Summer Social Webshop 2012: Technology-Mediated Social Participation

University Of Maryland, College Park, College Park MD

Investigators

Abstract

This is funding to support a workshop for 40 promising graduate students from the United States whose research covers aspects of Technology-Mediated Social Participation (TMSP). Technology-mediated social participation is generated when social networking tools, blogs and microblogs, user-generated content sites, discussion groups, problem reporting, recommendation systems, and other social media are applied to national priorities such as health, energy, education, disaster response, environmental protection, business innovation, or community safety. Although social media are transforming society, many universities have been slow to integrate these novel technologies and social structures into their curricula and research. Two previous NSF-supported TMSP Workshops have outlined an agenda for research and education in this area, which was published in a serious of journal articles appearing in a special issue of IEEE Computer. To increase research and education in TMSP, this workshop brings together an interdisciplinary group of graduate students to listen to presentations by leaders in the field, learn new research skills, and learn from each other by sharing the diverse research streams that focus on social media. The TMSP "webshop" will include 40 graduate students from such fields as sociology, anthropology, communications, psychology, journalism and humanities as well as from information studies, information systems, human-computer interaction and computer science. Effort will be taken to ensure gender balance, strong representation from ethnic minority groups, and cross-disciplinarity. Students will apply by submitting a one-page statement of why they wish to attend the workshop along with their curriculum vitae. During the three-day workshop, students will attend presentations from an interdisciplinary group of distinguished leaders in the field and engage in other research and community-building activities. Intellectual Merit: There is a growing recognition that social media technologies can bring profound benefits for national priorities such as disaster response, community safety, health/wellness, energy sustainability, and environmental protection. However substantial research is needed to scale up participation, raise motivation, control malicious attacks, limit misguided rumors, and protect privacy. The TMSP workshop will foster new ideas, tools and theories in this area through intense multidisciplinary discussion. Topics to be covered share (1) a close linkage to compelling national priorities; (2) a scientific foundation based on established theories and well-defined research questions (privacy, reciprocity, trust, motivation, recognition, etc.); and (3) computer science research challenges (security, privacy protection, scalability, visualization, end-user development, distributed data handling, network analysis of community evolution, cross network comparison, etc.). Broader impacts: The workshop will raise awareness of the importance of technology-mediated social participation as a distinct area of study, foster new interdisciplinary projects, raise the prominence of researchers and educators who are invited to speak, and promote greater understanding of the discipline among leading graduate students across the United States. The workshop will also help new researchers develop relationships with peers and experienced researchers and practitioners. Specific outcomes will include resources such as bibliographies, links to websites, video and slides sets from speakers and carefully crafted lists of courses, conferences, and journals. These resources will be helpful to researchers and educators who seek to expand their work in Technology-Mediated Social Participation.