HELPING PEOPLE'S

Vanessa Torres van Grinsven is a researcher at the University of Utrecht. Opinion surveys: they are all around us. Who hasn’t received a request – by mail, telephone, email or through one of those annoying pop-up windows on websites?  But, why do researchers even bother? Why are our opinions, our feelings and experiences even important for researchers? Our opinions matter for a whole lot of purposes: brands perhaps would like to know if and how we appreciate their products. Decision-makers would like to know how we feel about certain policy issues. Social researchers would like to find out, how, for example, people that are ill experience the healthcare system, or how elderly feel about the care they are receiving at retirement homes. One way to find out about these opinions, feelings and experiences is to ask people, like by sending out surveys or doing interviews.  There are though also other possible ways for doing opinion research. Nowadays, more and more people are becomi...

Wilma Garvin is currently undertaking research into organisation development and the role of women in business in the 21st century and lectures at the Docklands Business School, University of East London.  My research was to review approaches to organization development in multinationals and government departments in order to create specific case studies. The method used was to undertake face to face and telephone interviews. Sampling using probability sampling seemed a logical approach since the objective was to interview Heads of Organisation Development (OD) or similar i.e. senior people responsible for Organisation Development. Linkedin was used as the social media. I use Linkedin on a regular basis and I am a member of several OD networks. It seemed like the ideal way to identify and make contact with potential participants. Therefore, the opportunity was already being in OD networks and having contacts either in OD or with contacts in their networks in OD. The challenge was ...

If you can't attend our knowledge exchange seminar on Jan. 28th why not join us the debate by registering for our ' Qualitative Research and Social Media' Webinar on February 5, 2013 . The time is: 16:00 GMT/UTC, 17:00 CET, 12 pm EST, 11 am CST, 10 am MST and 9 am PST. Please email:claire.ashby@natcen.ac.uk to reserve a space and receive log-in information. New Social Media, New Social Science? The project title suggests a number of questions. “New Social Media?” While the big commercial networks of Facebook, Twitter and Linked In are generally thought of as synonymous with “social media,” what are the emerging new media sites, communities and approaches and how are they being used, by whom, for what purpose? And, how can scholars use social media as modes of communication with participants or as research sites? New Social Science? In recent years we have seen “new” interdisciplinary social science fields emerge, such as Sustainability Studies (science, management, public p...

Paul Hepburn is from the Institute for Social Change,  Manchester University, you can contact him at paul.hepburn@manchester.ac.uk.  Questions about researching the Internet are as old as arguments about its potential for democratic renewal. A case study into how the online network was used by those contesting the Manchester Congestion Charge referendum hits both these nails on the head. Using an innovative research approach this study explored the question: Can online engagement enhance local democracy or will it be another route ‘… for the sad, the mad, the bad and the very, very rich’ to exert their influence on the policy making process? The research design drew upon both quantitative and qualitative analysis to explore the online network in question. Firstly the web crawling software VOSON (http://voson.anu.edu.au/) was used to capture the online hyperlinked network of interest. The network was then mapped and analysed using a variety of statistical techniques, such ...

Not long ago entrepreneurs depended on financial capital to build the physical stores and factories needed to launch a business. And while costly physical operations are still important in some lines of business, 21century entrepreneurs see social capital as essential to a new venture. “Social capital” is the ability to build mutually-beneficial networks of partners, allies and customers ( Adler & Kwon, 2002, p. 214 ; Carolis & Saparito, 2006 ; OttÓSson & Klyver, 2010 ; Xiong & Bharadwaj, 2011 ). Free or cheap technologies make it possible for start-ups to build social capital and sell products and services without huge initial investments. How do women entrepreneurs perceive their opportunities given the availability of these technologies and how do they use them to build networks that generate business? How have their choices vis a vis use of technology influenced the types of businesses they chose to run– and the goals they have for the future? This set of questions ...

Chris Williams is a visiting fellow at University of London (IoE) and a visiting professor at Chubu University Japan. You can contact him at chrisunula@yahoo.com I’m researching the fast-evolving methods of crowdsourced research, especially among civil society groups and innovative academics. This is for a methods book-in-progress for Sage, called ‘Doing international research’. Over the past 2-3 years, crowdsourcing research has become significant in diverse areas - astronomy, archaeology, epidemiology, environmental activism, state crime. Bird watching is one of the oldest examples. The RSPB uses thousands of volunteers to map sightings on a website. Syria Tracker is a very pertinent current example. Evidence from within Syria - mobile phone photos, videos, emails - is sent to a Facebook site. Volunteers around the world compare this, with satellite images of Syria. Signs of state military action - like square objects which have a projection at one end, and are probably tanks - ...