fredag 18 september 2015

theme 3 - first post

Short summary of journal:
Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, is a web-based journal which focuses on social science research on communication with computer-based media technology. It is one of the oldest web-based journals and has been publishing since 1995.

It publishes a great variety of work by scholars in communication, business, education, political science, sociology, psychology, media studies, information science, and other disciplines. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication has an impact factor of: 3.117[1].

Short summary of paper:
I chose to read ”Channeling science information seekers´ attention? A content analysis of top-ranked vs. lower-ranked sites in Google” from the mentioned journal. The aim of the study was to find out if there is any differ with information about nanotechnology between popular sights and less popular. The paper start of very interesting and it is easy to follow the logical reasoning where it is going and the background of it. When Google presents different links on where you can read more about what you have searched for it is not an accident that some likes places higher than others. The rank of the different links depends on algorithms and one of the variables are popularity amongst the viewers, which means that when a website reaches the top it easily stay there. This leads to that a very wide field can become pretty narrow and in a way misleading for the audience. 

The method of the study there was a bit of a limitation sense they did not have access to all the data of all the links. And the theory is of the type that it is hard to predict. So what they compared was the differences of content for the top ten links with 11-37. I felt like the method was disconnected from the aim and tried to do too much, but the discussion around the result made the study get back on track.

I my opinion the study could have been a bit narrower so that the conclusion could have answered something. But other than that I think it emphasized some interesting questions and it showed that there is more to find out and investigate within this area. But since the theory is of its kind this is not something you can expect.

1.     Briefly explain to a first year university student what theory is, and what theory is not.
Theory is something that is very fundamental, and it has to be a part of whatever journal you are writing. No matter how good your study is, you have to have a theory if you want it to get published.
What a strong theory should do is: “emphasize the nature of casual relationships, identifying what comes first as well as the timing of such events.”

But there is no magical way of getting a strong theory, but Sutton, R. I. and Staw, B. M. (1995) has tried to make it a little clearer but explaining what is not a theory.
1, Your references are not your theory sense no logic are presented
2, Data are not your theory, your data presents that “what” while theory should present “why”
3, Lists of variables or constructions are not theory.
4, Diagram are not theory, just more like stage props.
5, Hypotheses or predictions are not the same as theory, describes “what” you can expect not “why”. It is more like the bridge between data and theory.

2.     Describe the major theory or theories that are used in your selected paper. Which theory type (see Table 2 in Gregor) can the theory or theories be characterized as?
The major theory in the selected paper describes why there are differences of what a “Googler[2]” will read about depending on the rank of the links. Why it could be that the people can have a different idea in general about a certain area even though there are different opinions about it amongst scientist and other more informed people.
The type of theory would be: Theory of explanation. Since the theory explain how it looks like and why, it gives a greater understanding and insight into the phenomena of interest.

3.     Which are the benefits and limitations of using the selected theory or theories?
The benefits with the selected theory: “theory of explanation” is, like said in the answer above, the clearness of it and it gives you a good understanding of the subject.
The limitations are that the theory does not provide any aim to predict with any precision. Which makes it hard to test and therefor the answer well be more general and in this study answered with more questions.



[2]  Person who searches on Google.

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