Suchergebnisse

Das Ziel personalisierter Online-Angebote ist, Rezipienten bei der Informationssuche zu unterstützen. Dabei greifen sie zwangsläufig in deren Auswahlentscheidungen ein und müssen deshalb als eigenständiger Einflussfaktor empirisch erschlossen werden. Die dahinterstehenden Algorithmen kommerzieller Anbieter sind für die Forschung größtenteils eine intransparente "Black Box". Automatisierte Online-Experimente stellen eine selten eingesetzte Methode dar, die durch systematische Simulation von Nutzerverhalten die Funktionsweise von Personalisierungsalgorithmen ermitteln kann. Der Beitrag diskutiert zunächst Auswirkungen und Funktionsweise von Personalisierung und stellt daraufhin ein automatisiertes Online-Experiment am Beispiel der Google-Suche dar. Die vorgestellte Methode ermöglicht einen sozialwissenschaftlichen Zugriff auf die Funktionsweise und Inhalte von personalisierten Angeboten und fördert gleichzeitig Validität, Transparenz und Replizierbarkeit von Nutzungsstudien.

Part 7: Nordic Networking ; International audience ; In the 1970s, some people believed in using computers for making almost any information available to anyone and for supporting information exchange and discussions regardless of geographical distances. These ideas were, at that time, novel and revolutionary. Some people regarded these ideas as dangerous; for example, the Swedish Data Inspection Board (Datainspektionen) forbade people from storing email messages for longer than one month as well as from discussing political and religious issues using computerized forum systems. Although people tried hard to implement systems and had some limited success, the ideas became successful with the public usage of the internet in the 1990s. Many had hoped to realize this much earlier.

This article investigates a new communication medium—public computer conferencing—by separately and jointly analyzing two basic aspects of human communication: (1) content, the extent to which such systems can support socioemotional communication, and (2) connectivity, communication patterns among system users. Results indicate that (1) computer-mediated communication systems can facilitate a moderate exchange of socioemotional content and (2) basic network roles did not generally differ in percentage of socioemotional content. Some fundamental issues in analyzing content and networks in computer-mediated systems, such as structural equivalence versus cohesion network approaches, are discussed in light of these results.

One of the most consistent findings in experimental studies of social dilemmas is the positive influence of face-to-face communication on cooperation. The face-to-face `communication effect' has been recently explained in terms of a `focus theory of norms': successful communication focuses agents on pro-social norms, and induces preferences and expectations conducive to cooperation. 1 Many of the studies that point to a communication effect, however, do not further explore whether and to what extent the communication medium affects cooperative behavior. In this article, we ask if pro-social behavior can emerge and survive in computer-mediated environments. We show that, like face-to-face communication, computer-mediated communication also positively affects cooperation in social dilemmas, but cooperation is more difficult to establish and maintain. We argue that the discrepancy between the computer-mediated and the face-to-face communication effects is a consequence of the distinct capabilities of different media to focus agents on pro-social norms and to allow them to develop mutual expectations about future behavior.

The purpose of this study was to investigate the linguistic forms, which commonly constitute meanings in the digital environment. The data were sampled from 200 Bachelor of Science (BS) students (who had Urdu as their primary language of communication and English as one of the academic languages or the most prestigious second language) of five universities situated in Lahore, Pakistan. The procedure for analysis was conceived within much related theoretical work on text analysis. The study reveals that cyber-language is organized through patterns of use, which can be broadly classified into minimal linguistic forms constituting a meaning-making resource. In addition, the expression of syntactic mood, and discourse roles the participants technically assume tend to contribute to the theory of meaning in the digital environment. It is hoped that the study would make some contribution to the growing literature on multilingual computer-mediated communication (CMC).

This article examines how interaction by means of computer-mediated communication (CMC) affects the operation of both status differentials and power relations. The authors attempt to provide a corrective to the dominant assessment, particularly within social psychological analyses, that CMC tends to equalize status, decentralize and democratize decision making, and thus empower and liberate the individual user. This emphasis contrasts with sociological critiques employing the Foucauldian metaphor of the panopticon, claiming that power relations can actually be reinforced in CMC. The authors argue that prevailing conceptualizations of influence and power within social psychology have tended to prefigure the more optimistic account, and outline a theoretical framework in which processes of "panoptic power" in CMC are given a more concrete social psychological foundation.

This research addresses three important issues regarding interpersonal expectancy effects and communication across various modalities. The phenomena of behavioral confirmation and disconfirmation were tested in an original experiment involving 148 participants using computer-mediated communication (CMC). First, this study tested a boundary condition asserted by previous theorists about whether or not confirmation and disconfirmation could occur in communication channels without nonverbal communication. Secondly, it shed light on an important causal variable of perceived malleability of interpersonal expectancies in a novel, simultaneous test of confirmation and disconfirmation. Lastly, it verified the hyperpersonal model of CMC by demonstrating behavioral confirmation, and extended the model by specifying when disconfirmation occurs online.

Text-based interaction among humans connected via computer networks, such as takes place via email and in synchronous modes such as "chat", MUDs and MOOs, has attracted considerable popular and scholarly attention. This collection of 14 articles on text-based computer-mediated communication (CMC), is the first to bring empirical evidence from a variety of disciplinary perspectives to bear on questions raised by the new medium. The first section, linguistic perspectives, addresses the question of how CMC compares with speaking and writing, and describes its unique structural characteristics. Section two, on social and ethical perspectives, explores conflicts between the interests of groups and those of individual users, including issues of online sex and sexism. In the third section, cross-cultural perspectives, the advantages and risks of using CMC to communicate across cultures are examined in three studies involving users in East Asia, Mexico, and students of ethnically diverse backgrounds in remedial writing classes in the United States. The final section deals with the effects of CMC on group interaction: in a women's studies mailing list, a hierarchically-organized workplace, and a public protest on the Internet against corporate interests.

PurposeAdvances in information technology (IT) have resulted in the development of various computer‐mediated communication (CMC) and social networking tools. However, quantifying the benefits of utilizing these tools in the organizational context remains a challenge. In this study, the authors aim to investigate the effects of three specific tools, viz. instant messenger, email and knowledge forum, on facilitating the communication and social network at work, and their subsequent influence on individuals' work performance. Together with a social network diagram, the proposed model is validated by a survey of 59 employees of a company which embeds these three CMC and social networking tools in the work process. The key findings, implications and future research are discussed.Design/methodology/approachThe authors verify the research model with data from the Hong Kong office of an international bank headquartered in London, UK. They also collected the data on the social networks of 59 employees to draw a network diagram of the respondents using the social network analysis software UCINET.FindingsThe research model is fully supported by the survey data. Meanwhile, the social networks analysis also suggests the linkage of using IM at work and the high level of degree and high level of closeness.Originality/valueThis study provided an empirical verification of media performance theories, evidenced by interactive tools such as IM and email. This research also directly linked the elements of social network, viz. degree, closeness and betweenness, with the CMC and social network tools, the communication, interactivity, relationship, and work performance.