research methodology - justification internet and lying
Hi there, I have just joined this list so please do forgive any etiquette problems I have with regards to how it's written etc. I am a sociology student in my honours year. The reason I have joined is because my thesis research is being carried out online and I am in need of advice with regards to the methodological justification. In essence I am carrying out online discussions in a chat room environment. The room has been set up by myself and only people taking part in the discussion are present. The problem I am being faced with is that of the internet and 'lying'. It is suggested by those with more knowledge than I that the methodology is rubbish as I cannot possibly tell if those taking part are lying, due to lack of body language. I contested this by pointing out that people can lie in face to face discussion also and it may be difficult to pick up on. Also it is my opinion that people in a familiar environment (ie at their own pc) may in actual fact be more at ease and this will therefore lead to a more honest response. Of course as a lowly honours student my opinion is worthless, so it is this that I need help with. Does anyone have any solid research I can justify this methodology with? I already have a few good links courtesy of the sociopranos board, but any further assistance would be great! Thanks for your time. Any help is greatly appreciated. Angela --------------------------- Sociopranos - Society Redefined www.sociopranos.com All new members welcome!
Angela, Unfortunately, I don't have many good citations of research on lying. I am sure others on this list do. There's work on play and performance of alternative identities online (see Brenda Danet's essay in Steve Jones' Cybersociety 2.0 as an example, or Sherry Turkle's Life on the Screen). I've seen other research (no cite off the top of my head, though) that suggests few people actually engage in, for example, gender switching online. Gender switching, one could argue, is not lying, but in essence the performance online is one that is somehow different than is true to one's "nature" (whatever that might be from moment to moment). So, while it is *possible* for people to play and behave in ways different from how they might behave offline, there is a real question regarding whether many people actually take advantage of the textual environment online to behave differently. My own research on why people talk politics online suggests that, at least for the folks I interviewed, they felt more comfortable expressing their true opinions. Because of the online environment, they felt less inhibited to express their real thoughts on political matters, even when others found those opinions to be racist, xenophobic, etc. In other words, they felt less likely to hide their true opinions when debating online than if they were debating offline. Now, this is reported behavior, so people hypothetically could be lying to me, but I don't think so. For one, their statements came spontaneously out of general questions about why they like participating on their chosen discussion space. And, second, a number of my interviewees made similar claims. They can't all be lying to me :-). Now, in this case I'm interested in lying or at least not revealing one's true opinion online in an argumentation sense, and not whether they are masquerading some alternative identity. Which raises the question of in which sense of lying do you mean, performing alternative identities, or arguing something that is an untruth or against what one genuinely believes? ~Jenny Stromer-Galley Assistant Professor Department of Communication, SS 340 University at Albany, SUNY 1400 Washington Avenue Albany, NY 12222 jstromer@albany.edu 518-442-4879
Hi Angela, I agree with what Jennifer wrote. Additionally, here are some thoughts.
In essence I am carrying out online discussions in a chat room environment. The room has been set up by myself and only people taking part in the discussion are present. The problem I am being faced with is that of the internet and 'lying'.
First, lying is possible in any setting, as you've noted. Having said that, however, the internet does provide good opportunity for it. Whether this fact is important or not depends in great part on the research question you're trying to ask. Are you using the chatroom as a convenient way to do focus group interaction? Or are you interviewing these people in context, with some goal of trying to understand their performance of identity online, the way they play with language and identity, the way they interact in this setting, etc. Another way to get at this issue is to ask: Are you doing research OF the internet or are you USING the internet as a methods tool for your research? (borrowing from Mann and Stewart here)
It is suggested by those with more knowledge than I that the methodology is rubbish
I love your sentence here, but the methodology of interviewing in chatrooms is not rubbish. Again, it all depends on the goal of your research and the specific questions you're trying to explore.
as I cannot possibly tell if those taking part are lying, due to lack of body language. I contested this by pointing out that people can lie in face to face discussion also and it may be difficult to pick up on. Also it is my opinion that people in a familiar environment (ie at their own pc) may in actual fact be more at ease and this will therefore lead to a more honest response. Of course as a lowly honours student my opinion is worthless, so it is this that I need help with. You're definitely on the right track here: Internet communication highlights both the absence and performance of socio-emotional cues, nonverbal language, and so forth. This feature of computer mediated communication is a good reminder of our limitations in any research setting to assess accurately the extent to which a participant is lying or not with.
Along the same lines, "honesty" may not be the best criteria to use to assess the quality of responses, content of responses, or the respondents themselves. Lived experience may never be truly honest....and who are the judges? Surely not us researchers! Maybe delve more deeply and ask yourself what you're really trying to get at by doing this study. If you're trying to understand how people perform and enact their everyday lives, you can only go by what they say and perform. And any interpretation you conduct will be through your own perspective and way of representing them. A different criteria for validating, qualifying, or otherwise justifying your interpretation as credible or good might be useful. If you're trying to understand how they really feel about some issue, and you're using the internet as a convenient interviewing tool, I recommend Mann and Stewart's book on Internet Research. In any case, it's worth the time to consider what is meant by "lying" anyway, which is part of what Jennifer is getting at in her response. Again, you may be able to more clearly defend your method by asking if it's a good fit with the question you're trying to get at.
Does anyone have any solid research I can justify this methodology with? I already have a few good links courtesy of the sociopranos board, but any further assistance would be great! Again, Mann and Stewart's book useful. Also, frankly, any good contemporary methodology text that discusses interpretive qualitative methods and addresses issues of knowing and representation would be useful.
Another recommendation: Denzin and Lincoln's Handbook of Qualitative Research. Then, here's a link to an early draft of a chapter I've written that will be forthcoming in the spring (in Online Social Research: Methods, Issues, and Ethics, editors Sarina Chen, Jon Hall, and Mark Johns). You might find some points or sources useful. http://ascend.comm.uic.edu/~amarkham/lectures/markhamDRAFT.htm Good luck with your project, Annette Annette N. Markham, Ph.D. Department of Communication University of Illinois at Chicago 1007 W. Harrison St. (m/c 132) Chicago, IL 60607-7137 Tel: 312-413-2124 amarkham@uic.edu <http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/stores/detail/-/books/0761990313/glance/104-0668328-2787956>Life Online: Researching Real Experiences in Virtual Space ******************
Just a quick addendum to Annette's excellent (as usual) suggestions... She's absolutely right, from my perspective, regarding the value and quality of the Mann and Stewart volume - especially the chapter on ethics. In addition to everything else that has been said (including in the aoir ethics report), I'd wonder if the following might also be helpful. I've suggested a version of the Golden Rule (yes, I know, it's been criticized - the reference is in the aoir ethics report - but I think that criticism can be countered) that runs as follows: "Never treat a person who participates in research in a way you would not be comfortable explaining to that person face to face" and "before you decide on how to conduct your research, ask yourself: If I was the person who take part in research, how would I like to be treated?" To get to this in a slightly different way: if (a) there is a good probability of benefits emerging from your research, and (b) whatever risks might result from your lies accruing to the participants would be small, - would your situation be analogous to the sorts of lies we tell people (e.g., because we may be required to by reason of confidentiality (very serious) to the more pedestrian sorts of white lies (keeping a surprise for a birthday party, etc.) that, while uncomfortable at the time, are lies that, once revealed, they agree are justified (on grounds of beneficence, etc.)? If so, then perhaps such lies are ethically justifiable. Hope this helps - and cheers! Charles Ess Director, Interdisciplinary Studies Center Drury University 900 N. Benton Ave. Voice: 417-873-7230 Springfield, MO 65802 USA FAX: 417-873-7435 Home page: http://www.drury.edu/ess/ess.html Co-chair, CATaC 2002: http://www.it.murdoch.edu.au/~sudweeks/catac02/ Exemplary persons seek harmony, not sameness. -- Analects 13.23 From: Annette Markham <amarkham@uic.edu> Reply-To: air-l@aoir.org Date: Tue, 19 Nov 2002 12:37:01 -0600 To: air-l@aoir.org Subject: Re: [Air-l] research methodology - justification internet and lying <remainder deleted to meet space requirements of air-list>
Hi Angela, here are some references I found on authenticity on the Internet for something I wrote recently: Kendall (in Steve Jones, Doing Internet Research) claims that spending time in an online community and getting to know the particular norms of the group compensates for the absence of facial cues online and also increases the researcher�s ability to evaluate the authenticity of responses. In online communities, members often apply an informal system of checks and criticize messages, which do not appear credible (see Smyres, 'Virtual Corporeality: Adolescent Girls and Their Bodies in Cyberspace.' Research Methodology Online, http://www.socio.demon.co.uk/magazine/6/smyres.html) Here's a quote from Tobin about a young Internet user who contests Turkle's idea of identity play on the Internet: �Unless I am playing a role playing game, I�m always myself on the Net. I never lie or make stuff up when I write to the list. I�m sure there are people who do, but I despise them, just like I despise people who lie and boast in real life.� Tobin, J. (1998). An American Otaku (or, a Boy�s Virtual Life on the Net). In J. Sefton-Green (ed.). Digital Diversions: Youth Culture in the Age of Multimedia (pp. 106-127). London: UCL Press. Finally, as Christine Hine writes in "Virtual Ethnography" there is no point in establishing if what someone says is the truth because authenticity should not be seen as absolute. It is instead "situationally negotiated and sustained [...] A search for truly authentic knowledge about people or phenomena is doomed to be ultimately irresolvable. The point for the ethnographer is not to bring some external criterion for judging whether it is safe to believe what informants say, but rather to come to understand how it is that informants judge authenticity." (p. 49) Hope that helps. Best, Magda Magdalena Bober Dept. of Information & Communications Manchester Metropolitan University United Kingdom http://www.mmu.ac.uk/h-ss/dic/people/mbhome.html __________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Web Hosting - Let the expert host your site http://webhosting.yahoo.com
Dear Angela, not sure if my article will help: Whitty, M.T. (2002). Liar, Liar! An examination of how open, supportive and honest people are in Chat Rooms. Computers in Human Behavior, 18 (4), 343-352. If you want I copy I can send you one. Good luck with your project Monica
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-- Dr. Monica Whitty Lecturer Coordinator of the Bachelor of Liberal Studies University of Western Sydney School of Applied Social & Human Sciences Werrington North Campus Locked Bag 1797 DC PENRITH SOUTH 1797 NSW Australia http://www.uws.edu.au/vip/mwhitty Ph: +61 2 9678 7186 Facsimilie: +61 2 9678 7120
participants (6)
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Annette Markham -
Charles Ess -
Jennifer Stromer-Galley -
Magda Bober -
Monica Whitty -
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