Theory and Method for Media Technology

Dienstag, 6. Oktober 2015

Theme 4: Quantitative Research (comments)

Montag, 5. Oktober 2015

Theme 4: Quantitative Research (after)

In my bachelor studies I have had lots of courses where we dealt with research methods and I had to write several papers (including two bachelor thesis), where I used qualitative and quantitative research methods. Therefore I felt like I already knew a lot about the topic from theme 4. My chosen paper was published in the Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication (volume 20) and is called "Professional Personae - How Organizational Identification Shapes Online Identity in the Workplace", written by Christian Fieseler, Miriam Meckel and Giulina Ranzini. It was easy for me to identify the method used in the paper and to discuss the methodological problems of it.

In the seminar we started to summarize the methods in our chosen papers and discussed benefits and limitations of the different methods. During the discussion we changed our topic to our bachelor thesis, which topic we worked on, which methods we used and if we had to do any other empirical research in our bachelor studies. It was very interesting to talk about how the different bachelor programs used empirical research and how practical or theoretical the topics of my colleagues were.

At the end of the seminar we discussed that in many cases the use of both quantitative and qualitative methods is necessary and tried to find examples for that. We also talked about that qualitative methods do not always need to be done before using quantitative methods when dealing with one topic. The other way round is also possible and it always depends on the question asked. Although I already knew a lot about research methods before it was very interesting to talk about how my colleagues used them more or less in their bachelor studies and to get to know their topics of their bachelor thesis.

Sonntag, 4. Oktober 2015

Theme 3: Research and Theory (comments)

Donnerstag, 1. Oktober 2015

Theme 5: Design Research (before)

For the lecture with Haibo Li:

1. How can media technologies be evaluated?

In the paper Réhman et al considered three aspects of usability: effectiveness, efficiency and satisfaction. To measure effectiveness the failure ratio is used as an indicator which describes if a task could be fulfilled with the specified system or not. Efficiency points out the required effort to accomplish a special task. Best case scenario is that the participant needs as little effort as possible. The third aspect satisfaction describes how comfortable and acceptable the use of a specified system is for the user.

2. What role will prototypes play in research?

Prototypes are a very important part of developing new products and functions. Not only the design but also the functionality can be tested with a prototype which helps to improve the final outcome. A very common mistake is to miss out on defects on the prototype because you are to involved in the product itself. People who have never used this kind of product are more critical when using it and can help the researcher monitoring strengths but also improvable points. It is important to let people without any bias test the product.

3. Why could it be necessary to develop a proof of concept prototype?

It could be necessary to develop a proof of concept prototype because it must not always bring the research a step forward when using a prototype. The use of the prototype should be tested if it brings the researcher closer to the goal they want to achieve and if it is a efficient way to do so with a prototype. Another important point is that the researchers need to have the resources to create a good and helpful prototype .

4. What are characteristics and limitations of prototypes?

Prototypes help to improve the development of a product because weak points can be eliminated or at least improved. It also shows how people actually use the product and what is good and bad about the design and the function of a certain product. The limitation of using prototype that a prototype is never the same like the actual product. Most of the time limited resources only allow to create a similar product out of lower quality and not exactly how it is going to be. That can affect the outcome of the research with the help of prototypes, because the users describe their experience with the prototype and not with the final product.

5. How can design research be communicated/presented?

Design research can be communicated with the use of models and prototypes, but also trough the use of stimulation material like videos, pictures, presentations and also explanations of a product. It always depends on the type of the research, the question, which should be answered and of course the topic and how the goals of the research are described.

For the lecture with Ylva Fernaeus:

1. What is the 'empirical data' in these two papers?

The empirical data in both papers is collected trough testing on prototypes. Anders Lundström collected additional empirical data from interviews.

Montag, 28. September 2015

Theme 2: Critical Media Studies (comments)

Theme 3: Research and Theory (after)

Last weeks theme was not my favourite. I already learned a lot about theories in my bachelor so it was more a repetition for me. Nevertheless reading the texts "The Nature of Theory in Information Systems" (Gregor) and "What Theory Is Not" (Sutton/Staw) was very interesting and I really liked the statements in the second text about what theory is NOT. As we discussed in the seminar it is difficult to find the one and only definition about what a theory is. Many factors, like the discipline in which the theory is created, the knowledge and situation at this time or the perspective on how one looks at a special case, are important to consider when describing what theory is. The discussion in the seminar showed very clearly how hard it is to bring up all the necessary components of theory.

This time I did not really feel that the lecture helped me understanding the themes most important point. I agree that the philosophical discussion about what is man is very interesting, but I did not get the link to what theory is. I liked the second part of the theme better, because choosing a journal and an article requires the practical use of all the theoretical things we learned until now and I could use lots of things I learned in my bachelor about the criteria of good research and what are benefits and limitations of different methods. Characterizing the theories used in the paper according to the table in Gregor's text was in the beginning a bit challenging and I needed to read most of the paper a second time to figure out where they fit best. During the lecture and the seminar I missed the discussion about how we choose our journal and the article from it. For me it was the most interesting part of theme 3.

Freitag, 25. September 2015

Theme 4: Quantitative Research (before)

1. Which quantitative method or methods are used in the paper? Which are the benefits and limitations of using these methods?
My chosen paper was published in the Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication (volume 20) and is called "Professional Personae - How Organizational Identification Shapes Online Identity in the Workplace", written by Christian Fieseler, Miriam Meckel and Giulina Ranzini. By the use of an Internet-based survey they collected 1862 questionnaires and were able to use 679 complete and correct filled in ones for continuing analysis. The 17 000 potential interviewees were contacted electronically and had time to fill out the survey within four weeks. Fieseler, Meckel and Ranzini focused on communication and marketing professionals who use digital and social media at work for job-related reasons. The biggest benefit of an Internet-based survey is that you can reach a big group of people and you do not need so much resources for it. The problem of an Internet-based surveys is that lots of people do not show interest and do not take part, so you need to have a very big database to reach enough people. Also you cannot control the answering-process of the participants, e.g. when more than one person answers questions in a questionnaire.

2. What did you learn about quantitative methods from reading the paper?
When using quantitative methods you always have to be careful and really think your survey trough. Having a good sample and a high return rate is one big part of a survey but you need more to get results out of it. Designing and using a good analysis method is important to get results. Therefore combining different methods and strategies is often useful, because a method does not always cover all the necessary points. The paper shows how much effort you need to put into designing an online-questionnaire and how careful you need to be when analyzing the results. Just because participants answer a questionnaire does not mean that they answered all the questions totally honest. You always have to consider the personal situation of the person but also the situation of the interview. If somebody is in a hurry he or she would probably answer in a different way that he or she would when answering in a quiet moment.

3. Which are the main methodological problems of the study? How could the use of the quantitative method or methods have been improved?
The main methodological problem of the study is that an online-questionnaire can only capture a snap-shot of how the participants think and feel. When using an Internet-based survey you cannot control the environment where the participants answer the questionnaire. That could affect the way they answer it, as I already explained above. Another problem is that you only get the opinion from people who want to participate in the survey and you also do not get the reasons why many other people do not participate.

The most important key point in the paper "Drumming in Immersive Virtual Reality: The Body Shapes the Way We Play" written by Konstantina Kilteni, Ilias Bergström and Mel Slater is "Immersive Virtual Reality". It means to transport people to a virtual place giving them the illusion that they are somebody else and trough that they loose the perception of their own body. In this paper the participants play drums and instead of seeing their own hands, they see the hands of a Caucasian formally dressed male or a dark-skinned casually dressed male. The aim of the paper was to find out if a virtual body ownership illusion can affect the perception and the behavior of the participants. It shows that virtual body ownership illusion could influence the behavior.

4. Which are the benefits and limitations of using quantitative methods?
Quantitative methods are high standardized, which is on the one hand good for the work flow and the realization, but on the other hand results trough quantitative methods are more superficial. By the use of standardized techniques some details would not be able to collect. But quantitative methods allow a more structured and clear interpretation, because of all the statistics and data you get out of it.

5. Which are the benefits and limitations of using qualitative methods?
Compared to quantitative methods the use of qualitative methods offer a wider range of getting detailed and in-deep information about a case. Qualitative methods allow a more flexible process when collecting data from participants. Therefore it is harder to analyze qualitative data because of the wide range of information you get.