Reading 'The Daily' -- the statscan report -- rather than the media account, it seems to me there are a number of places where the write-up is causing confusion. Two things in particular stand out -- the use of "the day" appears to mean literally the one day asked about, not a general measure of daily activity. Respondents filled out a diary for on 24 hour period. However, to me the term 'day' means daylight/9-5 hours, and hence the report is confusing (although if you look at the questionnaire it is quite clearly the 24 hour period). The other thing is that the report implies causality, e.g., "Internet use takes away from the time that its heavy users devote to both family life and chores around the house" -- but there is no comparison of before and after, so the statement about 'taking away from' is unsubstantiated. (In my quick look at the questions, there seems to be only one question that asks about prior experience -- asking about whether people feel more rushed now than 5 years ago). It's a lesson on how to write clearly and not to go beyond the interpretations possible from the data collected. I think it is also worth looking at the results themselves to get the best view of the work. /Caroline ---- Original message ----
Date: Wed, 2 Aug 2006 10:08:32 -0500 From: "Ledbetter, Andrew Michael" <aledbett@ku.edu> Subject: Re: [Air-l] Statistics Canada - General Social Survey: The Internet andthe way we spend our time To: <air-l@listserv.aoir.org>
I'm particularly concerned by the study's operationalization of heavy Internet users as "those who spent more than one hour on the Internet during the day" for personal reasons---though I appreciate the study's attempt to at least separate personal use from work/school use, I wonder if that is really possible for a group such as students, who tend to multitask online (even beyond students, how commonly do people write an e-mail or IM while also "studying" or "at work"? How was this accounted for in the study, if at all?).
And I'm even more troubled by the study's seeming assumption that Internet use cannot yield satisfying and meaningful relational interaction. Since results found that most heavy users spend their time using the Internet engaged in interpersonal and group communication, and talked on the phone more, and were less stressed... might one conclude that the study's heavy users are connected, media-savvy extraverts who lead richly satisfying and stress- reducing social lives?
Andrew M. Ledbetter Ph.D. Candidate and Graduate Teaching Assistant Department of Communication Studies University of Kansas ________________ _______________________________________________ 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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---------------------------------------- Caroline Haythornthwaite Associate Professor Graduate School of Library and Information Science, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign 501 East Daniel St., Champaign IL 61820