I think honesty is the best policy in terms of how you present yourself in a profile photo. This is probably best exemplified in regards to, for example, an employer checking the online presence of a potential job candidate. A lot of people use images other than their own in their profiles - a favourite study species for example, and I think this is fine for those who prefer to keep a modicum of privacy. In professional networks though, I do not think that it is appropriate to use avatar images which appear to be becoming more popular - save those for personal use only.

I think honesty is probably the best asset that a person can show on any given situation. However, I think in profile photos it may be difficult to pass on your feelings towards the ones who see it. For example: My photo shows myself and a couple of bans that I saw on a live show. Only I know what I was trying to express and what you perceive changes from person to person. So, all in all, the more assets that you expect to show, the more possibilities you have for success but the fact that individual values from others are directly associated, sometimes you may pass on a different message than the one you originally wanted.

Actually, there is a large body of literature on "impression management" from sociology, management, and communication. In addition to the factors that you bring up, there is also the social identity that you would like to portray based on the social groups that you identify as looking at your profile. There are three different impressions you might be want to project: who you feel you are, who you feel others think you are (or reference groups you want to relate to), and your "ideal self" or what you want others to perceive. It is not really dishonesty as much as deciding which "self" you want/are willing to project. If you have a public profile that anyone can see (or misinterpret) you might want to present a different profile than on a private site (i.e. organization's intranet or a closed professional group).

That is just professional vs. personal image. I think this becomes more of an issue as you progress up the ladder through your career. It also depends on the character of the person involved. For a very outrageous character, it is more likely that if they have a relatively important position (e.g. high court judge) they need to keep their personal and professional lives very separate. While we are not supposed to judge people on their appearance, it still does happen, and so in professional networks (like RG) I would always use a more conservative image while not trying to deceive anyone about who I am.

It is nothing to do with publicity! When it comes to professional networking sites, displaying ones' photo means self-respect as well as respect to others who interact with them. It is always good idea to put a face to someone to whom we are interacting with. It is as simple as this!

Yes, people's phenotype could change every day! So, that? Changes are always expect. You take a digital picture of me. I might look good in picture. But in reality I might not have a photogenic face. I might chose to put a picture that was taken 10 years back. However, the picture is still me.

In social networking sites such as facebook; people might chose to have an avatar, photo of a celebrities, beautiful baby pictures, pets, etc. It give an idea how mature they are! However, research gate is a 'professional' networking site. So, the analogy will not applicable to RG or LinkedIn or Xing.

But why is a face important. In science, the message, not the face, makes the difference, or not? For instance, you do not put photos of you or your team in a publication in a scientific journal, do you?

This is just an unwritten etiquette. Hypothetically, let's say, we both agreed to meet in New York in a hotel for a scientific project meet. You flown from France to meet me. When you report to the reception desk, the receptionist take you to a room and connect to a computer network and invite me to the meeting by dialing skype.

When I receive your call, I apologize to you for not being able to meet you in person as I have another meeting scheduled immediately finishing this call. The city traffic will not permit me to come and make a personal visit to the hotel. But I did assure you that, since this is a scientific project meeting, 'my face is not important' and we could very well collaborate on this new project that we propose to initiate.

The receptionist also gave an envelop containing a 2K worth of check to you for your travel, accommodation, and inconvenience.

How would you respond to this scenario?

a. It doesn't matter, although I didn't see his face; I got reimbursed the expense and the deal went through OK. I am perfectly OK with it! or

b. It is humiliating and unfair that he didn't tell me the entire truth. I rather not get any reimbursement,but will have the opportunity to meet and finalize the deal in person, rather than knowing who I am dealing with! The deal is off!

There are nearly 7 billion people on Earth. How much of them can we see/meet life?? Will it change the world when you meet >0.000000......1 % of them?

I published with people I never met what you would call 'physically', which can be fine and constructive and ecologically sustainable and.....

How many people give away gifts (e.g. financial support) to social organisations without physically meeting the people that are supported with these gifts?

well...Our perception of World is very different - Is the glass half empty or half full? situation!

This is akin to a couple go to a marriage counselor. One goes under the impression that, 'I have to make the marriage work' and other one goes there with the mentality that, 'Somehow, I have to get the divorce'.

We get what we see...we cannot change it!

For me the glass is always half full! Positive thinking and sharing is important and more sustainable! Smile to the people in the street you don't know personally....

I agree with Marcel. It is professional vs personal image issue. It also depends on whether you like to share personal image in public space. For some people, it may not be an issue at all. For some, it may be invasion in their private space.

Hello Deshmukh, thank you for your response. My thinking was, until you're work is unnoticed or until you're not recognized, it is possible for you to control certain actions within the public domain. When people recognize what you're and who you're, you're getting invited to give talks, getting awards, etc. In such situation, how can you keep everything under your control. You might not post your picture in the web. Most certainly, it is likely that your picture will surface when you do a search. Some best moments that you had in a picnic with your friends and families, when you gave a key note address in an international conference, or similar capacity - how can you control these factors?

My only argument was, when you acquire a 'celebrity status' (whether you like it or not) or become a 'public figure', privacy is a less of an issue in WWW. When you know that you have come to that stage or when you see that your pictures are surfacing, there is no need to think again. Just putting a picture in the web. This way, at least people could relate a face with the name that they have been talking about!

If the same person is exposed on different web-sites having a photo on web-site 1 and no photo on web-site 2, it my stimulate curiosity-based searching for information across web-sites or not?

well..it depends on the website owner if they want to put your picture or not. For example, you were given an award in a ceremony. If that information were to covered by media, one media may display your picture actually receiving award. Another media may just mention your name that Dr. Lambrechts received a prestigious award. There is nothing wrong in it. There are so many factor why they did what they did in a particular way.

As long as one maintains a positive profile, that's fine. All one has to maintain is a positive profile. That's all. Even if they have to periodically evaluate their own position to see if anything mentioned wrongly about them.

Although, people may differ in their ideas, for me this is not an issue at all!

A profile picture signals openness, accuracy and perhaps the real identity (not perfectly, but it's a rough rule of thumb) of the profile holder and is one of the many ways to connect with someone. However, the merit of substance shared by the followers matters at the most. There are ample of learned and excellent writers without a profile picture.

Dear @Marcel, see the story about different social networks and their comparison. It is about research networks. Portrait picture is one of the feature that was treated.

What will the scholarly profile page of the future look like? Provision of metadata is enabling experimentation.

Dear @Marcel, what is the meaning of honest profile photo?

http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/impactofsocialsciences/2015/07/16/scholarly-profile-of-the-future/

Dear @Ljubomir,

Photos always indicate the past. It is therefore assumed that there is a correlation between what happened in the past and what will happen in the future. How to establish a reliable relationship between a photo (which takes less than a second to make) and competence (which may take years to construct)?

Thanks @Marcel, I do understand it. Photo is always "old". So, what would be a proposal/technique for dynamic profile photo in order to be always up-to-date/actual?

 Dear Marcel, we discussed about this topic before. I still see that you're trying to argue why profile picture is not necessary on the contrary. I do aware that your profile picture is available in microsoft academic search: 

http://65.54.113.26/Author/3951841/marcel-m-lambrechts

Your argument doesn't make any sense to me at all. For example, your statement, 'photos always indicate the past'. So what? It is put a face to profile, which means you're open and transparent and not a person who would like to hide behind a curtain. Although we will not be making a one on one conversation, at least it gives an impression that we are talking to a person. Everyone aware that your photo is not going to give an indication as how tall you're, when this was taken, are you going to look exactly like the way you look in your photo, etc. They are not going to be judgmental about. What surprises the most is that, scientist such as yourself, making argument on a profile picture. A simple google search would give numerous reasons. If you're not convinced, you could always run by your colleagues office and see what he/she thinks. If not, when you have a team meeting, take a quick poll to think what others are feeling.

Surely no one would have time to take to take the 'current' picture to sign up in any social website or change the picture periodically as we all get older, one day at a time!

Finally, do you believe in 'cross sectional research study' of a dynamic scientific medical problem? If you do, then your following argument doesn't make any sense: "It is therefore assumed that there is a correlation between what happened in the past and what will happen in the future. How to establish a reliable relationship between a photo (which takes less than a second to make) and competence (which may take years to construct)? Should a profile photo as a form of 'publicity' in communication networks be honest, reliable, dynamic...?".  Let's assume you're studying the disease progression in a particular population or studying an evolutionary (e.g. atavism) or a genetic phenomena. How will you derive your conclusion based on a cross-sectional observation? How will you deduce a logical conclusion based on what you're provided with in the beginning? or it will not make any sense to you at all?

how can you be bold (microsoft academic search) and shy (researchgate) at the same time?

Is this your best argument? If you thought about behavioral plasticity, usually doesn't accompanied by morphological change. You should think about phenotypic plastcity instead of behavioral plasticity! Even when I was a grad student, when I came across the word 'plasticity', I thought it was a misnomer by some scientist. I thought it should have been 'elasticity' instead of 'plasticity', because, in principle, 'plastics' doesn't have the same property as an elastic!

Dear PPSR,

Whatever you name it. Some people don't wish to be in the arena all the time. By the way, the Microsoft site you indicated above is not handled by me. I also noticed for instance that I worked with Goelen, which is not true. Some of the oldest publications are missing (see RG History of publications plus later for the visible collaborations), ....

Cheers