I am bemuzzled by the Colorado teen internet survey which Reid Cornwell has shared with us. Here is what he posted: "The Center For Internet Research just completed an online survey. While the results are preliminary the trends are clear and as follows: * Links to the survey form were sent via email to 2000 Colorado teens between 14 and 18 * 1,000 were in rural settings and 1,000 were urban * 1,123 people responded * 610 rural kids responded (insignificant gender differences) * 515 urban kids responded (insignificant gender differences) * All respondents reported that they participated in some sort of real-time chatting * All reported that they did so while doing other tasks (homework etc.) * All reported that they preferred this form of communication rather than telephone * All reported that they spent more time chatting online or emailing than they spent in f2f activities * All reported that they downloaded music at some time * All reported that they share music, links data, and homework with their friends * All reported that they valued technical skills of their peers and it appears that kids who help them keep their devices working had certain status * All reported that they did not perceive a peer to peer negative reaction related to computer use or skills * All reported that kids who did not use these devices were seen as odd or different. (stigma)" /END PREVIOUS POST This apparently is an internet-only population. A few questions: 1. What was the sampling frame? Was it a random sample? 2. What was the response rate? 3. And most importantly, I am immensely impressed that All of the respondents agreed in All of the items mentioned above. Even Brezhnev only had 99% or so voting for him in USSR elections in the 1980s, as I recall. What is it about Colorado teens that they agree with each other so thoroughly? Barry _____________________________________________________________________ Barry Wellman Professor of Sociology NetLab Director wellman at chass.utoronto.ca http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/~wellman Centre for Urban & Community Studies University of Toronto 455 Spadina Avenue Toronto Canada M5S 2G8 fax:+1-416-978-7162 To network is to live; to live is to network _____________________________________________________________________