Clare Madge

Facebook, social integration and informal learning at university: ‘It is more for socialising and talking to friends about work than for actually doing work’

Whilst recent studies suggest that over 95% of British undergraduate students are regularly using social networking sites, we still know very little about how this phenomenon impacts on the student experience and, in particular, how it influences students’ social integration into university life. This paper explores how pre‐registration engagement with a university Facebook network influences students’ post‐registration social networks. Research was conducted with first year undergraduates at a British university using an online survey. Students reported that they specifically joined Facebook pre‐registration as a means of making new friends at university, as well as keeping in touch with friends and family at home. The survey data also illustrate that once at university, Facebook was part of the ‘social glue’ that helped students settle into university life. However, care must be taken not to over‐privilege Facebook: it is clearly only one aspect of students’ more general social networking practices and face‐to‐face interrelationships and interactions remain important. Students thought Facebook was used most importantly for social reasons, not for formal teaching purposes, although it was sometimes used informally for learning purposes.

Parenting gone wired: empowerment of new mothers on the internet?

The extension of information and communication technologies is purported to provide great opportunities for women, with the potential for empowerment and feminist activism. This paper contributes to the debate about women and cyberspace through a focus on the role of the internet in the lives of a group of technologically proficient, socially advantaged white heterosexual new mothers. The internet played a central role in providing virtual social support and alternative information sources which increased these womens real sense of empowerment in the transition to motherhood. Simultaneously, however, very traditional stereotypes of mothering and gender roles persisted. A paradox is evident whereby the internet was both liberating and constraining: it played an important social role for some women while at the same time it encouraged restrictive and unequal gender stereotypes in this particular community of practice. An examination of new virtual parenting spaces therefore has a contribution to make in understanding changing parenting practices in the new millennium.

“Focus groups in cyberspace”: using the Internet for qualitative research

The potential of the Internet as a valuable methodological research tool is increasingly being recognised by both market researchers and academics. This paper contributes to the debate surrounding virtual synchronous group interviews and the value of online research. Specifically it introduces the use of a software conferencing technique – Hotline Connect – and discusses the implications of using the technique for Internet‐based research. In particular, issues of interview design, developing rapport and the virtual venue are considered. The paper draws on the experience of a recent research project entitled “cyberparents” and concludes that the use of conferencing software holds great potential for synchronous online interviewing. However, this must be combined with sensitive, ethical handling of both the research process and the data to overcome problems inherent in any interviewing situation.

On-line with e-mums: exploring the Internet as a medium for research

This paper contributes to the emerging debate about the value of on-line research. Drawing on the experience of an Internet-based Cyberparents project, it explores the possibilities and limitations of web-based questionnaire surveys and on-line synchronous interviews. It discusses some of the implications of conducting research in the virtual arena, with particular emphasis on sampling, on-line interactions and computer-mediated conversations. Although on-line research holds promise, its potential should not be exaggerated: many of the issues and problems of conventional research still apply in the virtual venue.

Cyber-Mothers: Online Synchronous Interviewing using Conferencing Software

The potential of the Internet as a valuable methodological tool for social science research is increasingly being recognised. This paper contributes to the debate surrounding virtual synchronous interviews and the value of online research. Specifically it introduces the use of a software conferencing technique - Hotline Connect - and discusses the implications of using the technique for Internet- based research. In particular issues of interview design, developing rapport, the role of insiders and outsiders in the research process, language use and the virtual interface are considered. The paper draws on the experience of a recent research project entitled ‘Cyberparents’ and concludes that the use of conferencing software holds great potential for synchronous online interviewing. However, this must be combined with sensitive, ethical handling of both the research process and the data to overcome both the weaknesses of this particular method and those inherent in any interviewing situation.

Conceptualizing international education : from international student to international study

In a rapidly changing transnational eduscape, it is timely to consider how best to conceptualize international education. Here we argue for a conceptual relocation from international student to international study as a means to bridge the diverse literatures on international education. International study also enables recognition of the multiple contributions (and resistances) of international students as agents of knowledge formation; it facilitates consideration of the mobility of students in terms of circulations of knowledge; and it is a means to acknowledge the complex spatialities of international education, in which students and educators are emotionally and politically networked together through knowledge contributions.

Developing a geographers' agenda for online research ethics

This paper explores and advances the debate surrounding online research ethics. The use of internet-mediated research using online research methods has increased significantly in recent years raising the issue of online research ethics. Obviously, many ethical issues of onsite research are directly translatable to the online context, but there is also a need for existing ethical principles to be examined in the light of these new virtual research strategies. Five key issues of ethical conduct are commonly identified in the literature pertaining to online research ethics: informed consent, confidentiality, privacy, debriefing and netiquette. These are the issues that are most commonly discussed in procedural ethical guidelines for online research. However, this paper proposes that given the recent increased formal regulation and research governance over research ethics in many countries, it is important that discussion of such issues continues as an embedded part of professional self-regulation and procedural ethical guidelines are used as creative forums for reflexive debate rather than simply being routinely applied by bureaucratic ethics committees. Finally, in problematizing the role of procedural online ethical guidelines, the conclusions explore how geographers can contribute to the future debate about online research ethics.

Online Methods in Geography Educational Research. Resources.

Geographers are fully engaged in the debate surrounding the impact of new information and communication technologies (ICT) and there has been a proliferation of research on the impact of ICT on geographical education. This includes analyses of how ICT may affect geographical learning paradigms (Hill & Solem, 1999; Rich et al., 2000; Solem, 2000) and the role of multimedia in enhancing learning and teaching in geography (Castleford et al., 1998; O’Tuathail & McCormack, 1998; Lemke & Ritter, 2000; Vincent, 2000; Reed & Mitchell, 2001; Johnson, 2002; Shroder et al., 2002). Specific studies on ICT and geography higher education include discussions on the value of web-based resources (Gardner, 2003), the role of virtual fieldtrips (Stainfield et al., 2000) and cultivating study skills in web-based environments (Goett & Foote, 2000). Furthermore, there is a considerable and growing body of research exploring how online learning can enhance higher education more generally (Ehrmann, 1995; Bennett et al., 1999; Housego & Freeman, 2000; Speck, 2000; Davenport, 2001; Carmichael & Honour, 2002; Lapadat, 2002; Mason, 2002; Singh et al., 2003). The results of such studies are mixed. Lapadat (2002), for example, takes a positive view, stressing that the interactive nature of online learning fosters constructivist learning environments in which the learner’s conceptual development occurs through practical experience, discussion and problem solving. By contrast, Speck (2000) is more critical, arguing that the academy has embarked on the commercialization of online courses without giving sufficient attention to training and academic integrity. Yet despite this expansion of work into the virtual geographic world, less has been written about the potential of ICT as a medium of research for geographers in higher education. This is surprising given the great methodolog-

‘Geography is Pregnant’ and ‘Geography's Milk is Flowing’: Metaphors for a Postcolonial Discipline?:

This paper attempts to mobilise the metaphors of pregnancy and lactation to address the imperatives arising from British academic geographys postcolonial position. We embed our argument in our readings of extracts from two consciously postcolonial fictional texts. In the first part of the paper we consider geography as a discipline that is pregnant but ‘in trouble’ to illustrate the paradoxical struggle of the discipline to be a global discipline whilst at the same time marginalising the voices and perspectives that make it global. In the second part of the paper we consider geography as a discipline whose ‘milk is flowing’ to suggest ways that the discipline can acknowledge its global interconnectedness to produce a mutually responsible academic agency.

Ethnography and agroforestry research: a case study from the Gambia

This work examines the contribution that an ethnographic methodology can make to gender-sensitive agroforestry research. Using a Gambian case study, diverse subsistence, commercial and socio-cultural roles of forest products are investigated and the gender-based similarities and differences in their uses are highlighted. An ethnographic approach is combined with political economy perspectives to illustrate how the significance of such products, particularly for women, has markedly increased during the past two decades, especially for commercial purposes, in response to changing environmental, economic and social circumstances. Environmental management practices are used by rural individuals to regulate forest resources. Although there is potential for formal management policy to build upon these indigenous practices, a detailed understanding of local human-environmental relationships is essential for any planning mechanism to succeed. Thus an enthnographic approach can make a positive contribution towards gender-sensitive agroforestry research and practice.