I’m going to be honest. Coming into this research paper I didn’t really care about the topic I had chosen. I had heard that it had to be somewhere between 8 and 10 pages and I thought, 10 pages? I don’t know if I can write about anything for 10 pages. So I picked something that sounded relatively interesting that I had thought I could possibly come close to that. It wasn’t until I had actually begun to write my paper that I developed a real interest in what I was writing about.
It really is crazy to me the way in which technology affects today’s society, and to think that we can now meet our potential soul mates through an online dating service completely baffles me. As I was writing my research essay, I was trying to come up with as many crazy things that technology has affected today to help support my ideas throughout my paper. As I continued to write, I couldn’t think of anything that technology HASN’T affected. I had problems coming up with just one; one that would stand out as more absurd beyond the rest.
Some may still ask why I chose dating. Why that from everything to choose from, that was my choice. And I’m not real sure myself. I have always thought that the idea myself was somewhat crazy, that the thought of meeting a completely random person through a computer and finding compatibility just seemed so slim to me. So I guess by picking this topic, I wanted to try and make myself more open minded about the idea and maybe totally change my opinion on it overall.
One of the main problems I’ve always had while writing papers, is to properly support my sources and own opinions, and by doing it well. As I used to just site my sources and do my best to explain them, didn’t always make my paper “flow.” It seemed like I was doing just that. Finding a source, one that fit, and writing in different words, my own words, what the source had clearly already said itself.
Initially, my first thought on a “topic” was to sort of combine two different ideas. I was going to try to research and explain how social networking has affecting dating, while at the same time, showing how it affects people’s social skills. However, while explaining how social networking can be seen as a form of laziness, and losing “people skills” and social skills along with that laziness, technology has been a primary factor in that because more often than not, what we find ourselves preoccupying our time with wants rather than needs.
I felt that bringing up the importance of fraud with Internet dating was a big deal. I believe it raises a lot of issues, and for those that have a negative opinion on Internet dating, I feel it’s that, that makes them so eerie about it. That whole idea started one night when I was watching “To Catch A Predator” on MSNBC, a show where an young girl plays along with guys over the age of 18 to see if they will follow through with meeting this girl in person. When the guy shows up at the girls’ house, its there where they find out it’s a setup, and are arrested because they were clearly aware of the age of the young girl. It just makes you wonder how many times this happens, when it’s real and not a television show setup.
Finding and citing sources was a difficult challenge for me throughout my research essay. I found it difficult to find sources that supported the same ideas that I did. Some would help to prove one of my points while at the same time completely disagreeing with another. It was then that I realized that not all of my sources had to fully agree with everything I was trying to say and that by finding a source that did just the opposite and fully disagreed with my opinion was just as easy to use as an example to support my ideas.
For whatever someone feels towards online dating services, there are legitimate reasons behind each side. A main reason, and sometimes the only reason for why people that feel negative towards he issue, as I’ve already stated, is because of the fraud issue; the fact that you can’t be 100% positive that the person you are meeting is exactly who they say they are, or some creep who has nothing better to do with his time. On the other hand, someone who thinks it’s a good idea could have reasoning such as time. Someone that has no free time except for the hour they have to themselves when work is over and the kids are in bed, doesn’t necessarily have that extra time that some others do.
Throughout the semester, as we read three different pieces relating to technology, it helped me to remember back to what the writers of those pieces’ opinions on the forms of technology are that allow these types of advancements to take place, and to compare my own thoughts with theirs. Although I didn’t always agree, it helped to show me differently points of view that can be taken on with similar issues.
When our class met in small groups to talk over and give advice on one another’s papers, it proved very helpful to me. While revising my papers, I always notice that when things make sense to me, they don’t always make sense to others. So to see what my classmates did and didn’t understand helped me out a lot. It showed me what I needed to improve on that I, myself wouldn’t have seen otherwise. There were several times in my paper when students would either comment on that I didn’t give sufficient information to back up my opinions, or that I didn’t add in my own opinion enough with the sources I would use. That has also been one of my biggest challenges. To find a balance somewhere in the middle, where I have just enough sources to support my opinions and just enough opinions backing up my sources.
I believe that my research on this essay was successful. Not successful in the fact that I put down onto paper everything I discovered, but successful because of the fact that my opinion on online dating, did in fact, change. I didn’t go into this research topic expecting to come away from it with a life changing experience, however, I didn’t exactly expect it to change my whole outlook on the issue, as it did either.
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
Thursday, April 23, 2009
Blog #10
A decision I made while revising my rough draft, not only was making it longer, without adding insigificant information, but also supporting my sources and own opinions well. I realized that I needed to make my paper "flow" better as opposed to it seeming as if I was jsut throwing in sources and trying my best to explain them.
The face-to-face conferences helped me alot. I think the main reason it helped is because you get to hear your classmates, who are writing the same type of paper, say what would better help them understand your paper. Because sometimes when I write, it's obviously going to make sense to me, but not always to other people. So I like to hear which things dont. Those comments from my classmates help me to proofread my paper making sure it's clear and able to be understood by anybody, even people who would not have taken the class and known about the information or pieces of writings in them.
The face-to-face conferences helped me alot. I think the main reason it helped is because you get to hear your classmates, who are writing the same type of paper, say what would better help them understand your paper. Because sometimes when I write, it's obviously going to make sense to me, but not always to other people. So I like to hear which things dont. Those comments from my classmates help me to proofread my paper making sure it's clear and able to be understood by anybody, even people who would not have taken the class and known about the information or pieces of writings in them.
Tuesday, April 14, 2009
Assignment 8
To introduce the concept and understanding of technology would be like trying to predict the weather in the year 2020. We could all make a guess as to what sort of new crazy things we will have in 10, or 20 years, but how accurate will we really be?
We could sit and make a list all day long of things that include technology, but if we think of just a few that are especially absurd, on the top of my list at least, is dating. In middle school history class, we all learned about the days where a woman and a man could be paired together, by someone else’s choice, or by their financial or family background, and the divorce rate was hardly existent. These days, we have the opportunity to choose who we want to spend the rest of our lives with, yet it’s so uncommon anymore to even find children that still live with both of their parents. Now we’re “finding love” through online dating services? I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t have been able to predict that decades ago.
Just like anything else, everyone obviously has their own opinion on what they think of online dating. My opinion, as I have already made pretty clear, is that it’s weird, and somewhat crazy. The chart below shows what the average population’s opinions on the matter are. As you can see, other than the “undecided” population, the next most popular is thinking that online dating is a “great” way to meet people, followed closely by “frowned” upon. This chart alone can help to show that there’s no one way that people think of the issue over another. They are pretty evened out, leaving no “right answer” as to if it’s a good thing or not. Both sides could have good arguments. Those who are a fan of online dating could have many reasons for thinking that. For instance, a full-time working, single mom of three, obviously isn’t going to have a whole lot of free time to go out and meet people, making an internet service really convenient. However, those that don’t particularly like the idea, could see it as creepy, or just have the typical thought in mind that “only weird people do that stuff.” Both sides have valid points.
“The authors find that perceived online dating success is predicted by four dimensions of self-disclosure (honesty, amount, intent, and valence), although honesty has a negative effect”(152). This quote, written by Jennifer L. Gibbs, Nicole B. Ellison, and Rebecca D. Heino, in their article called “Self-Presentation in online personals,” briefly states that, “honesty has a negative effect” towards online dating. This leads us to what some may call “online predators.” As we all know, anybody can be anybody online. We’ve all heard of situations where older men tell young girls that they are the same age as they are and ask to meet them. You may also have seen the show that shows evidence of such situations on MSNBC’s “To Catch A Predator.” The picture below that’s says, “ You’re a model? Cool! I’m a Chippendale’s dancer. I also race speedboats. What’s your sign?” is just one example of how people misrepresent themselves, because clearly those statements do not prove true to the picture. Another good example would be Brad Paisley’s song called “online” which describes a guy who still lives with his mom, whose overweight and works at the local pizza pit. However, he then describes how he’s another person when he’s on the Internet and describes himself as highly attractive, with a lot of money. “Adolescents’ Identity Experiments on the Internet,” an article written by Patti M. Valkenburg, and Jochen Peter states that “about 50% of Internet users had pretended to be someone else”(209). There could be several reasons as to why people pretend to be someone else. Maybe it has to do with self-confidence issues, and since they are unhappy with themselves the way they are, it helps them to escape themselves, and be somebody completely different; someone that includes no expectations to live up to. Another reason could just be pure amusement.
Not only can online dating have negative outcomes, but along with that, I believe online social networks, such as online dating services, lead to social problems. You find a lot of cases in which people who spend a majority of their time online, aren’t “up to par” on their real life social skills. Sure, those people might be able to type up pages and pages of their opinion on a certain topic or discussion, but if you had a face-to-face conversation with that very same person, it is very possible that this person is at loss of words after even a few seconds.
Amanda Williams writes in her article “A review of Online Social Networking by Adolescents,” “in the past five years, social networking has “rocketed from a niche activity, into a phenomenon that engages tens of millions of Internet users”(2). How could the Internet not affect our young society today with that many users?
As none of these sources for examples really demonstrate a negative or positive feeling towards the internet, neither does David Nye, in his book “Technology Matters.” Nye never gives his real opinion on what technology is good for, or rather, if it is good at all. Nye more or less states facts on what technology has done for us. Since he takes no positive or negative take on it, it relates well to the dating issue. There is no right or wrong answer when it comes to what people believe.
All of these issues raise many questions in where our society might be in another 20 years from now. For example, if the Internet is affecting the world to this great of lengths today, can we possibly even imagine what we will be able to do in the future? If social networking is already a part of our personal lives, can it go any farther than that?
This topic of research most interested me because I’ve always wondered how what others besides myself think about the online dating. Also along with how social networks affects social skills, I find it a little ridiculous that some people spend so much of their times online that they can’t hardly live normal lives, communicating regularly with the people around them. What other things can help to affect our society’s social skills? What types of things can we do to help prevent these situations from happening? Those people that find love through online dating services, could be one of the most talkative, outgoing people ever, but when in person, they no longer have the comfort of their computer to help them interact. So is this idea really helpful at all?
We could sit and make a list all day long of things that include technology, but if we think of just a few that are especially absurd, on the top of my list at least, is dating. In middle school history class, we all learned about the days where a woman and a man could be paired together, by someone else’s choice, or by their financial or family background, and the divorce rate was hardly existent. These days, we have the opportunity to choose who we want to spend the rest of our lives with, yet it’s so uncommon anymore to even find children that still live with both of their parents. Now we’re “finding love” through online dating services? I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t have been able to predict that decades ago.
Just like anything else, everyone obviously has their own opinion on what they think of online dating. My opinion, as I have already made pretty clear, is that it’s weird, and somewhat crazy. The chart below shows what the average population’s opinions on the matter are. As you can see, other than the “undecided” population, the next most popular is thinking that online dating is a “great” way to meet people, followed closely by “frowned” upon. This chart alone can help to show that there’s no one way that people think of the issue over another. They are pretty evened out, leaving no “right answer” as to if it’s a good thing or not. Both sides could have good arguments. Those who are a fan of online dating could have many reasons for thinking that. For instance, a full-time working, single mom of three, obviously isn’t going to have a whole lot of free time to go out and meet people, making an internet service really convenient. However, those that don’t particularly like the idea, could see it as creepy, or just have the typical thought in mind that “only weird people do that stuff.” Both sides have valid points.
“The authors find that perceived online dating success is predicted by four dimensions of self-disclosure (honesty, amount, intent, and valence), although honesty has a negative effect”(152). This quote, written by Jennifer L. Gibbs, Nicole B. Ellison, and Rebecca D. Heino, in their article called “Self-Presentation in online personals,” briefly states that, “honesty has a negative effect” towards online dating. This leads us to what some may call “online predators.” As we all know, anybody can be anybody online. We’ve all heard of situations where older men tell young girls that they are the same age as they are and ask to meet them. You may also have seen the show that shows evidence of such situations on MSNBC’s “To Catch A Predator.” The picture below that’s says, “ You’re a model? Cool! I’m a Chippendale’s dancer. I also race speedboats. What’s your sign?” is just one example of how people misrepresent themselves, because clearly those statements do not prove true to the picture. Another good example would be Brad Paisley’s song called “online” which describes a guy who still lives with his mom, whose overweight and works at the local pizza pit. However, he then describes how he’s another person when he’s on the Internet and describes himself as highly attractive, with a lot of money. “Adolescents’ Identity Experiments on the Internet,” an article written by Patti M. Valkenburg, and Jochen Peter states that “about 50% of Internet users had pretended to be someone else”(209). There could be several reasons as to why people pretend to be someone else. Maybe it has to do with self-confidence issues, and since they are unhappy with themselves the way they are, it helps them to escape themselves, and be somebody completely different; someone that includes no expectations to live up to. Another reason could just be pure amusement.
Not only can online dating have negative outcomes, but along with that, I believe online social networks, such as online dating services, lead to social problems. You find a lot of cases in which people who spend a majority of their time online, aren’t “up to par” on their real life social skills. Sure, those people might be able to type up pages and pages of their opinion on a certain topic or discussion, but if you had a face-to-face conversation with that very same person, it is very possible that this person is at loss of words after even a few seconds.
Amanda Williams writes in her article “A review of Online Social Networking by Adolescents,” “in the past five years, social networking has “rocketed from a niche activity, into a phenomenon that engages tens of millions of Internet users”(2). How could the Internet not affect our young society today with that many users?
As none of these sources for examples really demonstrate a negative or positive feeling towards the internet, neither does David Nye, in his book “Technology Matters.” Nye never gives his real opinion on what technology is good for, or rather, if it is good at all. Nye more or less states facts on what technology has done for us. Since he takes no positive or negative take on it, it relates well to the dating issue. There is no right or wrong answer when it comes to what people believe.
All of these issues raise many questions in where our society might be in another 20 years from now. For example, if the Internet is affecting the world to this great of lengths today, can we possibly even imagine what we will be able to do in the future? If social networking is already a part of our personal lives, can it go any farther than that?
This topic of research most interested me because I’ve always wondered how what others besides myself think about the online dating. Also along with how social networks affects social skills, I find it a little ridiculous that some people spend so much of their times online that they can’t hardly live normal lives, communicating regularly with the people around them. What other things can help to affect our society’s social skills? What types of things can we do to help prevent these situations from happening? Those people that find love through online dating services, could be one of the most talkative, outgoing people ever, but when in person, they no longer have the comfort of their computer to help them interact. So is this idea really helpful at all?
Tuesday, April 7, 2009
blog #9
Valkenburg, and Peter Jochen. P. M., et. al., Adolescents' Identity Experiments on the Internet:
Consequences for Social Competence and Self-Concept Unity. Communication Research v. 35 no. 2 (April 2008) p. 208-31
Patti M. Valkenburg and Jochen Peter, both graduates with a PhD from Amsterdam School of Communications Research, teamed together to write this article, focusing primarily on the effects of media contents and technology with the development of children and young adults. The type of audience most likely to be interested in this article, are those just as interested in the research of how technology, primarily social networking, affects our young society today. Keywords the authors used for this article were: Internet, chat, social skills, loneliness, and self-concept clarity. These keywords make it easy to relate to my topic of research because I’m doing just that; showing how the Internet affects social skills, and therefore could cause things such as loneliness and self-concept clarity issues.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________
Couch, Danielle, and Pranee Liamputtong. "Online Dating and Mating: The Use of the Internet to Meet Sexual Partners." Qualitative Health Research 18 (2008): 268-79.
Danielle Couch, a postgraduate student at the School of Public Health, and Pranee Liamputtong, also at the school of Public Health, both researched the use of the Internet to meet sexual partners. They researched the process in which some people go about meeting their sexual partner through the way that they participate with online programs using such things as the webcam, email, and chat to engage in conversation, and meet one another. This article relates well with my research topic in the sense that I’m trying to figure out if the idea of developing a relationship from Internet resources is negative, or if it could actually prove as useful and successful.
________________________________________________________________________________________________
Levy, David. Love and Sex with Robots. New York: HarperCollins, 2007.
As an internationally known artificial intelligence expert and the International computer games association, David Levy seems to represent…something not offensive. Stereotypically, his audience is not widely known for their social skills. As his subject involves future intercourse with robots, this stereotype may hold true. Levy graduated from Acadia University in 1972 and received his masters in English from Queens University in 1979. The author’s audience is targeted at anyone who has an interest in technology in general, or specifically robots. The demand of Levy audience is the curiosity in just how far technology can go. Author David Levy is primarily trying to address the things that technology brings us to today, showing how absurd the new ideas that people create are. A main argument that Levy makes is that what we may have imagined never happening, could happen a lot sooner than we think, or could already be happening right before our eyes. For example in briefly describing what the book is about, Levy states: “Love, marriage, and sex with robots? Not in a million years? Maybe a whole lot sooner.”
Just the term, “Robot-human sexual intercourse” is a controversial issue. It’s no question sex in society has been a constantly changing argument, for centuries views have differed and changed by public opinion. But even in today’s society where sex seems to be a little less taboo, (even if no one wants to admit it but advertisements can publicly resemble at pin up poster) it’s unclear how people will react to sexual relations with inanimate objects. Considering the openness of the subject, it’s hard to tell if the author is “cropping out” certain topics. It’s possible that these robots might turn on their masters or become some sort of undercover device for the government. A threat to privacy could be eminent, but that’s the risk you run with dating a computer. The idea of being able to have a real relationship with a robot in and of itself, is interesting; thinking that someone can have real feelings for an object hardly considered anything but programmed. I think Levy’s main purpose in talking about this issue, is to make us aware of how technology is literally changing the world. This source could prove as very useful in terms of our final research papers, because it not only helps us to see the different affects technology has on us in just this aspect, but it opened our eyes showing us that it can relate to more topics than just our own.
From these three out of my six sources, I have hardly had to alter my original research topic at all. Although all three are very different articles, explaining very different topics and situations, each tie into my research topic in the sense that technology GREATLY changes our everyday life. Whether it changes our lives in the sense that it's our personal life, like relationships, and skills, such as those that could develop differently because of social networking through the Internet, or whether it be something as broad as how robots could one day "take over the world." Overall, research so far has opened my eyes to just how many ways I can take my views and opinions on my topic.
Consequences for Social Competence and Self-Concept Unity. Communication Research v. 35 no. 2 (April 2008) p. 208-31
Patti M. Valkenburg and Jochen Peter, both graduates with a PhD from Amsterdam School of Communications Research, teamed together to write this article, focusing primarily on the effects of media contents and technology with the development of children and young adults. The type of audience most likely to be interested in this article, are those just as interested in the research of how technology, primarily social networking, affects our young society today. Keywords the authors used for this article were: Internet, chat, social skills, loneliness, and self-concept clarity. These keywords make it easy to relate to my topic of research because I’m doing just that; showing how the Internet affects social skills, and therefore could cause things such as loneliness and self-concept clarity issues.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________
Couch, Danielle, and Pranee Liamputtong. "Online Dating and Mating: The Use of the Internet to Meet Sexual Partners." Qualitative Health Research 18 (2008): 268-79.
Danielle Couch, a postgraduate student at the School of Public Health, and Pranee Liamputtong, also at the school of Public Health, both researched the use of the Internet to meet sexual partners. They researched the process in which some people go about meeting their sexual partner through the way that they participate with online programs using such things as the webcam, email, and chat to engage in conversation, and meet one another. This article relates well with my research topic in the sense that I’m trying to figure out if the idea of developing a relationship from Internet resources is negative, or if it could actually prove as useful and successful.
________________________________________________________________________________________________
Levy, David. Love and Sex with Robots. New York: HarperCollins, 2007.
As an internationally known artificial intelligence expert and the International computer games association, David Levy seems to represent…something not offensive. Stereotypically, his audience is not widely known for their social skills. As his subject involves future intercourse with robots, this stereotype may hold true. Levy graduated from Acadia University in 1972 and received his masters in English from Queens University in 1979. The author’s audience is targeted at anyone who has an interest in technology in general, or specifically robots. The demand of Levy audience is the curiosity in just how far technology can go. Author David Levy is primarily trying to address the things that technology brings us to today, showing how absurd the new ideas that people create are. A main argument that Levy makes is that what we may have imagined never happening, could happen a lot sooner than we think, or could already be happening right before our eyes. For example in briefly describing what the book is about, Levy states: “Love, marriage, and sex with robots? Not in a million years? Maybe a whole lot sooner.”
Just the term, “Robot-human sexual intercourse” is a controversial issue. It’s no question sex in society has been a constantly changing argument, for centuries views have differed and changed by public opinion. But even in today’s society where sex seems to be a little less taboo, (even if no one wants to admit it but advertisements can publicly resemble at pin up poster) it’s unclear how people will react to sexual relations with inanimate objects. Considering the openness of the subject, it’s hard to tell if the author is “cropping out” certain topics. It’s possible that these robots might turn on their masters or become some sort of undercover device for the government. A threat to privacy could be eminent, but that’s the risk you run with dating a computer. The idea of being able to have a real relationship with a robot in and of itself, is interesting; thinking that someone can have real feelings for an object hardly considered anything but programmed. I think Levy’s main purpose in talking about this issue, is to make us aware of how technology is literally changing the world. This source could prove as very useful in terms of our final research papers, because it not only helps us to see the different affects technology has on us in just this aspect, but it opened our eyes showing us that it can relate to more topics than just our own.
From these three out of my six sources, I have hardly had to alter my original research topic at all. Although all three are very different articles, explaining very different topics and situations, each tie into my research topic in the sense that technology GREATLY changes our everyday life. Whether it changes our lives in the sense that it's our personal life, like relationships, and skills, such as those that could develop differently because of social networking through the Internet, or whether it be something as broad as how robots could one day "take over the world." Overall, research so far has opened my eyes to just how many ways I can take my views and opinions on my topic.
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