Daily life is a comprimised blend of posturing for the sake of role-playing and of varying degrees of self-revelation. Under stressful conditions even the "true" self cannot be precisely defined, as Erving Goffman observes.... Little wonder that the identity crisis is a major source of modern neuroticism, and that the urban middle class aches for a return to a simpler existence.

Wilson cites Goffman's Frame Analysis (1974) as a reference here. - On Human Nature (1978) - Ch.4 Emergence