Innovative approaches to analyses of online social networks

Panel for IR13 – Salford October 18th-21st 2012

Jakob Linaa Jensen (chair)Frauke ZellerAndra SiibakNiels Brügger

Background EU COST Action “Transforming audiences, transforming societies”

Working group on social media and social networking – and it’s consequences for audience research

Europan task force on social media methods Mapping the research field within Europe and beyond Publishing (journals, edited books, panels) Outreach (new research projects, connections beyond Europe)

Comparative studies Klaus Bruhn Jensen in charge

Survey in 13 countries

Data collection January 2013

IPSOS to carry out surveys in most countries

Twitter and the public sphere - The European elections in 2014

Joint Research proposal COST Action 'Transforming Audiences, Transforming Societies’:

Pieter Verdegem, Cédric Courtois and Peter Mechant (Ghent University, Belgium), Jakob Linaa Jensen (Aarhus University, Denmark), Stine Lomborg (University of Copenhagen)

Call distributed, so far participants from 10+ countries (Pieter?)

This panelAccessing use of online social networks in everyday life – a suggested framework

Jakob Linaa Jensen, University of Aarhus, Denmark

Mixed Methods in Online Social Network Analysis

Frauke Zeller, Technical University of Ilmenau, Germany

Historical Network Analysis: Methodological Challenges

Niels Brügger, University of Aarhus, Denmark

Making use of creative research methods for studying social media

Andra Siibak, University of Tartu, Estonia

Accessing use of online social networks in everyday life – a suggested framework

Jakob Linaa Jensen, Ph.D.Associate professor in media studies

Center for Internet ResearchAarhus University, Denmark

E-mail:linaa@imv.au.dkTwitter: jakoblinaa

Web: www.linaa.net

Agenda

1. Online social networks and other online phenomena

2. Interesting aspects of Facebook and social network sites

3. Example: a framework for studying Facebook use and it’s significance in people’s everyday life

4. Issues raised for future concern

Social media versus social networks

Social mediaBlogs, discussion groups

Flickr, You Tube etc.

Online social

networksMySpace, Facebook,

LinkedIn etc.

Online social networks vs online communities

Online communities Online social networks

Technologically centralised

Everybody visible

Privileged center

Technologically dispersed

Connections visible

No privileged center

MUDs Discussion groups WoW MySpace Facebook P2P

Online social networks vs online communities

Accounting for different technologies

Accounting for different user experiences

Accounting for different methodological challenges

Social networks vs websites After almost 20 years of WWW there has been certain methods, agreed standards for

analysing websites:

-Usability analyses (Jakob Nielsen etc.)

-Website analysis (Niels Brügger etc.)

-Web sphere analysis (Foot & Schneider)

Even though websites are fluent, dynamic, unstable, they are still a relatively fixed phenomenon, compared to social networks: the content is in principle available and accessible for everyone, despite exceptions (personalisation, client based software etc.)

The totality of social network sitesUsers (characteristics, performance, behaviour)

Content (status updates, shared objects, profile

Relations (networks, circles of friends, reciprocity)

Context (design, policies, frames for action)

Aesthetics (visual appearance, significance for use and perception)

Available methods for studying social media and social networks Subjective• Surveys (ask the users)

• Focus groups or individual intervies ”Technical"• Networks analyses of relationships (Gephi, NodeXL etc.)

• Data mining of traffic in general Observations• Aesthetics analyses of profiles

• Content analysis of profiles and dialogues (computer-based, semantic or a combination)

The case study: The New borderlines of the public sphere•2009 project survey (N= 1710)

•General survey on the public sphere, media use, participation, citizenship

•Sponsored by Danish National Research Council

The research questions• How are social media used to perform political and cultural

citizenship?

• Which role do social media play in respondents’ everyday life?

• How do users perform online compared to their own presentation and perception of their online presence?

Methods applied• Quantitative survey among Danish Internet users (N=1710)

• Subsequent focus groups (4, N=20) among strategically selected Facebook users

• Access to profiles and all information of the focus group participants (N=17)

Topics covered by the method Knowledge on respondents’ general media use and other variables

Specific knowledge on use and attitudes towards social network sites

Attitudes and experiences discussed and negotiated in a social context

Observation of actual behaviour and practices versus norms and ideal conceptions

Issues to consider Discrepancy between statements in social contexts (focus groups) and

practices while alone

A well-known methodological problem

Here the triangulation of focus groups and ”eaves-dropping” profiles illustrates such discrepancies, otherwise hard to get

This is good to cover aspects of daily practices and norms

One could have added analyses of relations, meta-analyses of content