Social Media Survey

[The Avatar 1,089]

Hey all. I know I haven't been very active lately - just lurking - but I need the community's help with a project for my AP Psychology class. I've been assigned to create a survey on a social media platform (and this site is the only social media-ish one I use) regarding other people's social networking and mobile device use. Given that this is a high school class, the questions are geared toward teenagers like me, but hopefully they will be somewhat relatable to other age groups. I don't know how many responses I need, but if you have the time, I'd appreciate your help.

Here are the questions (I did not come up with them):

1. How much time do you spend on social networking sites a day?

2. How emotionally distracted are you when using social media?

3. How many posts do you make that you would characterize as important?

4. How many posts do others make that you would characterize as important?

5. How often do you turn off your mobile device?

6. Have you ever gone on a social networking fast? If so, for how long and why?

7. Have you ever done an activity without your cell phone? If so, how did the separation make you feel?

That's it. If you have any questions, I'll try to answer them as best as I can. Thanks again. 

- Evan

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Evan, you need to make that into a poll.

I have an outlier for your study: I do not use social media and I do not now, nor will I ever own an electronic leash.  Twitter is for twits.

[AkemiAzula 280]

1. How much time do you spend on social networking sites a day?

An hour or two maybe, rarely more.

2. How emotionally distracted are you when using social media?

I am not emotional, or at any rate I am the master of my self.

3. How many posts do you make that you would characterize as important?

None. I rarely post anything that isn't a reblog or comment and my original posts are rarely worth reading. I would make a very dull friend.

4. How many posts do others make that you would characterize as important?

Quite a few. I mostly like or reblog rather than create discussions. I am not overly interesting.

5. How often do you turn off your mobile device?

Never. I never get calls so even during the Force Awakens she was alive in my pocket.

6. Have you ever gone on a social networking fast? If so, for how long and why?

No but I have emo deleted my pages at several sites, was banned from Myspace and have culled my friends and my posts often. The net is where I live so my life is pretty sad.

7. Have you ever done an activity without your cell phone? If so, how did the separation make you feel?

As in have I been without it? I don't take it with me when I go to the shop but I use it as a music player at work.

[The Avatar 1,089]

22 hours ago, A Nonny Moose said:

Evan, you need to make that into a poll.

I have an outlier for your study: I do not use social media and I do not now, nor will I ever own an electronic leash.  Twitter is for twits.

Is there an option to have a poll where people can respond freely, without having to select an option from multiple choices? I was planning on making a poll, but I didn't know if that was possible.

[Skimbo 304]

1. How much time do you spend on social networking sites a day?

If just FB&Co then about 5 minutes. On a whider definition the number will reach 20 minutes.

2. How emotionally distracted are you when using social media?

Distraction? not really.

3. How many posts do you make that you would characterize as important?

On my FB account, I managed to do some 24 postings since 2009.

4. How many posts do others make that you would characterize as important?

Not imortant: a lot, Important: not via FB.

5. How often do you turn off your mobile device?

Daily. I'm not really a Smombie.

6. Have you ever gone on a social networking fast? If so, for how long and why?

no

7. Have you ever done an activity without your cell phone? If so, how did the separation make you feel?

If my mobile phone is gone then it's gone. Infact I sometimes forget to take it with me and wonder where I left it until I come home again.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

3 hours ago, The Avatar said:

Is there an option to have a poll where people can respond freely, without having to select an option from multiple choices? I was planning on making a poll, but I didn't know if that was possible.

Limited only by your creativity.  If you are looking for exact numbers, then no, but you could have responses giving ranges, for example.  Polling is a bit of an art, and I am surprised that if your teacher wanted you to do a poll, some of the nuances were not taken up.

Now, I am sure that you know that to get any kind of decent confidence limits in your results you need around 1,000 responses,  I am not sure that there are that many active members here.

[The Avatar 1,089]

1 hour ago, A Nonny Moose said:

Limited only by your creativity.  If you are looking for exact numbers, then no, but you could have responses giving ranges, for example.  Polling is a bit of an art, and I am surprised that if your teacher wanted you to do a poll, some of the nuances were not taken up.

Now, I am sure that you know that to get any kind of decent confidence limits in your results you need around 1,000 responses,  I am not sure that there are that many active members here.

Ah, there's the problem - I need exact values. Plus, some of the questions require an explanation unique to the individual. The poll in and of itself is not the bulk of the assignment, but we're using the results, among other information, to write a short paper on the psychological need for belonging. My teacher told us not to worry about the number of responses because the survey is only a part of the project as a whole.

[Sabretooth78 808]

I'm probably an outlier but I'll answer anyway.  For the record I'm in my late-30s and reasonably tech-savvy.  I'm not an expert by any means but I know enough to be dangerous and if I want something done I can usually figure out how to do it.  I've somehow become the family "IT guy" but on the other hand I'm a bit of an idiot with smartphones.  I don't know, they've just never interested me much.  PCs all the way (by which I mean Windows and Mac).  Go big or go home.

 

1. How much time do you spend on social networking sites a day?

Unless you consider sites such as Simtrop and DeviantArt to be "social networking", then very little.  Otherwise I would say 1-3 hours.  I used to spend a ton of time on Facebook but grew bored with it.  It's too homogenized and unoriginal.  I've only ever used Facebook - no Twitter, not even LinkedIn (or however it's spelled) even though by right of my profession I probably "should".

2. How emotionally distracted are you when using social media?

Very little.  It's something to check if I'm waiting in line somewhere with nothing else to do.  If I need to connect with someone I will typically text/be texted.

3. How many posts do you make that you would characterize as important?

The crux of my boredom and lack of interest - I have no interest in other peoples' daily minutiae (unless they want to tell me directly for whatever reason) nor do I expect anybody to have any interest in mine.  I see it as almost pure narcissism.  So let's say none.

4. How many posts do others make that you would characterize as important?

Very little.  See No. 3.

5. How often do you turn off your mobile device?

Usually only when the POS needs to be rebooted or something of the like.  I usually turn it off on a flight to conserve battery (I'll read or play games on my Kindle or something of that nature).

6. Have you ever gone on a social networking fast? If so, for how long and why?

I haven't had Facebook on my phone since late 2013, in part because I said a hearty "hell no" to accessing my texts and other privacy invasions.  Not that I used it much before.  I just haven't gotten up to delete my account yet and I probably won't.  It is handy in the situation say for instance I'm on vacation or something and want to post some pictures for my parents - far simpler than email.

7. Have you ever done an activity without your cell phone? If so, how did the separation make you feel?

I'm always saying if you have some computing task that needs to be done and needs to be done right, you need to use a PC.  I rarely use my phone for anything beyond basic communication, as a calculator (have a nice RPN scientific calculator app on it) and for the occasional on-the-fly web browsing say to look up a phone number.  You can't "create" on a phone nor can you competently do anything important which requires filling out forms, etc. unless you want to fart around with some crippled mobile site/browser.

I have been known to "intentionally" forget it when I go somewhere just because I don't want to be bothered by it.  I find it liberating.

[MushyMushy 3,618]

I suppose I'd be in the target age group you mentioned.

1. How much time do you spend on social networking sites a day?

I am going to assume you consider game-related forums as social media (If you don't, then I spend 0 hours a day on social media). I'd say 1-3 hours if ST and SC4D count. In the past I've had similar numbers when I was a part of other forum communities for other games I used to play.

2. How emotionally distracted are you when using social media?

Not very.

3. How many posts do you make that you would characterize as important?

Not really very many, if any. When I post something I worked hard on, I feel it's important to me, but I doubt it is to others... which doesn't really matter.

4. How many posts do others make that you would characterize as important?

On forums like this, the only posts I think are actually truly important (not that I don't +1 other stuff) are mod breakthroughs and other major works. On standard social media sites (which I don't use or look at, but I am exposed to sometimes), I would say no posts people make are important. Of course, this is all a matter of taste in my opinion.

5. How often do you turn off your mobile device?

Does restarting count? I generally try to turn off all of the tracking type stuff on my phone to avoid as much of that as I can, but I don't really shot it fully off because I try to keep up with texts my friends send me. I can't say I always care about what they have to say, but I don't want it to look like I'm ignoring them or something.

6. Have you ever gone on a social networking fast? If so, for how long and why?

Well, provided ST counts as social media, not really. Even if I don't post for a while I still check up on it (and SC4D, which I don't post on at all) every day to see if anything new and interesting is going on.

7. Have you ever done an activity without your cell phone? If so, how did the separation make you feel?

I leave it home rarely by accident. Even though I'm not checking it constantly like most people my age (it can start at 100% battery power in the morning and still have 85% by dusk, compared to people who charge it everywhere they go because it's being used constantly), I like to be able to contact people I know if I feel like it. Sometimes I'll also quickly check ST if I'm seriously bored. Honestly, I am usually more bothered by the fact that one of the standard contents of my pockets is absent (I feel like I'm forgetting something) than the fact that I don't have access to my phone.

[nos.17 5,249]

<-- 20 year old engineering student. Most of my time is spent on course work and the rest is in hobbies and gaming, leaving little time for social media, to be honest.

1. How much time do you spend on social networking sites a day?
I would think Simtropolis and SC4D certainly count. I spend +/- one hour a day here browsing and +/- one hour a week on Facebook (usually less). I would say it averages out to about an hour a day.

2. How emotionally distracted are you when using social media?
What exactly do you mean by emotionally distracted? As in how does reading all of the posts and updated impact my emotions? Not too much. Every once in awhile its good to see what people are up to whom I haven't talked with in awhile. I almost forgot; add disappointment/frustration in there. Lots of times I see ignorant (dumbass) things folks are thinking and it really makes me wonder about the state of society today. I suppose that is a huge distraction for me.

3. How many posts do you make that you would characterize as important?
I am not trying to sound conceited here, but around 60-75% of the posts I make I think are important. I have posted like two things on FB over the past few years (like to lurk), so I'll talk about here. I usually try to refrain from posting redundant praise and prefer to give rep. If I see something I really like I will post and will also if I want to give constructive criticism or ask a question. Not really a fan of the forum games either; I just never saw the fun. I usually only post when I can actually help someone out, justifying (for me at least), the high percentage.

4. How many posts do others make that you would characterize as important?
To be honest, it depends on the person. Some I know are very good at posting lots of important things, and others, not so much. Again, "important" is relative to me and rather difficult to define, depending on the situation. On this (and other SC4 sites), I would say the percentage is high: 50-ish%; elsewhere on the web in FB and comment sections everywhere it hovers in the low single digits, say 4-5%.

5. How often do you turn off your mobile device?
Technically, its "off" fairly rarely. I turn it off for system updates and app crashes which are unfortunately not uncommon. See (7), however.

6. Have you ever gone on a social networking fast? If so, for how long and why?
Yes, mostly because I straight up do not care about most of the stuff that happens on Facebook. I get news from reliable sources so I only check less than once a week to see the few posts I care about.

7. Have you ever done an activity without your cell phone? If so, how did the separation make you feel?
Yup, lots. I survived all of high school without one, so I suppose I did not grow up using one so I do not use it all that often and do not feel any separation or insecure without it. Frequently I go 36 or 48 hours without charging the stock 2400 mAh battery. I text infrequently as I live with a lot of my friends on campus and usually have my laptop with me which I use for internet purposes. I take my phone with me almost all places I go, but don't feel the need to bring it out of my pocket. 

 

Glad I could help out with your AP Psych project. I never took it myself, but had many friends who had a great time doing their Social 'Norms' project. 

  Edited January 8, 2016 by nos.17  
Forgot to finish a sentence...

[The Avatar 1,089]

Thanks to all who replied. Your responses will be very helpful in completing this assignment. The analysis is due tomorrow, so I won't be needing any further info. 

- Evan 

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Good luck with this.

[citycowboy 183]

1. 10 minutes.

2. I pour my whole heart into it. 

3. 1 per week. 

4. 1 per day. 

5. Never, its 24 hour work related. 

6. No.

7. I do most activities without a cell phone.