Joseph Kerekes – jck46 Blue blog Chris McNally – csm44 Blue blog
Sources for data:
Our inter-rater reliability was around what Braithwaite’s study found, at 83.3%. The percent of messages for each supracategory were different, but the top three categories of our study were the same as Braithwaite’s. This was somewhat expected, as 20 posts is a rather small sample size compared to the 1100 or so posts Braithwaite’s study coded. The numbers were expected to be different. It was surprising to find no tangible or network support messages, as well as no humor in our post selections, but tangible and network had very low percentages in the main study, so with a small sample size it is not unreasonable to not see them surface. The humor was not numerically analyzed by the study, but the coders in the Braithwaite study indicated that humor was an important part of how the disability support group functioned. In our examination we found that humor was not present in any of the posts we chose. This may have been a function of the groups we chose to analyze, or the smaller sample size of our analysis.
Under examination through Walther and Boyd's four dimensions of attraction to online social support we find strong support for the theory in the comments and threads analysed. Many posters seemed very forthcoming and the responses to threads usually seemed to strength that candidness by the four dimensions.
Some people responded very analytically and professionally to certain posts, for example in post 12 of plasmacytomas. This lends weight to the social distance component of Walther's dimensions in that people believe that advice from strangers will be more objective. All posters seemed to us a pseudonym or simply a first name. This represents the anonymity component of Walther and Boyd's theory. People were forthcoming with there problems as thread starters and as responders trying to provide esteem support. As for interaction management, the third dimension, the forum provides for posters to post and read at the leisure, hours apart. There are a fair amount of posts that use relatively normal grammar and vocabulary with little internet jargon and short cuts hours or days apart. This shows a level of focus on the writing of the post that reflects a certain level of craftsmanship of the text. Finally, the last dimension, access, was reflected in the postings as people were posting in the early morning, afternoon, night, all the time. It is easy to see the convenience of being able to post whenever one has a problem.
Overall we can see a strong undercurrent of Walther and Boyd's four dimensions in the sample of posts that we reviewed for coding.
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