Jessica Vitak

It's complicated: Facebook users' political participation in the 2008 election.

In the 2008 U.S. presidential election, social network sites such as Facebook allowed users to share their political beliefs, support specific candidates, and interact with others on political issues. But do political activities on Facebook affect political participation among young voters, a group traditionally perceived as apathetic in regard to civic engagement? Or do these activities represent another example of feel-good participation that has little real-world impact, a concept often referred to as slacktivism? Results from a survey of undergraduate students (Nu2009=u2009683) at a large public university in the Midwestern United States conducted in the month prior to the election found that students tend to engage in lightweight political participation both on Facebook and in other venues. Furthermore, two OLS regressions found that political activity on Facebook (e.g., posting a politically oriented status update, becoming a fan of a candidate) is a significant predictor of other forms of political participation (e.g., volunteering for an organizing, signing a paper or online petition), and that a number of factors--including intensity of Facebook use and the political activity users see their friends performing on the site--predict political activity on Facebook. Students perceptions regarding the appropriateness of political activity on Facebook, as well as the specific kinds of political activities they engaged in and witnessed within the site, were also explored.

Student use of Facebook for organizing collaborative classroom activities

Social network sites such as Facebook are often conceived of as purely social spaces; however, as these sites have evolved, so have the ways in which students are using them. In this study, we examine how undergraduate students use the social network site Facebook to engage in classroom-related collaborative activities (e.g., arranging study groups, learning about course processes) to show how Facebook may be used as an informal tool that students use to organize their classroom experiences, and explore the factors that predict type of use. Data from two surveys (Nu2009=u2009302, Nu2009=u2009214) are used to analyze how Facebook use, social and psychological factors, self-efficacy, and types of instructor-student communication on Facebook are related to positive and negative collaboration among students. We found that predictors of Facebook use for class organizing behaviors include self-efficacy and perceived motivation to communicate with others using the site. When placed in the context of social and psychological factors, Facebook intensity did not predict either positive or negative collaboration, suggesting that how students used the site, rather than how often they used the tool or how important they felt it was, affected their propensity to collaborate.

Norm evolution and violation on Facebook

This study explores how norms on social network sites evolve over time and how violations of these norms impact individuals’ self-presentational and relationship goals. Employing Expectancy Violations Theory (Burgoon, 1978) as a guiding framework, results from a series of focus groups suggest that both the content of the violation and the users’ relationship to the violator impact how individuals react to negative violations. Specifically, acquaintances who engage in minor negative violations are ignored or hidden, while larger infractions (that could negatively impact the individual) result in deletion of the offending content and – in extreme cases – termination of the Facebook friendship. Negative violations from close friends (that did not impact participants’ goals) resulted in confrontations, while similar violations from acquaintances were often ignored by participants in an effort to ‘keep the peace.’ Furthermore, positive violations were more likely to arise from acquaintances than close friends.

Personal Internet use at work: Understanding cyberslacking

Cyberslacking, typically defined as the use of Internet and mobile technology during work hours for personal purposes, is a growing concern for organizations due to the potential in lost revenue; however, the majority of academic research in this area has focused on a limited number of cyberslacking behaviors and/or employed small, non-representative samples. In order to address these limitations, the present study employs a nationally representative sample of American workers and tests the relationship between nine cyberslacking behaviors and a variety of demographic and work-specific predictors. Three measures of cyberslacking are employed to provide a richer analysis of the phenomenon: individual behaviors, frequency of cyberslacking, and variety of cyberslacking. Results indicate that being younger, male, and a racial minority positively predict cyberslacking variety and frequency, as do routinized Internet use at work and higher perceived Internet utility. Results are discussed as to how the present study expands on previous research, and directions for future research are indicated.

‘There’s a network out there you might as well tap’: Exploring the benefits of and barriers to exchanging informational and support-based resources on Facebook

Research has established a positive relationship between Facebook use and perceptions of social capital, a construct that describes the total resources − both potential and actual − available in one’s social network. However, the process through which social capital conversions occur is unclear. This study presents results from semi-structured interviews with 18 adult Facebook users (ages 25 to 55) about their Facebook use, focusing on how participants use the site to request and provide social support (associated with bonding social capital) and information (associated with bridging social capital). Findings describe how Facebook use facilitates interactions related to social capital and users’ beliefs about the potential negative outcomes of these interactions, providing insight into how users negotiate potential benefits and risks when making decisions about site use.

Negotiating Privacy Concerns and Social Capital Needs in a Social Media Environment

Social network sites (SNSs) are becoming an increasingly popular resource for both students and adults, who use them to connect with and maintain relationships with a variety of ties. For many, the primary function of these sites is to consume and distribute personal content about the self. Privacy concerns around sharing information in a public or semi-public space are amplified by SNSs’ structural characteristics, which may obfuscate the true audience of these disclosures due to their technical properties (e.g., persistence, searchability) and dynamics of use (e.g., invisible audiences, context collapse) (boyd 2008b). Early work on the topic focused on the privacy pitfalls of Facebook and other SNSs (e.g., Acquisti and Gross 2006; Barnes 2006; Gross and Acquisti 2005) and argued that individuals were (perhaps inadvertently) disclosing information that might be inappropriate for some audiences, such as future employers, or that might enable identity theft or other negative outcomes.

Perceptions of facebook's value as an information source

Facebook has become an increasingly important tool for people engaging in a range of communication behaviors, including requesting help from their social network to address information needs. Through a study of 614 staff members at a large university, we show how social capital, network characteristics, and use of Facebook are related to how useful individuals find Facebook to be for informational purposes and their propensity to seek different types of information on the site. We find that bridging social capital and engagement with ones network through directed communication behaviors are important predictors of these dimensions of information seeking; furthermore, a number of demographic and usage behavior differences exist between those who choose to engage in information-seeking behaviors on Facebook and those who do not. Finally, when predicting information-seeking behaviors, we identify a significant interaction between users perceptions of Facebook as appropriate for purposes beyond the purely social and their engagement with their network.

The Ties That Bond: Re-Examining the Relationship between Facebook Use and Bonding Social Capital

Research has established a positive relationship between measures of Facebook use and perceptions of social capital. Like other social network sites, Facebook is especially well-positioned to enhance users bridging social capital because it lowers coordination costs associated with maintaining a large, potentially diverse network of Friends. The relationship between Facebook use and perceived bonding social capital, however, is not as clear. Previous studies have found a positive relationship between Facebook Intensity (FBI) and a measure of bonding social capital that focuses on benefits accrued locally, i.e., within a university context. This study looks at the relationship between Facebook use, offline behaviors, and social provisions, a broad-based measure of social support that taps into a dimension of bonding. Findings suggest that while FBI no longer predicts bonding, specific behaviors on Facebook are positively linked to perceptions of three social provisions related to ones closest friends and family.

The "S" in Social Network Games: Initiating, Maintaining, and Enhancing Relationships

Social network games embedded within social network sites (SNSs) such as Facebook facilitate play with Friends within the SNS. In this study, we look at different dimensions of how game play contributes to relationship initiation and development using qualitative data collected from adult Facebook users (N=18). Our data suggest that interpersonal motivations are a primary driver of initial game play and that while game play doesnt facilitate direct social interaction, participants perceived indirect interaction and sharing game-based content was useful in maintaining and even enhancing relationships.

Online social network sites and the concept of social capital

This volume puts together the works of a group of distinguished scholars and active researchers in the field of media and communication studies to reflect upon the past, present, and future of new media research. The chapters examine the implications of new media technologies on everyday life, existing social institutions, and the society at large at various levels of analysis. Macro-level analyses of changing techno-social formation such as discussions of the rise of surveillance society and the fifth estate are combined with studies on concrete and specific new media phenomena, such as the rise of Pro-Am collaboration and fan labor online. In the process, prominent concepts in the field of new media studies, such as social capital, displacement, and convergence, are critically examined, while new theoretical perspectives are proposed and explicated. Reflecting the inter-disciplinary nature of the field of new media studies and communication research in general, the chapters interrogate into the problematic through a range of theoretical and methodological approaches. The book should offer students and researchers who are interested in the social impact of new media both critical reviews of the existing literature and inspirations for developing new research questions.