My experience with computers began in 1985 as I learned the beauty of Logo on a Packard Bell computer at the vocation school and the ability of a turtle to move through an electronic field by giving the turtle directions. I’ve enjoyed writing programs for computers in BASIC, simple JAVA and ActionScript for years. The connection to the world of cyberstudies came from my first experience on a bulletin board system (BBS) during my middle school years. I got to see virtual interactions on a textual level. Little did I know that I would be studying those interactions for my doctorate later in life.
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...
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...
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...
Me back in my Radio Shack days working on my dissertation. This article formed part of my proposal. The reason that I want to use a triangulation method is that I believe that the convergence of different methods can lead to a better understanding of the research and the "gaps...
The purpose of my dissertation will be to observe incoming "traditional freshmen" (e.g. 18- to-20 year old students coming to college for the first time) at three Midwestern universities whose hometowns are small towns, where the population is less than 5,000 residents, and see how those freshmen use Facebook as...
A majority of the analysis will come under the theoretical framework already laid out by Jenkins and Rheingold. Henry Jenkins has been a tremendous influence on my work for the past couple of years. "Convergence Culture" is a strong theoretical work and an exemplar of praxis in the field. Jenkins...
Berger adds several concepts to the discussion, including how filters used by individual users of a community can impact the methods of communication used by their community. His work also helped begin the debate on approaching this research for a multi-disciplinary framework, as Berger's work used elements from history, sociology,...
