Social network positions of trust, credibility, prototypicality and social comparison: An examinatio

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Social network positions of trust,credibility,
prototypicality and socialcomparison An
examination ofinfluence factors in an
internetcommunity

• Aleks Krotoski
• SPERI
• University of Surrey
• BPS Social Section Conference
• 7 September 2006

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Overview

• Introduction
• Statement of Aims
• Method
• Procedure and respondents
• Multi-level Modelling
• Hypotheses
• Results
• Discussion
• Conclusions

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Introduction Persuasion

• Persuasion in online environments
• Lean medium?
• Effects on individual
• Deindividuation, social exclusion, loneliness
• Elaboration Likelihood Model of Persuasion (Petty
  Cacioppo, 1986)
• Peripheral route?
• Source factors
• Central route?
• Message
• Mediator immersion

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Introduction Persuasion

• Persuasion in online environments
• Social Identity Deinviduation Effects (Spears
  Lea, 1992)
• Conformity with a perceived social identity
• Assumptions of anonymity
• Dynamic Social Impact Theory (Latané Bourgeois,
  2001)
• Cultural homogeneity proximity

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Introduction Persuasion

• Structural properties of persuasion
• Social Network Analysis
• Influence
• Presence of tie
• Strength of tie

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Communication Network
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Introduction Persuasion

• Structural properties of persuasion
• Social Network Analysis
• Influence
• Presence of tie
• Strength of tie
• Social Learning (Bandura et al, 1977)
• Structural Equivalence (Burt, 1987)
• Analytic techniques to pinpoint influential
  actors
• Measurement process to define network structures

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Statement of Aims

• This paper examines the contribution of social
  network variables as predictors of persuasion.
• Specifically, I look at the different
  contributions which communication modes have on
  persuasion in an online community context.

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Hypotheses

• Ratings of communication network tie strength for
  different communication modes (e.g., public,
  private and offline) will contribute more
  predictive power for estimates of persuasion than
  a general communication score.
• Communication tie strength for different
  communication modes will be a greater mediator of
  persuasion as communication privacy increases.

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Method Procedure and Respondents

• Second Life
• Immersive Virtual community
• Virtual pub (Kendall, 2002)
• Third Place (Deucheneaut Moore, 2004)

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MethodProcedure and Respondents

• Second Life
• Immersive Virtual community
• Virtual pub (Kendall, 2002)
• Third Place (Ducheneaut Moore, 2004)
• Virtual identity
• Avatar-representation
• Synchronous, typed communication
• Public communication
• Instant Message communication (Garton et al, 1997)

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MethodsProcedure and Respondents

• Online survey
• 3 April 2006 8 June 2006
• Sociometric data collection
• 43 Residents
• Age M 32.9 years, SD 8.13
• Offline gender male 76.7, female 23.3
• Online gender male 67.4, female 32.6)
• 657 avatars, 539 scores

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MethodsIndependent Variables

• Social Network Communication
• 4 questions (a0.782) (Garton et al, 1997
  Correll, 1995)
• General communication
• Online public communication
• Online private communication
• Offline communication

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MethodsDependent Variables

• Prototypicality (Self-categorization theory
  Turner et al, 1987)
• One question SIDE (Spears Lea, 1991
  Sassenberg Postmes, 2002 Postmes, 2001)
• Source Credibility (Renn Levine, 1991)
• Four questions (a0.862) Perceived expertise,
  likeability, believability
• Social Comparison (Perez Mugny, 1996)
• Two questions (a0.849) ATSCI (Lennox Wolfe,
  1984)
• General Trust
• Four questions (a0.874)honesty (Renn Levine,
  1991), care (Poortinga Pidgeon, 2003),
  similarity (Cvetkovich, 1999), trustworthiness
  (Renn Levine, 1991)
• Domain-Specific Trust (Renn Levine, 1991)
• Four questions (a0.882) objectivity, honesty,
  perceived expertise, reliability

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Method MLM

• Multi-Level Modelling (models)
• Fixed models
• Single explanatory variable
• Multiple explanatory variables

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Results Single explanatory variable (General
Communication)

• The predictive power of the estimate of the value
  of this measure of General Trust is positively
  enhanced when we know how often two people
  communicate in general.

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Single explanatory variable General Trust SNC
categories

• Effect of interpersonal closeness on mode of
  communication (e.g., Garton et al, 1997)
• Offline communication contributes the most to the
  estimate of General Trust. Online public
  communication contributes the least.

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Results Multiple explanatory variables (General
Trust)

• Greatest improvement to the fit of a model occurs
  when offline communication scores are added to
  the single-variable public communication model
• Adding online private communication to the online
  public communication model renders the weight of
  online public communication insignificant, so
  this model is rejected.

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Summary

• Social network variables as mediators of
  persuasion variables
• Empirical assessment of SNA assumptions
• Greatest effects on General Trust
• Communication tie strengths effect on General
  Trust increases as communication becomes more
  private/intimate
• Supportive of Garton et al (1997) and others
  social network analysis work
• Communication mode tie strength effect less
  predictive than general strength measure

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Conclusions

• Review of aims
• Implications
• Use of SN measurements in Social Psychology
• Assessing assumptions of cohesion made by Social
  Network Analysis
• Further research
• Comparison with different types of network (e.g,
  trust-based)
• Larger dataset (currently in collection)
• Network position effects on social influence

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• Thank you
• A.Krotoski_at_surrey.ac.uk
• SPERI
• University of Surrey
• BPS Social Section Conference
• 7 September 2006