Facebook’s Hidden Potential

Author(s):  
Abdullah Saykili ◽  
Evrim Genç Kumtepe

As Social Networking Sites have come to play a greater part in our lives, more and more people interact with each other in these environments. Because social networking tools have managed to attract billions of users worldwide, they have also drawn the attention of educators. As the largest social networking site, Facebook has captured the interest of educators and educational institutions, regardless of its desirable or undesirable effects on education settings. However, empirical research on the implications of how Facebook can be utilized in English as a foreign or second language (EFL/ESL) learning and teaching setting is limited. This issue needs further exploration to provide deeper insights and meaningful conclusions. This chapter focuses on the utility of a multicultural Facebook special interest group, FaceLearning, which was created by the authors to support the EFL/ESL learning and teaching. The research attempts to map the potentials and the concerns that arise from the perspectives of three instructors involved in the study to explore the value, role, and educational implications of Facebook for EFL/ESL settings.

2015 ◽  
pp. 684-709
Author(s):  
Abdullah Saykili ◽  
Evrim Genç Kumtepe

As Social Networking Sites have come to play a greater part in our lives, more and more people interact with each other in these environments. Because social networking tools have managed to attract billions of users worldwide, they have also drawn the attention of educators. As the largest social networking site, Facebook has captured the interest of educators and educational institutions, regardless of its desirable or undesirable effects on education settings. However, empirical research on the implications of how Facebook can be utilized in English as a foreign or second language (EFL/ESL) learning and teaching setting is limited. This issue needs further exploration to provide deeper insights and meaningful conclusions. This chapter focuses on the utility of a multicultural Facebook special interest group, FaceLearning, which was created by the authors to support the EFL/ESL learning and teaching. The research attempts to map the potentials and the concerns that arise from the perspectives of three instructors involved in the study to explore the value, role, and educational implications of Facebook for EFL/ESL settings.


2019 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 157-168
Author(s):  
Mohammad Ashraful Alam ◽  
Mahmuda Akter ◽  
Saikat Alam Santona

Social networking site is an important area of research. It is a known fact that young adults and teenagers, especially students are the most avid users of online Social networking sites which have a great impact on their lives. Yet, little is known about the sardonic experiences of students in social networking sites. With approximate 22.880 million users Facebook holds its number one popularity rank. Therefore, this paper takes Facebook as commissar of these Social Networking sites and focuses to provide an insight on the victimization of Female student and tends to explore the current nature and causes of female Facebook victimization. Female students are opted because they are more vulnerable in these sites than male. This paper reports the findings of a research work that was carried out in the higher secondary educational institutions in Tangail by using a non-probability purposive sample of 15 to 26 years aged female students. 70 samples were collected through a structured questionnaire and the gleaned data was analyzed by using SPSS. This study demonstrates, although social networking site have opened up a new way of socialization, respondents had experienced several types of cyber crime in Facebok. Such experiences create a state of insecurity, depression, fear, isolation and to a very large extent suicide. It is relatively a new phenomenon and hopefully both the effective technical strategy along with public consciousness used as a useful tool to reduce female vulnerability in Facebook from individual to national level in Babgladesh.  


Author(s):  
Grainne Conole ◽  
Rebecca Galley ◽  
Juliette Culver

This paper describes a new social networking site, Cloudworks, which has been developed to enable discussion and sharing of learning and teaching ideas/designs and to promote reflective academic practice. The site aims to foster new forms of social and participatory practices (peer critiquing, sharing, user-generated content, aggregation, and personalisation) within an educational context. One of the key challenges in the development of the site has been to understand the user interactions and the changing patterns of user behaviour as it evolves. The paper explores the extent to which four frameworks that have been used in researching networked learning contexts can provide insights into the patterns of user behaviour that we see in Cloudworks. The paper considers this within the current debate about the new types of interactions, networking, and community being observed as users adapt to and appropriate new technologies.


2017 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 205630511770440 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sara Santarossa ◽  
Sarah J. Woodruff

The aim of this study was to investigate whether problematic social networking site (SNS) use (i.e., degree of dependent relationship with SNSs), total SNS time/day, total SNS friends, and specific SNS activities were related to body image (BI), self-esteem (SE), and eating disorder (ED) symptoms/concerns. A sample of young adults ( N = 147) completed an online survey which measured SNS usage, problematic SNS use, BI, SE, and ED symptom/concerns. The findings revealed that females and males spent 4.1 ± 3.9 and 2.9 ± 2.8 hr on SNS, respectively, with the majority of time spent lurking (i.e., looking at another users’ profile but not actually communicating with them). Furthermore, problematic SNS use was found to be related to BI, SE, and ED symptoms/concerns. Moreover, SNS activities, such as lurking and posting comments on others’ profiles, were found to be related to BI, whereas SNS total time was found to be related to ED symptoms/concerns. Overall, this study demonstrates the possible correlational influence of SNSs on BI, SE, and ED symptoms/concerns.


Author(s):  
Hamed Qahri-Saremi ◽  
Isaac Vaghefi ◽  
Ofir Turel

Prior studies have primarily used "variable-centered" perspectives to identify factors underlying user responses to social networking site (SNS) addiction, their predictors and outcomes. This paper extends this perspective by taking a person-centered approach to examine (1) the prototypical subpopulations (profiles) of users' extent of SNS addiction and responses to it, (2) how affiliations with these profiles can explain user behaviors toward SNS use, and (3) how personality traits can predict affiliations with these profiles. To this end, we propose a typological theory of SNS addiction and user responses to it via two empirical, personcentered studies. Study 1 draws on survey data from 188 SNS users to develop a typology of users based on the extent of their SNS addiction and their responses to it. It further examines the relations between affiliation with these profiles and users' SNS discontinuance intention, as a typical behavioral response to SNS addiction. Study 2 uses survey data from 284 SNS users to validate the user typology developed in Study 1 and investigate its relations to users' Big Five personality traits. Our findings shed light on a typology of five prototypical profiles of SNS users-cautious, regular, consonant, dissonant, and hooked-who differ in their extent of SNS addiction and their cognitive, emotional, and behavioral responses to it. Our findings also demonstrate how Big Five personality traits can predict user affiliations with these prototypical profiles.


IFLA Journal ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 44 (3) ◽  
pp. 203-222
Author(s):  
Deirdre McGuinness ◽  
Anoush Simon

This paper explores the use of social networking sites amongst the student population of a Welsh university, with particular respect to information-sharing and privacy behaviours, and the potential impact of social networking site checks by employers on future use of these sites. A mixed-methods research design incorporating both quantitative and qualitative approaches was employed to investigate the research question. Results demonstrated that participants were concerned with maintaining privacy online, and were careful with regards to posting and protecting information on social networking sites; however, protective measures were imperfect due to human and system errors. Most respondents were aware of social networking site surveillance, with many noting that this would have an impact on their future use; however, users are active in protecting their privacy through a combination of use of privacy settings and varied levels of information disclosure dependent on context.


2015 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 84-96 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul R. Brewer ◽  
Michael Habegger ◽  
Ruby Harrington ◽  
Lindsay H. Hoffman ◽  
Philip Edward Jones ◽  
...  

AbstractVoters and political candidates increasingly use social networking sites (SNSs) such as Facebook. This study uses data from an online posttest-only experiment (N = 183) in analyzing how exposure to supportive or challenging user comments on a fictional candidate's Facebook page influenced participants’ perceptions of and willingness to vote for the candidate, as well as whether candidate replies to each type of user comments affected these outcomes. Participants who viewed a page with supportive comments and “likes” reported more favorable perceptions of and greater support for the candidate, relative to participants who viewed a page with challenging comments. Thus, the appearance of interactivity between a candidate and other users on the candidate's Facebook page can shape the responses of those viewing the page. However, exposure to candidate replies to either supportive or challenging comments did not lead to significantly more favorable perceptions or a greater likelihood of voting for the candidate.


2017 ◽  
Vol 41 (4) ◽  
pp. 558-579 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jayan Chirayath Kurian ◽  
Blooma Mohan John

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore themes eventuating from the user-generated content posted by users on the Facebook page of an emergency management agency. Design/methodology/approach An information classification framework was used to classify user-generated content posted by users including all of the content posted during a six month period (January to June 2015). The posts were read and analysed thematically to determine the overarching themes evident across the entire collection of user posts. Findings The results of the analysis demonstrate that the key themes that eventuate from the user-generated content posted are “Self-preparedness”, “Emergency signalling solutions”, “Unsurpassable companion”, “Aftermath of an emergency”, and “Gratitude towards emergency management staff”. Major user-generated content identified among these themes are status-update, criticism, recommendation, and request. Research limitations/implications This study contributes to theory on the development of key themes from user-generated content posted by users on a public social networking site. An analysis of user-generated content identified in this study implies that, Facebook is primarily used for information dissemination, coordination and collaboration, and information seeking in the context of emergency management. Users may gain the benefits of identity construction and social provisions, whereas social conflict is a potential detrimental implication. Other user costs include lack of social support by stakeholders, investment in social infrastructure and additional work force required to alleviate the technological, organisational, and social barriers in communication among stakeholders in emergency management. A collective activity system built upon the Activity Theory was used as a lens to describe users’ activity of posting content on the Facebook page of an emergency management agency. Practical implications By analysing the findings, administrators and policy makers of emergency management could identify the extent to which the core principles of disaster recovery are accomplished using public social networking sites. These are achieved in relation to: pre-disaster recovery planning; partnership and inclusiveness; public information messaging; unity of effort; and, psychological recovery to maximise the success of recovery in a disaster. Furthermore, a core principle which evoked a mixed response was timeliness and flexibility. Originality/value Previous studies have examined the role of social networking sites in disastrous situations, but to date there has been very little research into determining themes found in user-generated content posted on the Facebook page of an emergency management agency. Hence, this study addresses the gap in literature by conducting a thematic analysis of user-generated content posted on the Facebook page of the Federal Emergency Management Agency.


Author(s):  
Mark Anthony Camilleri

There are numerous assumptions on research evaluation in terms of quality and relevance of academic contributions. Researchers are becoming increasingly acquainted with bibliometric indicators, including; citation analysis, impact factor, h-index, webometrics and academic social networking sites. In this light, this chapter presents a review of these concepts as it considers relevant theoretical underpinnings that are related to the content marketing of scholars. Therefore, this contribution critically evaluates previous papers that revolve on the subject of academic reputation as it deliberates on the individual researchers' personal branding. It also explains how metrics are currently being used to rank the academic standing of journals as well as higher educational institutions. In a nutshell, this chapter implies that the scholarly impact depends on a number of factors including accessibility of publications, peer review of academic work as well as social networking among scholars.


2018 ◽  
Vol 57 (5) ◽  
pp. 1131-1159 ◽  
Author(s):  
Felix N. Koranteng ◽  
Isaac Wiafe ◽  
Eric Kuada

This article investigates how students’ online social networking relationships affect knowledge sharing and how the intensity of knowledge sharing enhances students’ engagement. It adopts the social capital theory as the basis for investigation, and the partial least square structural equation modeling was used to examine the hypothesized model. Responses from 586 students in higher education were analyzed. The findings provided empirical evidence which contradicts the argument that students perceive social networking sites as an effective tool for learning. Also, contrary to previous studies which posit that knowledge sharing impacts engagement, it was observed that there is no relationship between the two. However, as social networking sites differ in terms of member behavior norms, it is envisaged that if a similar study is conducted and limited to a specific academically inclined social networking site such as Academia.edu, ResearchGate, Mendeley, and so on, different findings may be observed.


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