Introduction
This chapter focuses on sociability via social media. In this context sociability describes how people interact with each other via social media such as: discussion boards, blogs, microblogs, social networking environments (e.g., Facebook, Myspace, Linkedin), and user-contributed content sites (e.g., Flickr, Youtube, Wikipedia), and many others.
Sociability is influenced: (1) by the characteristics of people; (2) the purpose of the interaction; (3) the norms and policies that govern online behavior; (4) the design of the software environment that supports the interactions (Preece, 2000), and sometimes by (5) the physical environment in which people interact either together or separately.
Both the functionality (i.e., what the software is designed to do) and usability (i.e., how it is designed to do it) impact sociability. For example, software that is cumbersome and annoying to use is likely to have a negative effect on sociability, whereas software that is easy and...
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References/Further Readings
Jones, M., & Marsden, G. (2005). Mobile interaction design. Chichester: Wiley.
Komlodi, A., Ho, W., Preece, J., Druin, A., Golub, E., Alburo, J. et al. (2007). Evaluating a cross-cultural children’s online book community: Lessons learned for sociability, usability, and cultural exchange. Interacting with Computers, 19, 494–511.
Maloney-Krichmar, D., & Preece, J. (2005). A multilevel analysis of sociability, usability and community dynamics in an online health community. Transactions on Human-Computer Interaction (TOCHI), 12(2), 1–32.
Nonnecke, B., & Preece, J. (2000). Lurker demographics: Counting the silent. Paper presented at the ACM CHI 2000 Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, The Hague, The Netherlands.
Postmes, T., Spears, R., & Lea, M. (2008). The formation of group norms in computer-mediated communication. Human Communication Research, 26(3), 341–371. (Published online 10 January, 2006)
Preece, J. (1999). Empathic communities: Balancing emotional and factual communication. Interacting with Computers, The Interdisciplinary Journal of Human-Computer Interaction, 12(1), 63–77.
Preece, J. (2000). Online communities: Designing usability, supporting sociability. Chichester: Wiley.
Preece, J., & Shneiderman, B. (2009). The reader-to-leader framework: Motivating technology-mediated social participation. AIS Transactions on Human-Computer Interaction, 1(1).
Preece, J., Nonnecke, B., & Andrews, D. (2004). The top five reasons for lurking: Improving community experiences for everyone. Computers in Human Behavior, 20(2), 201–223.
Putnam, R. (2000). Bowling alone: The collapse and revival of American community. New York: Simon & Schuster.
Turkle, S. (1995). Life on the screen: Identity in the age of the internet. New York: Simon & Schuster.
Wenger, E. (1999). Communities of practice. Learning, meaning and identity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
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Preece, J. (2010). Sociability. In: Anheier, H.K., Toepler, S. (eds) International Encyclopedia of Civil Society. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-93996-4_598
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-93996-4_598
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