans also. They were not treated the way the Indians were treated. That was something I was not happy with…. It was so blatant. I mean, you can never miss it; it was like that kind of a case. The way they were actually treating…. I mean, in US also we came [later that day], but yet nothing happened. Yet, also, they did check-up, but not to that extent. I mean, at least they treated us with some dignity. Which is important.”Vik’s account has been explored in some detail because it contains two intermixed misrecognition by omission categories: that of his humanity and that of his nationality, which he communicated in intersectional terms with race. First, Vik objects to being treated as trash, as a worthless object. His humanity is ignored. He is not treated as a person with feelings and rights. He is thoroughly dehumanized. What is more, that dehumanization is selective. Vik is selectively treated badly as an Indian. Europeans are not treated in the same way. Vik’s national group membership as an Indian is defined negatively, and is positioned as a warrant that he (and his fellow Indians) do not deserve respectful treatment.These two categories need not always be intermixed. Often people resent their humanity being ignored without ascribing their treatment to an inappropriate view of their group membership. For instance both Nora  and Emily  express concern at the ways in which they are treated as objects, open to the gaze of others with no human rights to privacy or dignity. Nora is concerned with body scanners. Who sees the scans? “Nobody I have authorized to see my body, not like in medicine where I can establish a relationship of trust.” Emily shares this concern, although she finds being patted down even worse: “I don’t like someone looking at me basically on display,” she said, “but I almost prefer it to having a stranger’s hands on me (for pat downs). Anyone can look at me and imagine me without clothes on and see my figure, but not everyone gets to touch (you know what I mean – the latter just feels more invasive).”Both misrecognition by commission and omission resulted in strong negative emotions. In the case of threat misrecognition, a form of misrecognition by commission, travelers typically reported mixed and unsettled emotions. When Ellie  visited England in 2008, a screener asked to look at her laptop.“And, I got very nervous,” she said, “and very kind of, I didn’t know what was going on, and I obviously said yes, because if I said no, then they’d probably take me away, and it would be very bad.…When someone asks you that, you kind of go through your mind, ‘Well, did I touch something, did I do something,’ and it kind of goes through that thought process of ‘I hope I don’t get in trouble, I hope I didn’t touch something that I’ll get in trouble,’ that kind of thing. Not that I thought I did, but that thought process kind of goes through your head whenever someone grabs your stuff and says ‘Is that yours?’ And you’re like, ‘uh, yes? Maybe?”’In the case of misrecognition by omission, there is similar negativity but less uncertainty. Nora rejected an international trip soon after airport security introduced body scanners. As a result, she said, “I have had to reflect, and articulate for myself why I had that reaction [to the body scanners]. If anything, it has made me more confident in what I am…. How the security is conducted does not respect who I am.”Misrecognition by omission also invokes anger. Fiona  described her experience at a Scottish airport: “As I passed through the detector, it bleeped and a woman who was talking to a colleague pulled me aside. She proceeded to rub down my arms, stomach, and legs while still talking to a colleague…. I think what annoyed me most of the whole experience was that the woman who searched me continued to talk whilst searching me. I found this very unprofessional and I felt as though I was in a ‘cattle market’ – just someone else to process, more hassle for them.”The first way travelers react to misrecognition is simply to avoid the sites where it occurs. Sometimes this is a matter of avoiding particular airports where one has been misrecognized, or thinks misrecognition is likely. Recall how Vik experienced dehumanizing treatment in a London airport, linked to anti-Indian discrimination. He now tries to avoid that layover location: “Unless I go to London, I try not to connect to London.”7 Each time she books a flight, it’s very stressful wondering whether she’ll be able to go through the metal detector or not.Some avoid aspects of the process itself. Nora, as demonstrated previously, objects to body scanners that remove her dignity and lay her open to the gaze of all. “It is not for strangers to see my body,” she said. “When I fly, I have always opted out of the scanner…. Usually I am traveling with an infant in arms, so I’ve gone through the metal detector.” However, without an infant to divert her to the metal detector, the only other option is a thorough pat-down. Nora is equally unwilling to be frisked, and she explained why. ‘Traveling with children, it’s difficult for children psychologically to see police/authorities scrutinizing parents.’8 Charlotte refuses to be miscategorized by airport security, and as a result, is unable to travel by air.Sometimes, where the misrecognition experience is linked less to a specific site or procedure, and more to generic aspects of the screening process, the reaction is to stop flying altogether. Charlotte  expressed a fear of screening because she always anticipates that some valued part of her self will be denied or rejected. She no longer travels by air, even though this comes at a cost. As she observed, ‘I think I’m just punishing myself by avoiding, probably. But I feel like I’m resisting.’A second way in which people respond to misrecognition experiences is to change their behavior to adapt to the operation of the security system, and thereby make themselves less likely to be picked out and exposed to special scrutiny. Remember how Sarah, who traveled with her daughter to attend baseball games, experienced threat misrecognition as she was repeatedly stopped and searched at security checkpoints. Eventually, she discovered the problem.“I had brought newspapers to keep the box scores for the ballgames we went to,” she said. “And I wanted to bring that stuff home with me. So I stuck the newspapers…in the front pockets. And when they lay the suitcase on its back, and shine the X-ray through it, they can’t get through the newspapers. So they opened it up.” So Sarah adapted her behavior. “From that point on, I have always put any kind of papers on the bottom of the bag. I made sure…. And, I’ve never had a problem.”George, whose recognition experience was discussed with some depth earlier, also experienced problems with a luggage search. However, while being positioned as a threat preceded Sarah’s misrecognition, George’s misrecognition was due to a lack of respect. “I’ve gone through security, and for whatever reason, they want to visually open and inspect the bag,” he said. “I asked what the issue was. They did not tell me. I suspected it may be a camera, a camera lens, because that can be very dense, and perhaps confusing on the X-ray, on the radiographic screening that they do. So, I offered to show them exactly where the camera was, so that they wouldn’t have to root through my bag. Save them time, and save me intrusion. And, they were very curt, to the point of being unpleasant, and told me that I was to back away and not touch any of the bags, and basically be quiet. And, I said, ‘you know, I was just trying to help.’ And, I was not impressed with their level of professionalism or appropriateness.”So George, like Sarah, adapted his behavior. He carefully arranges his bags to avoid attracting attention. “I minimize anything that would be a question or a distraction,” he said “particularly in the packed bags. I don’t put anything in them that would be so radiopaque, or difficult to X-Ray, that they can’t tell obviously what it is. So, for example, with a camera, I don’t leave it in the bag anymore. I will have it on top of my suit coat and shoes, so that it’s easily visualized and seen. I also ensure that as it’s sitting on the belt, that it goes through in such a way as to be easier to appreciate what it is…. Number two is that I don’t even speak to them. I don’t engage them. They ask a question, I give a short answer. They don’t ask a question, I don’t say anything.” This allows him to avoid having any “personal interactions with any of the folks who are working as security screeners.”Two “quite polite employees” stopped Kostas  just before he went into the security checkpoint. They “made me drink the entire bottle of cola before proceeding,” he said. “Technically, I didn’t have to drink it, just throw it away, but I did enjoy their awkwardness when watching me drink slowly.”Nora, who finds frisking and body scans adverse, also commented on screener interaction. “I try to make it more personal,” she said. “Like, if the questions are being rattled off, I may like, hesitate, and then like, actually make eye contact with the person before I respond to the question, just to kind of, like, break the routine, so to speak, to kind of recognize, like pause and be like hey, like, ‘it’s not just– it’s not just dealing with goods, passing through, or these toxic goods or these non-toxic goods,’ but that it’s an actual person, interpersonal interaction, albeit perfect strangers.” Nora wants to be treated like a human being, not a commodity, so she subtly changes the communication dynamic between herself and screeners.Both of these examples can be seen as instances of resistance. They involve attempts to regain a degree of agency and to acquire some control in the screening process. To some extent they may be seen as successful: Kostas makes the security personnel wait for him and Nora makes them acknowledge her human presence. At the same time they are very constrained and partial victories. Kostas might drink his soda slowly but he is still forced to consume his drink rather than take it with him. Nora might make eye contact, but is still subject to processing she finds objectionable. Ultimately, these travelers can only change how they comply with security demands, not whether they comply.The reason is obvious. If resistance goes too far, the security staff has the ability to forbid air travel, or even worse. As Andrea  said, “you can get really anxious. Not because of they treating you bad, because you feel that you can eventually get in a unpleasant situation.”Even watching resistance evokes anxiety because of the potential consequences. Louise  observed a disagreement between a traveler and screening staff in a British airport. She “noticed a young man questioning his bag being searched – two members of airport security were with him, one seemed to be the other’s supervisor. I wished the young traveler would stop questioning as it was making the staff very defensive.” Here, the staff’s defensiveness is the patina on the surface of an embedded risk: travelers may be sorted out of the ‘safe us’ and into a ‘dangerous other’ at the discretion of surveillers.The analysis addressed three questions:(1)What are the forms of recognition and misrecognition that people experience at airports?(2)How are these experienced?(3)How do people react?Surveillance Experiences and the (Mis)recognized Self section summarizes and contextualizes the answers to these questions. Then, as promised the Autonomy, the Variable Self, and Context section uses these findings to explore the implications of the (mis)recognized self for autonomy.The explicit recognition with an incident where airport screeners claimed shared group membership with a military officer, and the officer in turn accepted this claim. Here, the screeners affirmed a valued social identity. This recognition was mutual; the military officer in turn saw the screeners as uniformed government employees, along with himself. Within this case, screeners referenced a safe ingroup  that occurred at airports as a result of security screening. It demonstrated roup see , to whicimplicit recognition, airport surveillance itself served as a recognition vector. This occurred when travelers projected a relatable category onto an aspect of the surveillance process; here, the example was ‘people who have had to do work they don’t enjoy.’ Another form of implicit recognition occurred when travelers felt included within a ‘common us,’ which was understood as an airport-security protected safe ingroup. In this case, travelers projected their own sense that airport security exists to protect ‘people like them’ onto airport screening, and felt recognized as a result. The process of airport security physically separates people, processes them, and then recognition psychologically reintegrates them into the ‘safe us.’In Whichever its form, recognition improves security screening experiences. This can be a matter of making experiences that might ordinarily be invasive and unpleasant, such as intimate body searches, less negative. In other cases it transforms screening into an experience that is memorable for its extreme positivity. Because of this improved experience, recognition does not put travelers off the screening process. It does not lead them to change their behavior in order to change their experience. If anything the contrary is true. Recognition led travelers not only to accept screening, but also to be open to more. Recall, for instance, George’s remark that recognition made his day. In that moment, if screeners had asked, he would have been okay with turning his socks inside out.This response to recognition looks like engaged followership, a type of identification that occurs when people identify with leaders and the community they represent . Here, iThis is not to say recognition gives carte blanche for surveillance. One can feel fully recognized as a member of a ‘safe’ ingroup, but simultaneously express qualified acceptance when recognition on one self-definition occurs at the same time as misrecognition on another self-definition. Recall how Apple endorsed airport surveillance as something that exists for ‘our safety,’ but also expressed regret and wished for a less rigid and cautious society. The present study’s findings, in conjunction with research that showed qualified support for CCTV in public space , suggestFinally, this study shows recognition has the power to move people from one category to another, a phenomena which the psychology literature has termed ‘recategorization.’ What this means, in plain terms, is category transition. Recall that George doesn’t always have good experiences with screeners. Sometimes, he positions them as outgroup members due to being unimpressed with the TSA’s “level of professionalism [and] appropriateness.” In the present study, George reframed this group (TSA officers) after they showed him they were ‘recognizable’ as members of a common ingroup. A similar finding has been demonstrated in experiments . The preMisrecognition by commission occurred when hetero self-definitions  were dissonant with auto self-definitions. Threat misrecognition, a specific subtype of misrecognition by commission, occurred when travelers who identified as unthreatening members of the surveillance-protected ingroup instead felt airport security treated them as personally dangerous.When it comes to misrecognition, things are very different. Threat misrecognition can come from a sense that screening procedures are flawed, and thus unable to determine who is ‘safe’ and who is ‘dangerous.’ Once confidence in reincorporation into the ‘safe us’ is lost, then the mere fact of being scrutinized becomes contested. Surveillance is pointless and intrusive when it is not for ‘our’ safety.Misrecognition by omission, on the other hand, refers to instances where valued identities are denied or misperceived. In the case of devalued national/racial categories and dehumanization, either one’s identity as a human being, with attendant rights and dignity, is violated, or else a specific group membership  is treated negatively. The separation here is analytic rather than substantive. Often the two are intertwined: Vik is treated as trash because he is viewed as Indian.With regard to experience, misrecognition is the opposite of recognition. It is experienced negatively: a combination of unwelcome confusion , distress, and anger. In recognition, ingroup members open bags. In misrecognition, strangers invade them. What is acceptable in one context becomes intrusive in another. In recognition, acts that would be otherwise invasive can be experienced as mildly discomforting, or even actively endorsed. The opposite is the case with misrecognition: what might be minor intrusion in another circumstance is strongly discomforting.Such is the negativity of misrecognition experiences that the sampled travelers changed their behavior, going to considerable lengths to try and ensure these experiences don’t reoccur. Travelers try to avoid sites where they experienced misrecognition, because they anticipate it happening again, even to the extent of eschewing air travel entirely. If they continue to travel through potential misrecognition sites, they take great care not to do things that might invoke scrutiny. Or, they try to reassert a measure of agency and dignity, but are limited by the knowledge that if they confront authorities directly, they will be the ones to lose.So, resistance is risky, and thus limited; however, this does not mean these travelers accepted imposed self-definitions. The people in this sample are very clear about who they are. They are apt to question the system after misrecognition rather than question themselves. As Nora reported, misrecognition inspired confidence in her own self-definitions. But, this may not always be the case. For instance, this study showed imposed categories stimulated avoidance, accommodation, and resistance. None of these involved category acceptance, though this has been demonstrated in other studies . ClearlyFinally, in the present study, participants experienced recognition as a positive affirmation. But what happens when people accept recognized self-definitions, but don’t want to be read on that dimension in a given temporospatial context? Recognition functions as misrecognition when it coincides with a desire to be read on a different self-definition . A clearFirst, while some research suggests that interviews and diaries result in different types of information that might not be comparable in one analysis , this is9 Therefore, unlike While some participants did contextualize their experience temporally, these types of reflections were present, unprompted, in both the retrospective interviews and diaries completed soon after travel.Second, readers might ask whether there were differences between responses in the diaries and interviews that impacted the analysis. There were no analytically relevant differences in richness between datasets  except in the case of two diary respondents who did not answer the reflection question . As explained in the methods section, these were excluded as data because those respondents opted out of future contact.It is, however, worth mentioning that some participants had a first language other than English, and the first author asked all questions in English. If this paper reported a study specifically on emotional complexity e.g., , or a stThird, when the first author was preparing this manuscript, a colleague asked her whether she thought all of the requested demographic categories were relevant to the surveillance experience analysis. Simply put, not necessarily. This paper’s analysis was oriented around the categories participants raised in their screening accounts. So the demographic categories should be understood as relevant to describing the sample as a whole, not necessarily as relevant to the individual accounts. The demographic categories were chosen in order to describe an international, mixed student/non-student sample to readers with enough information so as paint a picture, but not so much that the categories risked priming participants or asking them unnecessarily intimate questions.For instance, participants weren’t asked to report past sexual trauma, which can make pat-downs difficult e.g., . There iFourth, while these data were drawn from a mixed student/non-student sample (a particular strength of this study), the sample skewed toward highly educated white Americans and Western Europeans. This reflects the university populations the first author had access to during data collection, and it also reflects the fact that the accessible people who had time to be gatekeepers were themselves privileged with enough free time  relevant to empirical topics other than surveillance. To start the process of pushing forward recognition/misrecognition research, the final portion of the paper presents a problematization of autonomy, selfhood, and context in light of the recognition/misrecognition and surveillance analysis.The first section shows that autonomy needs a recognized self. The second section is a brief analysis of airport surveillance in terms of whether it is an autonomy supportive or coercive context.Let’s return once more to how autonomy is generally defined within the psychological literature. It involves self-rule, self-regulation, and willingly endorsed action e.g., . By defiThis means autonomy comprises two freedoms, not just one. The first is the freedom to determine the self one acts upon. The second is the freedom to act on that self. This means that autonomy can be compromised at two levels. Either the subject can be constrained in terms of self-definition, or they can be constrained in terms of the ability to act on a chosen self-definition. This distinction may be obscured if selfhood is viewed as singular, or if the possibility of multiple selves is alluded to without attendance to its structure, function or context. However, the question of ‘choice of self’ becomes critical if we view selfhood as multiple and contextually variable. That is precisely what the variable self gives us, and why recognition and misrecognition are fundamental to autonomy.10Under conditions of recognition, even behaviors that might be seen as imposed (submitting to scrutiny), and therefore fall outside conventional autonomy definitions, are seen as acts of volition from the recognized actor’s perspective. Those who anticipated or experienced recognition wanted to be screened. They wanted to be screened thoroughly. They would choose to increase participation, should that choice be offered. For in complying in this way, their sense of self is affirmed. If autonomy is to be defined only in terms of volition, then they are acting autonomously, even within a context of power inequality and constraint.Misrecognition, however, denies people the self they would choose, and consequently the ability to act on that self. For the misrecognized, their preoccupation becomes to avoid further misrecognition, or else to recover their desired self. They avoid places they would otherwise want to go, and they go through elaborate procedures that they would not otherwise choose to undertake. In neither case could this be described as autonomous action. Resistance, one might think, would be different. Here people reassert who they are and act on their own autonomous terms. But this paper demonstrates how limited resistance can be under conditions of misrecognition.In sum, none of the range of possibilities open to travelers under conditions of misrecognition are entirely satisfactory. They are all strategies to deal with a situation where one cannot act on the basis of the self one would choose, but none of them entirely restores that choice of selfhood. But, this is not all. There is still the issue of whether contexts are autonomy supportive or coercive.As So, one might come to the conclusion that airport surveillance is incompatible with autonomy. In other words, perhaps the airport security checkpoint is simply a heteronomous context. But that would be missing the point. While Nora and Charlotte were unable to act from their chosen self-definitions and also expose themselves to airport surveillance’s gaze, others clearly demonstrated a willingness to expose more. They were engaged participants in surveillance because they identified with their surveillance-protected ingroup, and were recognized as members of this ingroup. As another example, Kostas gleefully resisted, suggesting misrecognition on one self-definition may, in some circumstances, open the possibility of autonomy on another self-definition.So it is not a matter of whether surveillance is or is not an autonomy-supportive context in any absolute sense. The critical point is surveillance experience has a frame of reference; it is perceived from a position  masking primary phenomena (recognized/misrecognized selfhood).This is not just a theory problem, however. It is also a practice problem. Misrecognition structurally limits the ability to act upon on auto self-definitions , which m(explicit recognition) or travelers projected recognition on the screening process (implicit recognition). The sampled travelers experienced recognition positively, except when recognition conflicted with a dissonant self-definition. They reproduced their behavior, reported willingness to undergo searches that would be considered invasive in other circumstances, incorporated themselves into a common ingroup, and incorporated others into a common ingroup. While recognized travelers were engaged security participants, misrecognized travelers withdrew, accommodated, or enacted limited resistance. Misrecognition occurred when screening imposed dissonant categories (misrecognition by commission) and when it devalued or denied auto self-definitions (misrecognition by omission). This was negatively experienced.Self-definitions are fundamental to surveillance experience. When airport surveillance imposes self-definitions, they may be consonant or dissonant with how travelers define themselves. Recognition occurred when screeners affirmed travelers’ auto-self definitions Finally, this paper theorized autonomy by problematizing the self and autonomy through the lens of previous analyses. With recognition, behaviors that might seem to be enforced by an outside authority are instead experienced as acts of volition. Misrecognition denied auto self-definitions, so actions then centered on avoiding misrecognition or asserting self-definitions. None of these actions, however, restored the choice of self, nor the ability to act on the self one chooses. Therefore, autonomy is conceptually limited when it does not integrate the variable self. What is more, autonomy is inhibited if people cannot choose the self they wish to act upon, or are constrained to act on a self they do not choose. The autonomous self is multiple; contextually variable, and acts within a supportive context.In sum, recognition/misrecognition are central to surveillance experience, selfhood, and autonomy. Autonomy requires the freedom to choose selfhood, as well as the freedom to enact selfhood. Autonomy is inhibited if people cannot choose the self they wish to act upon, or are constrained to act on a self they do not choose. This has implications for how studies are designed, how findings are used to build theory, and how theory is used to design interventions.We obtained permission for this research from ethics committees at Cambridge and St Andrews.MM designed the studies, collected the data, conducted the first and second analyses, discerned the autonomy theory analysis, composed drafts, wrote, revised, edited, and prepared the final manuscript, and reviewed both proofs. SR supervised the second analysis, commented on and contributed to the first draft, and reviewed the first proof.The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.