Privacy on social media: ethical dilemmas in personal exposure among Generation X and Z

Abstract

This article analyzes the ethical dilemmas arising from the digital exposure of private life on social media, from an ethical-communicational perspective. This research seeks to understand how people from two different generations, Gen X and Gen Z, LIVING IN Quito, navigate ethical challenges tied sharing personal life online. To achieve this, a structured survey was applied to a stratified sample, addressing three main variables: strategic management of personal image, ethical awareness of digital consequences, nan emotional self-expression online. The findings reveal that, although both groups face similar ethical dilemmas, they respond in diverse ways: Generation X tends to regulate their exposure more reflectively, while Generation Z operates through an emotional and adaptive logic. The study concludes that digital exposure is not a uniform practice, but rather a communicative construction shaped by ethical decisions (with emotional and identity components), all included by the technological and cultural frameworks particular to each generation. These exposure patterns not only respond to generational differences but also reveal complex ethical decisions about what to show, why, and to whom, positioning communicational ethics as a fundamental axis for inhabiting the digital environment with greater awareness.