Diana Mok

Does Distance Matter in the Age of the Internet

This study is part of the broad debate about the role of distance and technology for interpersonal contact. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study that systematically and explicitly compares the role of distance in social networks pre- and post-Internet. An analysis is made of the effect of distance on the frequency of e-mail, phone, face-to-face and overall contact in personal networks, and the findings are compared with their pre-Internet counterpart whose data were collected in 1978 in the same East York, Toronto locality. Multilevel models with a spline specification are used to examine the non-linear effects of distance on the frequency of contact. These effects are compared for both very close and somewhat close ties, and for different role relationships: immediate kin, extended kin, friends and neighbours. The results show that e-mail contact is generally insensitive to distance, but tends to increase for transoceanic relationships greater than 3000 miles apart. Face-to-face contact remains strongly related to short distances (within five miles), while distance has little impact on how often people phone each other at the regional level (within 100 miles). The study concludes that e-mail has only somewhat altered the way people maintain their relationships. The frequency of face-to-face contact among socially close friends and relatives has hardly changed between the 1970s and the 2000s, although the frequency of phone contact has slightly increased. Moreover, the sensitivity of these relationships to distance has remained similar, despite the communication opportunities of the Internet and low-cost telephony.

Did distance matter before the Internet?: Interpersonal contact and support in the 1970s

Well before the coming of the Internet, strong ties with friends and relatives stretched beyond the neighborhood: the traditional domain of community. Phones, cars and planes allowed people to have contact over substantial distances. But the mere fact that ties stretched over long distances does not tell us the extent to which distance mattered for contact and support in pre-Internet days. Although, scholars have mused about this question, they have not provided empirical evidence. This paper applies multi-level analysis to assess the extent contact and support declines with distance. It shows a marked drop in the frequency of face-to-face contact at about 5 miles. The frequency of contact continues to decrease steadily further away, with substantial declines happening at about 50 and 100 miles. Distance affects telephone contact somewhat differently, with a marked drop only happening at about 100 miles. Distance also has a significant impact on providing tangible support. As our data were gathered in 1978 in the Toronto area of East York, they allow comparisons with how relationships have changed in light of new forms of communication, such as the Internet and mobile phones.

NAVEL Gazing: Studying a Networked Scholarly Organization

Many North Americans now work in a global economy where corporations foster networked work – with employees participating in multiple teams and often for multiple purposes – and they do so in networked organizations – whose workers may be physically and organizationally dispersed. We analyze networked workers in one networked scholarly organization: the GRAND Network Centre of Excellence. Drawing on qualitative and social network data, we present our preliminary findings at the early stages of GRAND. Early discussions viewed networked organizations as the antithesis of traditional bureaucratic organizations and expected bureaucratic characteristics such as hierarchy, centralization and formalization to be absent and cross-boundary flows – the hallmark of networked organizations – to be prominent. Our research shows that reality is more complex than the early deductive expectations for networked organizations. The GRAND network is well positioned for cross-boundary flows but they are not yet extensive. In the distributed GRAND network, researchers communicate mostly via now-traditional email although in-person contact is almost as frequent. GRAND is designed with few formal hierarchical differences. Yet hierarchy matters when it comes to communication – researchers in higher positions have higher centrality in communication structures, both GRAND-wide and within projects, suggesting consistent advantages in their communication. Cross-disciplinary exchanges in GRAND are low at the network’s early stages, with little collaboration between Computer Science and Engineering, on the one hand, and Social Sciences and Humanities, on the other. Researchers in Arts and Technology emerge as the most active collaborators in the network both internally and externally. Work within provinces is still the norm.

Changing Ties in a Far-Flung, Multidisciplinary Research Network The Case of GRAND

We study a multidisciplinary, geographically dispersed, and multi-institutional research network that shows the complex relationships in collaborative research. Although collaborative work ties declined, the number of friendship and advice ties stayed stable and acquaintanceship ties grew. Most researchers seem satisfied with the network and relish the opportunities for cross-disciplinary exchanges. The benefits of the network do not lie in the traditional academic output of publications and artifacts, but in intellectual exchanges, knowledge transfer, fostering long-term ties within and across disciplines and universities, and the development of a collaborative culture.

The Spatiality and Cost of Language Identity

The study uses Social Identity Theory as a framework to explain how language acts as a source of social identity and motivates individuals to sort themselves by residential location. To assess the validity of the framework, the study tests the hypotheses that group size, geography, and institutions matter in the preservation of language identity, using the 1991, 1996 and 2001 census data for urban Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver, Canada. The study models a system of three simultaneous equations that describe changes in property values and mobility of language groups, accounting for the presence of spatial lag and spatial error. The study estimates the model by generalized spatial two-stage least squares (Kelejian and Prucha, 1998). The results of the study show that, while residential segregation by language could be a cognitive behaviour, people’s search for language identity within a social group is influenced by economic opportunities in terms of capital gains in properties; it is also affected by proximity to peers and by government policies favouring language-based activities.