Online sociability:Social relationships and the Internet

Corinna di Gennarocorinna.digennaro@oii.ox.ac.uk

OII Summer Doctoral Programme, Oxford, 18 July 2006

Today’s session

• Theoretical perspectives

• Example from existing research

• Discussion: further research questions, methodology

Theoretical Perspectives –the story so far (I)

• Is computer-mediated communication (CMC) good for relationships formation?

• Cues filtered out theories: anonimity, lack of cues, unhibited behaviour (Kiesler, Siegel, & McGuire, 1984)

• Hyper-personal relationships: shared interests, people’s true selves (Walther, 1996)

Theoretical Perspectives –the story so far (II)

• Does the Internet detract or increase sociability?

• Isolation, depression (Nie & Erbring, 2000; Kraut et al. 1998)

• Internet users more sociable (Kraut et al. 2002)

• Focus on online to offline transition

Web 2.0 & Social software

• Mailing lists, Usenet, email

• SS allows to connect/collaborate through computer mediated communication

• IM, IRC, Internet forums, Blogs, Wikis

• Social bookmarking (e.g. del.icio.us)

• Social citations (eg. CiteULike)

• Social network services (e.g. MySpace, Facebook, Flickr, Bebo, Xanga, LiveJournal, Friendster, Meetup)

Social networking sites

• Profile, friends, comments, online diaries, blogs; uploading of videos, photos, music

• Bottom-up creation of online communities

• Voluntary membership, shared interests

• Self-governing/policing + moderator

• Sustainability thanks to mechanisms of reputation and trust

The negative repercussions

• Misalignment btw users’ perceptions of their audience and the actual audience

• Image management problems

• Privacy & Cyber-safety (stalking, identity theft)

• Problematic content (e.g. racist, sexist)

• Bandwidth theft & copyright infringement

• Lack of regulation?

• Information overload

Our research questions

• Does the Internet reconfigure people’s social networks?

• What are the factors which lead people to meet new friends online?

• Under what conditions do social relationships formed online migrate to face-to-face settings?

Data and methodology

• Oxford Internet Survey (OxIS) 2005• 2,185 respondents, 72% response rate• National multi-stage probability sample• 14 year olds and older• England, Scotland and Wales• 60% current Internet users• Gender, age, education and social grade divides

The Internet and social relationships

• 20% of Internet users have met new people or made new friends online

• Of these, 56% met in person at least one of the friends they had met online

• 74% agree ‘Internet allows me to keep in touch with people’

• 44% agree ‘Internet permits to get personal information about me’

• 64% disagree ‘It is easier for me to meet people online than in person’

Making friends online

1.1

2.6 2.83.2 3.3

1

1.9 2

3.3

77.7

2.22.6

0.90.80.6

0

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

Japan USA Singapore Korea Macao Hungary Britain China(Urban)

Number of online friends never met in person

Number of online friends met in person

Source: WIP, circa 2003; OxIS 2005 for British data.

Dependent variables

1. Perceived social value of the Internet

2. Friends met online

3. Online friends met in person

Explanatory variables• Model 1: Socio-demographic factors (gender, age,

education, social grade, employment status, health status, marital status)

• Model 2: Years online, Internet ability, broadband, online context of communication (blog, website, distribution lists, message board, chat, IM, email, post photos)

• Model 3: Attitudes (Shyness/helplessness, perceived risk, confidence in people you communicate with)

• Model 4: Types of Internet use (Entertainment, Information, Communication, Banking, Learning, Planning)

• Multivariate analysis: linear + logistic regression

Dep var 1: Perceived social value of the Internet

• None of the socio-demographic factors had a significant effect

• Posting photos, chat, emails (+) but this disappears once we control for:

• Confidence in people you communicate with (+)• Entertainment (+)• Communication (+)• Planning (+)

Dep var 2: Meeting online friends

• Being single (+) and living with a partner (+)• Effect of age disappears once we control for

experience and communication context• Hours online (+)• Blog (-), message board (+), chat (+)• Perceived risk (-)• Learning (+)• Communication (+)

Dep var 3: Meeting online friends in person

• Gender: female (-)• Social grade (-)• Years online (+)• Blog (+), posting photos (+)• No effect of attitudes• No effect of types of Internet use

Summary• Different explanatory variables have different

impacts on each of the three dependent variables

• Age not significant: surprising result?

• Interesting result: the impact of different types of use.

• Dynamics of online friendships not driven by technological determinism but by a rich ecology of online behaviours

• Policy implications: must move beyond identification of different user groups approach (i.e. young people)

Social Implications

• How meaningful are the social relationships formed online?

• Strong ties vs. weak ties

• Social capital creation

• ‘Bridging’ vs. ‘bonding’ social capital – the role of similarity (Mesch)

• Digital have and have nots (e.g. Facebook)

Discussion

• Social networking: something for digital natives only?

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