Statistics Canada - General Social Survey: The Internet and the way we spend our time
Folks, This was posted on Canoe.ca today: "Heavy Internet users are different 2006-08-02 09:40:00 OTTAWA (CP) - There's a new study that says heavy Internet users lead a considerably different lifestyle than people who do not surf the web. Statistics Canada says it found that heavy Net users spent less time to socializing with their spouse or partner, or their children and friends. And they tended to stay at home, showing less interest in outdoor activities than non-users." Rest of article: http://money.canoe.ca/News/Sectors/Entertainment/2006/08/02/1715240-cp.html More information about the study can be found here: http://www.statcan.ca/Daily/English/060802/d060802a.htm Happy reading, M -- Mark Bell MA student in Ball State University's Digital Storytelling program http://www.storygeek.com "The future is here...it's just not widely distributed." - Tim O'Reilly
Interesting effect ;-) As surprising as finding that people who almost always use a car for transportation lead a different lifestyle than those who exclusively use horses for transportation. And those who are almost always on the road spend less time socializing with their spouse or partner, or their children and friends. And they may also not have time to indulge in outdoor activities. So what? Sad to see this type of study reflected in the media over and over again. Regards, --u At 10:18 Uhr -0400 2.8.2006, Mark Bell wrote:
Folks,
This was posted on Canoe.ca today:
"Heavy Internet users are different 2006-08-02 09:40:00
OTTAWA (CP) - There's a new study that says heavy Internet users lead a considerably different lifestyle than people who do not surf the web.
Statistics Canada says it found that heavy Net users spent less time to socializing with their spouse or partner, or their children and friends.
And they tended to stay at home, showing less interest in outdoor activities than non-users."
Rest of article: http://money.canoe.ca/News/Sectors/Entertainment/2006/08/02/1715240-cp.html
More information about the study can be found here: http://www.statcan.ca/Daily/English/060802/d060802a.htm
Happy reading,
M
-- Mark Bell MA student in Ball State University's Digital Storytelling program http://www.storygeek.com "The future is here...it's just not widely distributed." - Tim O'Reilly _______________________________________________ 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
Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
I think it's no simple as that. 1/ Time use studies as the one mentioned often record only the major activity, to reduce the reporting burden of the respondent. So, what do you report when doing household chores and having the radio, or TV running and you listen, or hear, at the same time? The same is true of the kids in front of the screen who play a game together - is this to be reported as a PC activity or a social one? 2/ And writing emails - a social or an Internet activity? We know people largely use the Internet as an additional communication tool. So people who use the Internet for more than an hour per day for personal use will probably write quite a lot of emails. This is called asocial ? I might add: If it wouldn't be an email but a letter that takes the time - would this cause a social concern ?
*Internet use* covers personal use of the Internet over a 24-hour period and does not include use of the Internet for other reasons (e.g., work or school).
...
*Heavy users* are those who spent more than one hour on the Internet during the day
http://www.statcan.ca/Daily/English/060802/d060802a.htm If I remember well Nie also reported that heavy Internet users were less sociable face to face than others but mixed Internet use and email use. 3/ Multivariate study can provide result that contradict the Canadian results. After taking the socio-demographic composition and social capital indicators in a multivariate analysis into consideration, as we did in the SOCQUIT project, I did NOT find that regular Internet correlates with people having less contacts. Also, concerning civic activities, in my analysis based on European Social Survey data I got the contrary of the following Canadian result:
Heavy Internet users also devoted less time to participating in .., engaging in civic and volunteer activities, ... .
But maybe delving into the report will solve these contradictions - F. Thomas Ulf-Dietrich Reips wrote:
Interesting effect ;-) As surprising as finding that people who almost always use a car for transportation lead a different lifestyle than those who exclusively use horses for transportation. And those who are almost always on the road spend less time socializing with their spouse or partner, or their children and friends. And they may also not have time to indulge in outdoor activities. So what? Sad to see this type of study reflected in the media over and over again. Regards, --u
At 10:18 Uhr -0400 2.8.2006, Mark Bell wrote:
Folks,
This was posted on Canoe.ca today:
"Heavy Internet users are different 2006-08-02 09:40:00
OTTAWA (CP) - There's a new study that says heavy Internet users lead a considerably different lifestyle than people who do not surf the web.
Statistics Canada says it found that heavy Net users spent less time to socializing with their spouse or partner, or their children and friends.
And they tended to stay at home, showing less interest in outdoor activities than non-users."
Rest of article: http://money.canoe.ca/News/Sectors/Entertainment/2006/08/02/1715240-cp.html
More information about the study can be found here: http://www.statcan.ca/Daily/English/060802/d060802a.htm
Happy reading,
M
-- Mark Bell MA student in Ball State University's Digital Storytelling program http://www.storygeek.com "The future is here...it's just not widely distributed." - Tim O'Reilly _______________________________________________ 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
Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
_______________________________________________ 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
Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
-- .......................................... Dr. Frank Thomas FTR Internet Research 93110 Rosny-sous-Bois France
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
In a forthcoming paper in the Columbia Law Review, I argue that the conceptualization of the Internet as a heterotopian "other space" that is widespread within the legal and policy literature works all sorts of mischief. This study seems to be a classic example of that process at work: It presumes that if one is "on the Internet" one is somewhere else, not "here." To that extent it diverts attention from more useful inquiry into how ICTs/networked communications technologies/whatever-you-want-to-call-them* change processes that remain social. (Paper is at http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=898260 if anyone cares...) Julie -- Julie E. Cohen Professor of Law Georgetown University Law Center 600 New Jersey Ave., NW Washington, DC 20001 V 202-662-9871 F 202-662-9410 jec@law.georgetown.edu http://www.law.georgetown.edu/faculty/jec/
I think many of us have struggled to find an appropriate way to measure time spent online or (heavy) internet use. Although diaries seem a good solution often people only report one activity when in fact they are doing a number of activities. Or in the case of the PCs when they have 7 windows open at the same time and they are dipping in and out of the internet they do not consider themselves to be actually using the internet. Each of us has different definitions of what is meant by 'using the internet' and what is real contact with others. Perhaps people are now more often in touch with friends and family through email and chat, but perhaps what they say is different? Is this a quantity versus quality debate? Often people seem confused about emailing, was this included as an internet activity in this study? For many people it technically and practically is not. It is probably also difficult to separate work from personal use for many people, since personal emails are written in parallel to work emails and vacations are booked at work and work is done at home all using the internet or PCs. Extremely hard to measure therefore and frustrating to researchers. Does anyone know if there have been extensive comparative studies on the effects of different methodologies to measure internet or media use? What are the differences when you use interviews, diaries, or a survey? How does this correspond to observation of online behaviour? I know that the research has been done but I am not sure if something has been published recently in relation to this topic. I would be interested in compiling the available texts on this subject both for teaching and to inform my own work. One more note. There will always be measurement error, that's the nature of social statistics, but that's also why interpretation is so important and has to be done with caution. In the case of the Canadian survey or at least this report I think it is not measurement errors that are the problem but perhaps an over interpretation of the statistics in terms of attributing causality and strong effects. If anyone has good references on measuring media use time (especially if they are focussed on the internet) I would be interested in receiving these. Best wishes, Ellen J. Helsper Tutorial Fellow Media and Communications Department London School of Economics and Political Science Houghton Street, London WC2A 2AE E.J.Helsper@lse.ac.uk
On 3 Aug 2006, at 09:44, <E.J.Helsper@lse.ac.uk> <E.J.Helsper@lse.ac.uk> wrote:
Does anyone know if there have been extensive comparative studies on the effects of different methodologies to measure internet or media use? What are the differences when you use interviews, diaries, or a survey?
Jonathan Gershuny's papers in IT & Society and also Social Forces deal with this to an extent. His more general work covers comparisons of time use estimates from surveys vs diaries over all topic domains (not just ICT use). http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=gershuny+time+use John Robinson (Maryland) has also been active in this area for a long time. As part of a project we are currently undertaking here Paul Stoneman has written a working paper on some of these issues - including new analysis of the same longitudinal time use diary data as Gershuny but with different stats models and thus some different results. see http://www.essex.ac.uk/chimera/projects/esoctu/ He's also currently writing a new paper where he tests a number of different stats models on the same data to see if the results differ. And why. And what this means for 'interpretation' :-) If you're in Copenhagen later this month for the IATUR 2006 conference (http://www.sfi.dk/sw26297.asp) you'll get a preview. Ben ---- Dr Ben Anderson Deputy Director, Chimera, University of Essex +44 (0) 7710 187 806 http://privatewww.essex.ac.uk/~benander
I'm looking for references that review/compare Internet survey delivery systems. Either there are few or none of these references or I can't figure out the syntax for a search. I'm aware that Reips recently posted an indication that he intends to create such a resource. Can anyone suggest some good articles that review Internet survey delivery systems? Thanks, Charlie Balch LSU Doctoral Candidate, Instructional Technology (in dissertation hell) Arizona Western College, Professor CIS (my first day is in two weeks) http://charlie.balch.org mailto:charlie@balch.org
hi, i don't know if it is good enough, but may be worth looking: http://jcmc.indiana.edu/vol10/issue3/wright.html (Kevin B. Wright, Researching Internet-Based Populations: Advantages and Disadvantages of Online Survey Research, Online Questionnaire Authoring Software Packages, and Web Survey Services) currently i am using calibrum (www.calibrum.com) for my phd and happened to compare it with other tools the university has license to them: websurveyor (www.websurveyor.com) and classaps (www.classapps.com). these three unfortunately are not reviewed in the article and i haven't done it either! :-) there is also an article about online survey which i found quite useful. Burke, LA. and KE. James (2006), Using online surveys for primary research data collection: lessons from the field, International Journal of Innovation and Learning, Volume 3, Number 1/2006, pp.16-30 hope this is of some use. y ---------------------------------- Yanuar Nugroho http://myprofile.cos.com/yanuar-n Research Assistant & PhD Researcher PREST - Institute of Innovation Research The University of Manchester
Hey Charlie: I am in the same boat, and we have the Baton Rouge heat wave as usual up here in Baltimore Chris Heidelberg Morgan State University Doctoral Candidate -----Original Message----- From: air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org [mailto:air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org] On Behalf Of Charlie Balch Sent: Thursday, August 03, 2006 10:39 AM To: air-l@listserv.aoir.org Subject: [Air-l] Online Survey Reviews I'm looking for references that review/compare Internet survey delivery systems. Either there are few or none of these references or I can't figure out the syntax for a search. I'm aware that Reips recently posted an indication that he intends to create such a resource. Can anyone suggest some good articles that review Internet survey delivery systems? Thanks, Charlie Balch LSU Doctoral Candidate, Instructional Technology (in dissertation hell) Arizona Western College, Professor CIS (my first day is in two weeks) http://charlie.balch.org mailto:charlie@balch.org _______________________________________________ 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 Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
Chris, If you'll send me a direct Email address, I'll keep you posted on what I find. What is the focus of your research? BTW: I will make my complete work available to this list when it is complete. Charlie Balch LSU, AWC -----Original Message----- From: air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org [mailto:air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org] On Behalf Of Heidelberg, Chris Sent: Thursday, August 03, 2006 1:17 PM To: air-l@listserv.aoir.org Subject: Re: [Air-l] Online Survey Reviews Hey Charlie: I am in the same boat, and we have the Baton Rouge heat wave as usual up here in Baltimore Chris Heidelberg Morgan State University Doctoral Candidate -----Original Message----- From: air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org [mailto:air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org] On Behalf Of Charlie Balch Sent: Thursday, August 03, 2006 10:39 AM To: air-l@listserv.aoir.org Subject: [Air-l] Online Survey Reviews I'm looking for references that review/compare Internet survey delivery systems. Either there are few or none of these references or I can't figure out the syntax for a search. I'm aware that Reips recently posted an indication that he intends to create such a resource. Can anyone suggest some good articles that review Internet survey delivery systems? Thanks, Charlie Balch LSU Doctoral Candidate, Instructional Technology (in dissertation hell) Arizona Western College, Professor CIS (my first day is in two weeks) http://charlie.balch.org mailto:charlie@balch.org _______________________________________________ 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 Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/ _______________________________________________ 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 Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
Charles my email address is chris.heidelberg@ssa.gov and seeufilms@yahoo.com I will send you additional information when you send me your email data. -----Original Message----- From: air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org [mailto:air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org] On Behalf Of Charlie Balch Sent: Thursday, August 03, 2006 2:53 PM To: air-l@listserv.aoir.org Subject: Re: [Air-l] Online Survey Reviews Chris, If you'll send me a direct Email address, I'll keep you posted on what I find. What is the focus of your research? BTW: I will make my complete work available to this list when it is complete. Charlie Balch LSU, AWC -----Original Message----- From: air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org [mailto:air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org] On Behalf Of Heidelberg, Chris Sent: Thursday, August 03, 2006 1:17 PM To: air-l@listserv.aoir.org Subject: Re: [Air-l] Online Survey Reviews Hey Charlie: I am in the same boat, and we have the Baton Rouge heat wave as usual up here in Baltimore Chris Heidelberg Morgan State University Doctoral Candidate -----Original Message----- From: air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org [mailto:air-l-bounces@listserv.aoir.org] On Behalf Of Charlie Balch Sent: Thursday, August 03, 2006 10:39 AM To: air-l@listserv.aoir.org Subject: [Air-l] Online Survey Reviews I'm looking for references that review/compare Internet survey delivery systems. Either there are few or none of these references or I can't figure out the syntax for a search. I'm aware that Reips recently posted an indication that he intends to create such a resource. Can anyone suggest some good articles that review Internet survey delivery systems? Thanks, Charlie Balch LSU Doctoral Candidate, Instructional Technology (in dissertation hell) Arizona Western College, Professor CIS (my first day is in two weeks) http://charlie.balch.org mailto:charlie@balch.org _______________________________________________ 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 Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/ _______________________________________________ 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 Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/ _______________________________________________ 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 Join the Association of Internet Researchers: http://www.aoir.org/
participants (10)
-
Ben Anderson -
Charlie Balch -
E.J.Helsper＠lse.ac.uk -
Frank Thomas -
Heidelberg, Chris -
Julie Cohen -
Ledbetter, Andrew Michael -
Mark Bell -
Ulf-Dietrich Reips -
Yanuar Nugroho