SOCIOLOGY 167 QUIZ 1

Google is making us stupid

- Google has rewired the ways in which we read and process information - we now seek short and simple answers, we skim articles

Density

- a measure of how close a network is by displaying all of the possible ties - all the strong ties in a network compared to the number of people who know each other

Virtual communities as "real communities"

- a social unit of any size that shares common values - may manifest differently in different cultures

Bonding social capital

- associated with strong ties - parent supporting your education, emotional support

Bridging social capital

- associated with weak ties - for example, info about job opportunities

Hyperpersonal space

- computer mediated communication = freer of social judgments - less emphasis on appearance, more on conversation

Gender and SNS (kin-keepers)

- female use = 80% - male use = 73%

Facebook use and social capital

- leads to greater bridging - mitigates the fear of rejection and facilitates convo - maintains the connection between weak ties

Actor-Network Theory

- networks are materially heterogeneous - objects and materials must be analyzed as actors too! - equality of analytical importance assigned to different agents in a network

Pervasive awareness

- passively keeping up with other people - helps users identify the person most equipped to provide a particular resource

'Real' communities

- shares common values - may manifest differently in different cultures

Technology determinism

- technologies have their own inertia, totally separate from the influences of people. - technological change comes from outside society as part of an autonomous scientific development - technically maybe even cause change

Duality of Technology

- technology is the product of human action while it also assumes structural properties (structural model) - an example, perhaps, of how technology and society are embedded in one another (Orlikowski 1992)

Heterogenous Network

- the social is a network of heterogeneous materials - networks are composed of people, AS WELL AS machines, animals, texts, money, architecture, and many other materials

Dunbar's number

150 persons in a network

Seek and ye shall find

If you search hard enough for something (friends online), you will find it

Three Periods of History

McLuhan divides this into - oral (traditional societies) - writing and print (modern societies) - electrical (global societies)

The WELL

Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link one of the first virtual communities

Bridge

a "bridge" is the only path between two points/nodes, or when there is only one connection that ties an entire group to another. Important to note is that all bridges are weak ties, but not all weak ties are bridges

Medium Theory

a system of ideas that explores the potential influence of the means of expression of communication (technological) impact the meanings of human communication

Alone together

book by Sherry Turkle, where she proposes a dystopian view of technology (we need it when most vulnerable; increased anxiety; alienation)

Bowling alone

by Putnam; he writes about decline in social capital since 1950 and how it has negative effects, including undermining civic engagement which is necessary for a strong democracy

YMMV (Your Mileage May Vary)

how you use virtual communities will affect your experience and what you get out of it

Solitude vs Loneliness

loneliness is where being alone feels like a problem to be fixed, but solitude is being secure while being by oneself

Strength of ties (measurements)

measured through emotional attachment, frequency of interaction, time commitment, closeness

Technopanic

moral panics about contemporary technology

Dystopian discourse

more "negative" feelings about technology - shallow communication - social isolation - privatism - decline in network diversity - laziness - moral degradation - loss of privacy

Utopian discourse

more "positive" feelings about technology - more supportive networks - shrinking of time and space - increase in network diversity - connect with similar others - greater political engagement - freedom

Goldilocks Principle

not too close not too far, but just right

Strong ties

peer group and kinship contacts which are quantitatively small but qualitatively powerful

Social compensation

people who are more introverted are active online to compensate for real life

Interactivity

refers to the ability of a communication tool to facilitate social interaction between groups or individuals

Temporal Structure

refers to the time it takes to send and receive messages

Second Generation of Medium Theory

says that social identity is based on your social roles as defined by your social network

Virtual Community

social aggregations that emerge from the internet when enough people carry on those public discussions long enough, with sufficient human feeling, to form webs of personal relationships in cyberspace

Fear of missing out

social media users' fear that others are engaging in activities without them, constant connection leads to anxiety about no communication

Domestication of technology

technology become so normal in our environment that it become part of the landscape

Social shaping

the concept that there are choices (though not necessarily conscious choices) inherent in both the design of individual artifacts and systems, and in the direction or trajectory of innovation programs

Interpretive Flexibility

the degree to which users can alter and decide how they want to use the technology (Orlikowski 1992)

Robotic Moment

the moment in the near future, introduced by Professor Turkle, when humans will merge with robotic companions in dramatic ways, resulting in new species of super-intelligent beings and new kinds of relationships

Strength of weak ties

the notion that relatively weak ties often turn out to be quite valuable because they yield new information

Social capital

the sum of the resources, actual or virtual, that accrue to an individual or a group by virtue of possessing a durable network of more or less institutionalized relationships of mutual acquaintance and recognition

Homophily

the tendency for people to seek out or be attracted to those who are similar to themselves. In simpler terms, similarity breeds connection.

Social cues

the verbal and nonverbal features of a message that offer more information about the context, the meaning, and the identities of the involved parties

Social constructivism

theoretical perspective that focuses on people's collective efforts to impose meaning on the world

Rich get richer

this model predicts that those who are highly sociable and have existing social support will get more social benefit from using the internet

Latent ties

ties that are technically possible but have not been activated yet

Social Media

tools used to create and interact in virtual communities and online networks

Punctualization

we simplify the networks into singular objects and ignore other connected networks

SNS

web-based services that allow individuals to... - construct a public or semi-public profile within a bounded system - articulate a list of other users with whom they share a connection - view and traverse their list of connections and those made by others within the system

Social decapitalization

why is it happening: women joining labor force, increased mobility, people moving more, demographic changes-divorce up, marriages down, fewer children, lower wages, technology replacing other forms of leisure (does not include face to face engagements)

Moral Panic

widespread social fear over a group of deviants who display a behavior that is considered "evil"