Teen Choice of Social Networks Sites
While researching and writing an article on social network sites and social networking, I was reintroduced to the research of danah m boyd, a Researcher at Microsoft Research New England and a Fellow at the Berkman Center for Internet and Society. danah has spent a lot of time investigating the intersection of technology and society, teen use of social network sites, and social media. I highly recommend reading the article that she wrote with Nicole Ellison, "Social Network Sites: Definition, History, and Scholarship," which is an interesting introduction to social network sites. Almost immediately after reading that article, I added her blog, apophenia, to my reader. (And for those of you who think that I've forgotten to capitalize her name, I haven't.)
Her latest post, is Facebook for old people?, reflects on teens and their choice of social network sites. danah has some great observations, but what struck me was her thoughts about socioeconomic background and preferred site. Simply put, danah suggests that youth from lower- and higher-income communities choose different social network sites to use.
So what does this mean for organizations that work with low-income families? Obviously, it gives us some direction about where we need to be doing outreach. But is there more than that? Does this raise other issues that we need to think about when incorporating these sites into our work? - K
