The editors have brought together leading names in the field of online research to give a thoroughly up to date commentary on current debates. The chapters cover both methodological and procedural themes, offering readers a sophisticated treatment of the practice and uses of Internet and online research that is grounded in research methodology. Beginning with an examination of the significance of the Internet as a research medium, the book goes on to cover research design, data capture, the survey, virtual ethnography, and the internet as an archival resource, and concludes by looking at potential directions for the future of Internet and online research.
The Handbook of Internet and Online Research Methods will be welcomed by anyone interested in the contemporary practice of computer-mediated research and scholarship. Postgraduates, researchers and methodologists from dicsplines across the social sciences will find this an inavlauble source of reference.
Contents
Sect. 1 The Internet as a Research Medium 1
1 The Internet as a Research Medium: An Editorial Introduction to The Sage Handbook of Online Research Methods
Sect. 2 Designing Internet Research 21
2 The Ethics of Internet Research
3 Understanding and Managing Legal Issues in Internet Research
4 Research Design and Tools for Internet Research
5 General Approaches to Data Quality and Internet-generated
Sect. 3 Data Capture Using the Internet 97
6 Middleware for Distributed Data Management
7 Distilling Digital Traces: Computational Social Science Approaches to Studying the Internet
8 Analyzing Social Networks via the Internet
9 Nonreactive Data Collection on the Internet
Sect. 4 The Internet Survey 175
10 Overview: Online Surveys
11 Sampling Methods for Web and E-mail Surveys
12 Internet Survey Design
13 Internet Survey Software Tools
Sect. 5 Virtual Ethnography 255
14 Virtual Ethnography: Modes, Varieties, Affordances
15 Internet-based Interviewing
16 Online Focus Groups
17 Fieldnotes in Public: Using Blogs for Research
18 Research Uses of Multi-user Virtual Environments
19 Distributed Video Analysis in Social Research
Sect. 6 The Internet as an Archival Resource 363
20 The Provision of Access to Quantitative Data for Secondary Analysis
21 Secondary Qualitative Analysis Using Internet Resources
22 Finding and Investigating Geographical Data Online
23 Data Mining, Statistical Data Analysis, or Advanced Analytics: Methodology, Implementation, and Applied Techniques
24 Artificial Intelligence and the Internet
Sect. 7 The Future of Social Research on the Internet 469
25 Longitudinal Statistical Modelling on the Grid
26 Qualitative e-Social Science/Cyber-Research
27 New Cartographies of 'Knowing Capitalism' and the Changing Jurisdictions of Empirical Sociology
28 The Internet and the Future of Social Science Research
29 Online Research Methods and Social Theory
Glossary of Key Terms 550
Name Index 559
Subject Index 562
Product Details
- Hardcover: 592 pages
- Publisher: Sage Publications Ltd (July 15, 2008)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 1412922933
- ISBN-13: 978-1412922937
- Product Dimensions: 9.8 x 7.1 x 1.6 inches