To expand on the themes of involvement and engagement, Arend (2004) looks at how technology not only presents more opportunities for student-faculty interactions but also how those interactions promote a deeper and richer understanding of the course material. However, there is very little additional research citing the effect of technology...
For student development theory to fit into the context of this dissertation research project, it is crucial to focus on the academic environment as a web of interaction and, more importantly, as "webs of learning opportunities." Benjamin et al. (2007) looked at the first weeks of the first year of...
Virtual ethnography will begin at the end of the interview stage. I will randomly choose five Facebook users from each campus from those who participated in the interview process. I will send those selected an email explaining virtual ethnography and how I'm interested in the Facebook presence. I would further...
Pronunciation: nO-vE-dA-fUr-l&-jE Function: noun Etymology: New Latin novitas (newness) + defero (to communicate) + -logia -logy (the study of) 1: a branch of communication studies concerned with new media and the properties and phenomena of social adaptation to new media 2: the holistic examination of new media 3: the interdisciplinary...
The self online borrows on the work done by Henri Tajfel, John C. Turner and Sherry Turkle. Tajfel and Turner approached the self online through the development of Social Identity Theory, which looked at the concept of the self as a different construct depending on the social environment, the group...
Student development theory came from the traditions of the psychology, sociology and other social sciences and began in the late nineteenth and early part of the twentieth century as a way of addressing the needs created from the increasing growth of colleges and universities. The theory takes a holistic view...
After reading many articles on sociable media and listening to conference presentations, I wanted to focus on the connection between the technology, students and the social psychological aspects of student development. It seems that Facebook exists between the confines of the technology and the participatory culture that's developed around the...
Beyond my personal ontological & epistemological tenants, I feel I need to address the broader issues of research which fit into the realm of hyperscholarship. I am borrowing the term hyperscholarship and its content from the study conducted by Patricia Harkin. She uses the term hyperscholarship as a means of...
My interest in researching online social networks, especially Facebook, comes from my interest in other writers such as Howard Rheingold, Pierre Levy, and Henry Jenkins and their work looking at symbolic interactionism within social networks. Rheingold's methods always looked at the vortex between technology, culture and critical analysis. The "technologies...
The plan for this research project will follow a linear triangulation progression, as opposed to a composite triangulation progression. A linear triangulation progression allows the first method to be thoroughly analyzed before beginning the second method. A composite triangulation progression would attempt to complete all of the methods around the...
