Hello Annette, Thanks for your recommendations. To make it more clear.... I selected purposefully four facebook pages, but I don't want to analyze all their content (posts and comments). I am using a quantitative method mainly. I will analyze content qualitatively & quantitatively and then measure the level of political toleration in discussions within the pages as an estimate for the political toleration within a society. Will this change your reply? On Sun, Sep 14, 2014 at 12:55 PM, Annette Markham <amarkham@gmail.com> wrote:
Hi Noha,
Not sure what you’ve already done to establish the most appropriate sampling plan, but off the top of my head systematic is not part of random sampling. You’re probably doing a purposeful sampling. Are you taking a qualitative or quantitative orientation to the analysis? That makes a difference in how you’ll describe (and conduct) the sample.
As for further reading: Because these two books are sitting open on my desk, I can recommend these basic introductions to sampling concepts and terms:
Sarah Tracy’s textbook on qualitative research methods: covers different qualitative sampling strategies (in the chapter on interviewing). http://eu.wiley.com/WileyCDA/WileyTitle/productCd-EHEP002631.html I’ve shared a screenshot of her summary of types of sampling here, but the larger section is much more detailed: https://www.dropbox.com/s/6jmm7th5mbl0jfz/tracysamplingchart.png?dl=0
Donald Treadwell’s textbook on introducing Communication Research: presents positivist and interpretivist notions of sampling. http://www.sagepub.com/textbooks/Book237564 You can see a copy of Treadwell's chapter on sampling here: https://www.dropbox.com/s/0320vm66m0gec2w/Treadwellch8Sampling.pdf?dl=0
and here’s a nice piece that cuts deeper into the ideas and complexity of qualitative sampling:
http://corcom300-s12-lay.wikispaces.umb.edu/file/view/ARTICLE_Sampling_Quali...
Best,
annette
On 14 Sep 2014, at 11:22, Noha Nagi <noha.a.nagi@gmail.com> wrote:
Dear Professors and colleagues,
I was wondering if there are different sampling methods for internet data than the already known sampling methods.
For my research, I was thinking of taking a *systematic random sample* from facebook posts on a each of four facebook pages. I have no information about the heterogeneity between the different pages according to any variable (gender, political affiliation...) so I thought it is not stratified nor cluster, and it will be more likely a systematic sample.
Is systematic sampling* logically right*?
Did any one come across *other sampling techniques for facebook pages*? or internet data in general?
Can anyone suggest *a book to read about this*?
I would love to hear any advice from you.
Yours, *Noha A.Nagi* _______________________________________________ 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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-- *Noha A.Nagi*