Sounds like the young folks have an unemcumbered, objective understanding of the medium: "simply" a different form of interaction contextually integrated into their lives. Horrah! :) -eg
-----Original Message----- From: air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org [mailto:air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org] On Behalf Of Mechthild Maczewski Sent: Tuesday, February 28, 2006 10:11 AM To: air-l@listserv.aoir.org Subject: Re: [Air-l] teens and myspace
I also think these issues are fascinating. A few more thoughts:
From doing interviews with young people who frequently use the Internet and Cell Phones, I'm noticing that young people tend not to think of 'online', e.g.as a poor substitute for meaningful face to face interactions, but that they are in the process of integrating the technologies into their lives as different forms of interaction and communication. The opportunities and drawbacks are recognized and appreciated differently depending on who you talk to and their life contexts. Being together in a group was still talked about as a richer and preferred means of hanging out, with IM or cell communication often used to organize these.
What communication medium to choose, when to use it, what to say and how to say it, seemed to emerge from the interaction of many different factors, like location (school, home, on the road, etc.), purpose, their relationships with the other people and their own personal preferences. Embarassment seemed to pop up, when the use didn't really "fit" - for example, when the cell phone goes off in class or movie theatre and everybody turns around and looks. It will be interesting to follow, how and if these situations will change.
mechthild
********************************** Mechthild Maczewski Interdisciplinary PhD Student School of Child and Youth Care & Department of Computer Science University of Victoria, BC, Canada
Nancy Baym wrote:
The "generation" concept is interesting. We had a discussion last night in my New Com Techs and Society class about MySpace/Facebook. My students are grad students, but have gone straight to grad school from undergrad, so they're in their early/mid 20s. They admit being "addicted," but also considered it a juvenile pursuit; they were embarrassed to say they were members of that community.
Is Facebooking just another thing that "kids" grow out of? JS
This adds a whole other dimension to the issue -- for instance, many of the students I interviewed described instant messaging disdainfully as "so teenage" and were proud of themselves for maturing enough to use it less, which I think sheds a different light on recent findings that young people are using IM and not email.
It's the embarrassment factor that interests me. Do teens feel or express no embarrassment about their online socializing? If not, will they come to as they age or are the days of being embarrassed about online socializing over?
I appreciate Andrea's comments about the granularity, that it's differentiating amongst online pursuits that is important, rather than online versus offline. I do think though that this is true for adults as well -- adults are less embarrassed or ashamed when they talk about maintaining mailing lists to keep the extended family in touch, for instance, than they are when they talk about, say, spending time on discussion boards with people they don't know offline. For most adults though, the online/offline distinction (false as we net scholars know it to be) is still perceptually salient. If that is not the case for youth, that's really interesting, and does raise the question of whether it's a distinction that will no longer be relevant to anyone in a few years time, or whether they will eventually come to see a difference as they age and the social norms surrounding their interactions evolve accordingly. _______________________________________________ The air-l@listserv.aoir.org mailing list is provided by the Association of Internet Researchers http://aoir.org Subscribe, change options or unsubscribe at: http://listserv.aoir.org/listinfo.cgi/air-l-aoir.org
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