First-Generation Students and College: The Role of Facebook Networks as Information Sources
27 Feb 2016-pp 887-899
TL;DR: It is found that first-generation students were more likely to select higher quality information sources among their Facebook Friends after exposure to the visualization, suggesting that social media can help users identify good human information sources by making hidden resources in one's network more visible.
Abstract: Social network site (SNS) platforms have the potential to be effective information-seeking channels due to their technical and social affordances, such as the ability to broadcast content to a large group and to aggregate one's contacts. This study tests the impact of a Facebook app that allows users to visualize their network of Facebook Friends to see how it influences who adolescents identify as good sources of information about college. Comparing Friends selected by 24 high school seniors before and after viewing Facebook network visualizations reveals that first-generation students were more likely to select higher quality information sources among their Facebook Friends after exposure to the visualization. Our results suggest that social media can help users identify good human information sources by making hidden resources in one's network more visible.
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TL;DR: This paper surveys the educational research literature to examine: How such technologies are perceived and used by K-12 learners and teachers with what impacts on pedagogy or students' learning.
Abstract: The increasingly widespread use of social network sites to expand and deepen one's social connections is a relatively new but potentially important phenomenon that has implications for teaching and learning and teacher education in the 21st century. This paper surveys the educational research literature to examine: How such technologies are perceived and used by K-12 learners and teachers with what impacts on pedagogy or students' learning. Selected studies were summarized and categorized according to the four types introduced by Roblyer (2005) as studies most needed to move the educational technology field forward. These include studies that establish the technology's effectiveness at improving student learning; investigate implementation strategies; monitor social impact; and report on common uses to shape the direction of the field. We found the most prevalent type of study conducted related to our focal topic was research on common uses. The least common type of study conducted was research that established the technology's effectiveness at improving student learning. Implications for the design of future research and teacher education initiatives are discussed.
187 citations
Cites background from "First-Generation Students and Colle..."
...Moreover, researchers have argued that SNSs might be re-imagined as supports for student learning outcomes from two vantage points: first, they can facilitate peer/ alumni support to help learners manage the ups and downs of high school or college life and support academic help-seeking where learners use their social network site to get help with school-related tasks (Greenhow, 2011) or the high school-to-college transition process (Jeon et al. 2015); second, SNSs can catalyze civic benefits....
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Journal Article•
TL;DR: The early aughts saw an explosion of interest in social network sites as mentioned in this paper and many such sites including Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter expanded to become "platforms", meaning they are both websites and distributors of data.
Abstract: The early aughts saw an explosion of interest in social network sites. Many such sites, including Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter expanded to become “platforms,” meaning they are both websites and distributors of data. These data would typically be distributed to third parties in privacy-sensitive ways and regulated by the platform. Such access is based on balancing three issues: user privacy, generativity (i.e., capacity for novelty) for third parties, and control for platforms. Platforms appear to be seeking progressively more control at the cost of generativity by severely restricting third-party access to data about the user’s friends. The reductions or outright lack of access means that the insights from our digital traces are no longer as knowable to either third parties or users. This article unpacks this shift by clarifying some of the technical issues involved (particularly APIs, the main means of external data access). The case study of social network visualization is used to exemplify how social network sites seek control at the expense of generativity. The article notes how this shift was done with little oversight.
56 citations
07 May 2016
TL;DR: It is asserted that touchscreen-based social network capture is now a viable alternative for highly sensitive data and social network data entry tasks.
Abstract: While much social network data exists online, key network metrics for high-risk populations must still be captured through self-report. This practice has suffered from numerous limitations in workflow and response burden. However, advances in technology, network drawing libraries and databases are making interactive network drawing increasingly feasible. We describe the translation of an analog-based technique for capturing personal networks into a digital framework termed netCanvas that addresses many existing shortcomings such as: 1) complex data entry; 2) extensive interviewer intervention and field setup; 3) difficulties in data reuse; and 4) a lack of dynamic visualizations. We test this implementation within a health behavior study of a high-risk and difficult-to-reach population. We provide a within--subjects comparison between paper and touchscreens. We assert that touchscreen-based social network capture is now a viable alternative for highly sensitive data and social network data entry tasks.
53 citations
Cites background from "First-Generation Students and Colle..."
...3 In the case of studies that involve the participant in interpreting the visualization, the effectiveness is often further enhanced by their inherent expertise regarding the data [24]....
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28 May 2020
TL;DR: This work argues that platform moderation is enmeshed with wider processes of conformity to specific versions of mental illness, and discusses changes to the ways that platforms handle content related to eating disorders by drawing on the concept of multiplicity to inform design.
Abstract: For individuals with mental illness, social media platforms are considered spaces for sharing and connection. However, not all expressions of mental illness are treated equally on these platforms. Different aggregates of human and technical control are used to report and ban content, accounts, and communities. Through two years of digital ethnography, including online observation and interviews, with people with eating disorders, we examine the experience of content moderation. We use a constructivist grounded theory approach to analysis that shows how practices of moderation across different platforms have particular consequences for members of marginalized groups, who are pressured to conform and compelled to resist. Above all, we argue that platform moderation is enmeshed with wider processes of conformity to specific versions of mental illness. Practices of moderation reassert certain bodies and experiences as 'normal' and valued, while rejecting others. At the same time, navigating and resisting these normative pressures further inscribes the marginal status of certain individuals. We discuss changes to the ways that platforms handle content related to eating disorders by drawing on the concept of multiplicity to inform design.
47 citations
Cites background from "First-Generation Students and Colle..."
...Research addresses the proliferation of networks and communities across these platforms as well as the content of discussions and practices of sharing [1, 5, 48, 73, 83, 109]....
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19 Apr 2018
TL;DR: In a study of IntroAssist with novice entrepreneurs, it is found that expert raters consider help requests written with the tool as more effective, and participants are able to perform introduc-tory help seeking skills after the tool is removed.
Abstract: Writing introductory help requests is a key part of develop-ing new professional connections, such as through email and other online messaging systems. This paper presents the design and an experimental evaluation of IntroAssist-a web-based tool that leverages cognitive apprenticeship in-structional methods to support writing introductory help requests through an expert-informed checklist, tagged peer examples, self-tagging, and suggested word limit. In a study of IntroAssist with novice entrepreneurs, we find that 1) expert raters consider help requests written with the tool as more effective, 2) participants are able to perform introduc-tory help seeking skills after the tool is removed, and 3) participants report being more likely to send help requests written with the tool. We present implications for the de-velopment of systems that support the initiation of profes-sional relationships.
42 citations
Cites background from "First-Generation Students and Colle..."
...And social media platforms, like Facebook, help people seek career inspiration from friends and family [33,58,65]....
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TL;DR: It is found that reporting more ‘actual’ friends on the site is predictive of social capital, but only to a point, and the explanation for these findings may be that the identity information in Facebook serves as a social lubricant, encouraging individuals to convert latent to weak ties and enabling them to broadcast requests for support or information.
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1,206 citations
"First-Generation Students and Colle..." refers background in this paper
...Moreover, researchers examining question asking in SNSs within the framework of social capital have found other relational benefits to answering questions from friends, including signaling attention to specific ties and social grooming [14, 16]....
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