Well…I’m pretty candid. It doesn’t take a lot to figure out that I’m a parent…with college grad kids. And I very often remind posters that I am not an expert…just a parent.
If only everybody were as transparent, @thumper1. Then this wouldn’t be an issue!
Prior to the site’s redesign there used to be location information under the username. Many posters, myself included, used it to identify which school we went to as well as the year we were graduating. I would imagine it would be feasible to put info like that under posters’ avatars.
Case in point, my post count is almost as high as MYOS’ and I am not a parent. 
When I started searching this site a few months before I became a member, I assumed that there would be all kinds of folks participating in the forums. I read posts on topics I was interested in and searched for more threads on those topics, then used some common sense and my own values to filter. Some excellent advice and thoughtful perspectives I hadn’t entertained previously, and thus found very useful. Others were rubbish.
Forums have been around for a long time (correct if you see an error):
(a few key sites - not comprehensive)
Computerized Bulletin Board System - developed by Ward Christensen and Randy Seuss in 1978
Usenet - established in 1980
IRC, or Internet relay chat - in 1988
Forums - developed by the W3 Consortium in 1994
Blogs - also 1994
Six Degrees - 1997
Social Media … - 2000s
My son was born after Blogs became a ‘thing’.
My point is … he grew up in, aware of and interacting in this online world (he was allowed computer access in his teens). He’s way more hip to forums, chatting on them, judging who’s an idiot, who’s reliable, than I am.
I’m not any more concerned about the teens taking bad advice than the adults.
Also there’s no real way we can know who’s who here … usually.
Love the posts by students advising other students that parents have no right to decide which college to go to.
Parent here. I can’t imagine a parent deciding which college kids should attend (except that I know some do). We reserved veto rights, unnecessarily.
Once you start on this road, it gets dicey because it can become possible to identify people-at least those who may work for universities in some capacity. I, like many on this site, wear multiple hats-employee, advisor, parent and former student–back when dinosaurs roamed. If I had to list schools I’d attended it would be quite a long list and totally irrelevant because things change. I hear Fred Flintstone even graduated since I was in school-who’d have guessed! That would be true about schools I’ve been associated with or worked at also-many many and If I listed them my current and former colleagues, if they cared to (and I don’t think anyone would) could take an educated guess based on the history. But I am not representing any school when I post. I think most of the adults who post a lot show their cards enough so that readers can guess their level of expertise of knowledge base. I also agree with those that already mentioned the fact that knowledgeable people usually provide their opinions about mis-information. And i’ve been called on the carpet for what I believe to be accurate information about a school–so I can see that most information gets thoroughly vetted.
I have mixed feelings about identifying as middle school/HS/College/ parent/admissions rep/years-out-of-college-have no spouse -or -kids- but-hang-out-here-anyway posters, but it could at the very least cut down on the claims of sharing accounts (which is sometimes claimed when inconsistencies are spotted)