Reasons in Using the Internet - Assignment Example

The effect of the Internet Data communication between computers, with each computer able to send, receive and pass data on its own, as nodes in a network technically defines Internet or what came to be known as the world wide web. (van der Geest 2001, p. 2) Since its conception in 1990, it has grown by leaps and bounds – from a mere curiosity to its use today is essential and standard means in the transfer of communication and data among people. A rough estimation for 2002 is that 58% of the adult population in the United States has access to internet, with considerable percentage for other English-speaking parts of the world as well. (Lessig 2004, p. 7) People generally have two reasons in using the Internet. One is that it is useful to communicate with other people and, secondly, it has a comprehensive database of information than can retrieved immediately. Such information can be everything – a research report, a computer game, current stock exchange data, an update for a computer program, an item in a shopping catalogue, an audio clip of a favorite artist, a road map to a destination, among others. Naturally, such scope and importance in communication underscore how the Internet or the World Wide Web influenced the modern research method and design. According to D. A. de Vaus (2002), research design and methodologies are important ways of ensuring accurate gathering and explanations to data as well as in giving researchers confidence in drawing conclusions from the data gathered from different sources: I use the term [research design] much more narrowly to refer to the structure of the data rather than the particular data… The central point is that it provides a context in which relatively unambiguous statements can be drawn… [and] move conclusions about causal processes from the realm of the plausible and possible to the convincing and compelling. (p. 31) An essential preliminary to doing any social scientific research, for example, is to conduct a review of the literature. According to G. Nigel Gilbert (2006), this has two primary reasons: to ensure that a research question has not already been answered in a previous study, and to relate your research to what has gone before, so that it contributes effectively to a growing body of knowledge. (p. 3) The Internet offers a new opportunity in this area as it provides immensely rich resource for researchers. The World Wide Web can provide data in a literature review through both the conventional published kind and in the form of online databases of citations and surveys. The Internet can be a primary source of data collection through observation of the traces of Internet users revealed in email, chat rooms, blogs and websites. It can also be used as a tool just like traditional techniques of the social scientist, such as standardized surveys, interviews and even focus groups. Particularly, Internet changed focus groups from physical to online. The following issues will specifically address how Internet shaped modern research design and approaches. How the Internet changed focus groups online from physical focus groups and whether the differences are valuable or a problem. As the Internet brought about the emergence of virtual social groups, a new dimension to this area has developed. Let us take, for example, two of the resources’ accounts for this paper: Alain Watkins and Rissa Tomei. The former is an online gamer while the latter enjoys chatting in instant messaging applications. Both of them spend about an average of 2 hours everyday playing and chatting. In an interview these are their answers to the question why they like doing what they do in the Internet: Alain: Online gaming is much more interesting, say, from the usual video games because there is a community out there and you could interact with people as you develop your character in the game… with the added fun of having some fancy power over things and others. (Watkins 2007) Rissa: It’s funny how I can say that I am more honest in chatting than speaking with friends face to face. I like it that way because I think people could really be what they are. Also, you can easily find people who have the same interests so it’s easy and, yes, a lot of fun. What these interviews tell us is that simulated interpersonal interaction online appeals to people because of the anonymity it provides (especially in chat rooms) thus allowing a freer self-expression and in the way they behave and hence, could be more sincere than in a physical situation. The downside comes from the same area. Anonymity can give license to individuals to lie, deceive and fake information, which is detrimental to any research undertaking. Specifically, the sudden interest of the pollsters in the Internet underscores how it revolutionizes the function of focus groups. Extensive use of focus groups is prohibitively expensive for many campaigns and that according to Robert Watson and Colton Campbell: Internet surveys hold promise as a way to address these problems… Methodology is developing to conduct real qualitative research with quantitative support on the Internet. That is, pollsters are developing ways to generalize about qualitative information. (p. 42) To envision online focus group in the previous example, think of multiple chat rooms with large numbers of participants. Computer technology allows for rapid analysis of the content of these exchanges and considering the fact that online dial groups are now potentially thousands of participants because of audio and video streaming technology. However, one of the problems of online focus groups according to Watson and Campbell is that it is not yet fully interactive and correlating opinions with demographics is difficult to achieve. (p. 42) How the general social effect of the Internet create 'virtual' groups and whether research methods should follow this social trend. Although, this paper argues that the Internet can create virtual groups by offering opportunities to share interest with others whom we have not yet met and to communicate with people we already know, one can’t really say whether this phenomenon created some form of virtual community, essentially. There are sociologists who argue that true communities cannot be established in the digital environment of the cyberspace. While the Internet is a mine of resource for academicians and researchers alike, it cannot be relied upon all the time in conducting research. Diana Kendall (2006), for instance, wrote that virtual communities on the web do not have geographic and social boundaries and are limited in their scope to specific areas of interest. (p. 149) And so it is recommended that research methods should not exclusively follow this social trend. One should remember that although internet is an essential communication tool, it is possible that the internet will create a weak community replacement for people based on a virtual community of specialized ties developed by email correspondence and chat room discussions. How display and interactive features of electronic, Internet-based surveys differ from paper-based surveying and how they make it easier or more difficult to gain access to a survey population. There is huge difference between paper-based surveys and electronic, internet-based surveys. For the paper-based research, the display is static and tangible and almost always, there is a surveyor present who respondents can interact with. This highlights the fact that the display or the composition of the survey questionnaire could include just questions and simple directions on how to go about the survey. Also, I cite the point made by Harry Reis and Charles Judd (2000) as they explored research methods in social and personality psychology: If several participants at a time are seated in a room to fill out individual questionnaires, they may influence each other (perhaps by muttering comments about questions and their answers), or situations factors (such as uncomfortably warm room or an audible disturbance in the hallway outside. (p. 28) With the web-based research, the respondent is left to his own resources. The success or failure of sampling depends on the skill and understanding of the respondent in computer hardware and software operations. The interface and usability of internet-based research are, therefore, much convenient, more interactive and user-friendly. In this regard, paper-based surveys offer a more successful response rate. One should remember that the attention span of people browsing the Internet, extracting information and, in this case, answering a survey, is very short. Finally, online polls and surveys face a self-selection bias. That is because there is no simple way to access email addresses so it is nearly impossible to get a random sample, with potential respondents having to volunteer still. (Watson & Campbell, p. 42) How Internet technology enables the tracking of users' behaviour without their knowledge and how this is different to other research situations. A website has mechanisms in place that logs in actions taken by the site’s visitors – from the pages of entry to the pages of exit; the pages read, links clicked, the duration of visit and so forth. These statistics are recorded by the Control Panel or some other web application within the administrator’s section in a particular website. The main difference of this methodology from other conventional techniques is its comprehensive coverage. Here, the recorded data chronicle every detail of the collective behavior of people who visit a website. And that these are collated real time. How there is too much faith placed in the analysis of apparently 'objective' data generated from websites and what this faith says about our social understandings of the Internet? One of the problems of the Internet is that resources are not usually backed by citations and evidence. The standards and industry benchmarks are currently focused on the technical side such as web design, usability test and not the content. And so, it is very complicated and certainly tedious to verify each and every data gathered. There is too much faith involved in this area because people have no option left. Accurate analysis and effective conclusions are weak foundations of a non-compelling and unreliable web sources. How the technological mediation involved in Internet research create / prevent ethical issues. Understandably, there are certain technical and ethical dilemmas in using the Internet as a resource in research in terms of its nature as an emergent technological and social phenomenon. For instance, ethical concerns emerge in issues like consent, confidentiality and privacy, harm, and relationships with subjects, organizations and institutions in data gathering. (Gilbert, p. 4) Accessibility of materials, literature and other works in the Internet is very easy and therefore, it is equally easy to disseminate them, often without the consent of the sources. Technical mediation involved in Internet research cannot fully prevent ethical issues. Today, the Internet is self-regulating and that there are very few laws and statutes in most countries covering and requiring specific behaviors within the World Wide Web. How unethical / ethical practice connect with the introduction of new technologies. New technologies allow for easy and fast extraction of data. Their introduction render documents to be copied fast, sent to someone from another part of the world within seconds; conversations can be recorded, videos of communicators can be shared real-time and that documents and materials can be altered – the possibilities are endless with the advent of new technology. If these potentialities were exploited and used illegally or in order to take advantage of an individual or organization, issues on ethics or absence of it emerge. Stealing other people’s ideas, copying work, hacking websites and even stealing identities are just some of the unethical practices that permeate in the World Wide Web. Conclusion Although there are significant pitfalls in using the Internet as a tool in research design and approaches, it is unarguably becoming a permanent fixture in the research field, complementing established traditional techniques. This fact is undeniable and certainly encourages a more systematic and comprehensive data gathering process, data analysis and conclusion formulation. To underscore the point, we summarize the important factors in support of the abovementioned argument: 1. More and more people have access to the internet; 2. The Internet allows people who have the same interests congregate; 3. Technological capabilities as well as innovations enable a survey or a research study to gather bulk of information in a short period of time. References de Vaus, D.A. (2002). Surveys in Social Research. Allen & Unwin. Gilbert, N. (2006). From Postgraduate to Social Scientist: A Guide to Key Skills. Sage Publications, Inc. Kendall, D. (2006). Sociology in Our Times. Thomson Wadsworth. Lessig, L. (2004). Free Culture: How Big Media Uses Technology and the Law to Lock Down Culture. Penguin. Reis, H. and Judd, C. (2000). Handbook of Research Methods in Social and Personality Psychology. Cambridge University Press. van der Geest, T. (2001). Web Site Design is Communication Design. John Benjamins Publishing Company. Tomei, R. (2007). email. 19/11/07 Watkins, A. (2007). email. 18/11/07 Watson, R. and Campbell, C. (2003). Campaigns and Elections: Issues, Concepts, Cases. Lynne Rienner Publishers. Read More