Virtual Methods : Issues in Social Research on the Internet
Virtual Methods : Issues in Social Research on the Internet
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虚拟方法:互联网社会研究问题
DOI：
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发表时间：
2007
期刊：
影响因子：
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通讯作者：
George Macgregor
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
George Macgregor
对于图书馆和信息科学来说，网络的出现继续挑战我们对专业的理解以及我们为用户提供的服务。迎接这一挑战绝不是一个简单的过程，但有些人可能会说，我们的努力得到了帮助，因为作为一个专业，我们自己公布了许多上述发展。有些人可能还会说，我们的努力得益于我们学科相对线性的性质。在LIS中有许多研究问题有利于定量分析和强有力的定性探索;例如，与LIS相关的社会学和人类学问题占研究的少数。社会科学和人文科学的情况则大不相同。在这里，网络催生了大量新的社会形态。个人和社会通过网站、社交软件、电子邮件、移动的通信技术和其他形式的计算机介导通信（CMC）进行交流和组织。CMC已经成为正常社会生活的重要组成部分，因此社会研究人员必须研究，解释和理解这些丰富的互动及其暴露的社会问题。然而，社会研究人员对这些现象的分析充满了困难和忧虑。获取可靠的数据仍然很困难，目前还不清楚以前的方法框架在这些虚拟环境中的适用性。
For library and information science, the advent of the web continues to challenge our understanding of the profession and the services we provide to users. Meeting this challenge is by no means a simple process, but some might say that we are aided in our efforts by virtue of the fact that, as a profession, we have promulgated many of the said developments ourselves. Some might also say that we are aided in our efforts by the relatively linear nature of our discipline. There are many research questions within LIS which are conducive to quantitative analyses and robust qualitative explorations; sociological and anthropological questions relating to LIS account for a minority of research, for example. The situation is quite different for those in the social sciences and humanities. Here, the web has given rise to a plethora of new social formations. Individuals and societies communicate and organise themselves via web sites, social software, email, mobile communication technologies, and other forms of Computer-Mediated Communication (CMC). CMC has become such a significant component of normal social life that it is imperative social researchers research, interpret and understand these rich interactions and the social questions they expose. Yet, analyses of such phenomena by social researchers are fraught with difficulty and apprehension. Capturing robust data remains difficult and it is unclear how applicable previous methodological frameworks are within these virtual contexts.