1. The Impact of Social Media
Conducting Independent Enquiry About Social Media
Part A & Part B
sociology.hku.hk/impact-social-media

2. Welcome to Independent Enquiry Study !
Structured Enquiry Approach
School-based assessment
20% of your DSE final mark
Research on any issues related to the DSE LS curriculum
Submit a report of not more than 4,500 words

3. How will this course be useful for me?
Deeper understanding of social media
Learning how research is done, meeting researchers
How will this course be useful for me?
Connecting with students in the UK
Exploring academic texts
Step by step guidance on how to carry out your IES

4. A Step by Step Guide
Part A
What are the issues I should focus my research on?
Part B
What concepts and methods are relevant to your IES?
Part C
What areas should I explain in detail for my enquiry issue?
Part D
How do I formulate an argument?

5. Part A: Problem Definition
What are the issues I should focus my research on?

6. 1. Getting You Thinking……
What socially significant issue do you feel interested in?
What are the debates related the issue?
Let’s take social media as an example!

7. Video Watching: Why do you think that social media is significant to research on? (p.4)
Watch this video at:
Social media is very popular and its impact is widespread.
Social media changes the way people communicate with each other.
Studies of social media may have policy implications etc.

8. 2. Choosing a Controversial Issue
a. What’s debatable? (p.6)
The impact of social media on education.
While some people believe social media has detrimental effect on academic
performance of students, others believe that social media benefits both
formal education and informal education.
b. Whose view might be relevant to the debate?
Students, teachers, parents etc.

9. 3. Choosing Your Focus Questions
Enquiry question: How does social media affect education?
How do teachers and students use social media?
How useful do parents from various socio-economic classes see social media in terms of their children’s formal and information education?
How do teachers develop school policy to regulate the use of social media in school?

10. Kahoot: Which of the enquiry questions are good?
Teachers can discuss with students about what research questions to choose.

11. Good Enquiry and Focus Questions Are:
Controversial
Allows you to discuss from multiple perspectives
Specific enough
Feasible to collect data to research on
Focus questions are relevant to the enquiry question

12. Your Turn…… P.9-10 of Student Pack
What is your enquiry issue and major enquiry question?
Why is your study significant? Who might the results be useful for and why? Could your results be used to create social policy? If so, how?
What controversy(ies) are you going to discuss in your IES?
What do you aim to achieve?
What focus questions do you ask?
Who do you want to study?
Where would you base your research and why?

13. If you are interested in debates related to social media… Check them out on p.11
Education
Individualism
Privacy
Students could be given some time in class to explore these topics and think about which one they may want to research on.
and many more…
Gender relations
Culture

14. Part B: Relevant Concepts and Knowledge Facts / Data
What concepts and methods are relevant to your IES?

15. 1. What is a Concept? Example: What is gender?
Gender is biological. Men and women have different bodies from birth.
I disagree, gender is social. We learn how to act like a man or a woman as we grow up.
A “key concept” speaks about an important idea that a number of different people, normally experts, might agree on. Not everyone will agree on a particular concept, though, and different people may suggest different understandings of a key concept.

16. 2. How Do You Operationalise a Concept?
Make abstract concepts measurable so they are concrete enough to observe.

17. Define the Key Terms of Your Enquiry Question and Focus Questions!
Enquiry question: How does social media affect education?
How do teachers and students use social media?
How useful do parents from various socio-economic classes see social media in terms of their children’s formal and information education?
How do teachers develop school policy to regulate the use of social media in school?

18. Operationalization: How Do You Make these Abstract Concepts Measurable?
Socio-economic classes
Social media
positivist
Education
Formal education
hawthorn effect
consent
Informal education
School policy

19. Example: Let’s Define and Operationalize Social Media (p.12-14)
What do you think social media is? Do you find it difficult to define social media? Why?

20. Example: Let’s Define and Operationalize Social Media (p.12-14)

21. Example: Let’s Define and Operationalize Social Media (p.12-14)
How do the researchers of the Why We Post Project define social media?
How is their definition different from the definition of previous studies?
Why do they define social media in ways different from other researchers?
They define social media as a place within which people socialize and as
the contents people posted on social media platforms.
The researchers do not define social media as platforms for people to
communicate with each other.
If social media is defined as platforms, then a comparative study of social
media is not possible. There are no regional variations in how social media
platforms work. However, what people post on social media does have
regional variations. They define social media in different ways to suit the
needs of their research.

22. Your Turn…… P.27 of Student Pack
What do you think is the best way to define social media in your IES?
How is your definition of social media useful to your analysis?
How would you operationalise (to make measurable) the concept social media?
What are the other key concepts in your enquiry question and focus questions? How would you define, operationalise and explain them?
Start with searching for literature!
sociology.hku.hk/social-media-concepts
For those who are interested in social media studies:

23. 3. Choosing Your Research Method
Choose and justify the method you use to collect data

24. Secondary Data
Search through academic journals, government reports, and research papers etc.

25. Video Watching: Questionnaire VS Interviews (P.19)
Watch this video at:

26. Video Watching: Questionnaire VS Interviews (P.19)

27. Kahoot: Which methods are suitable?
Techers can discuss with students reasons for choosing a research method for the given research questions.

28. Your Turn…… P.21 of Student Pack
Which methods would be most suitable for and why?
Who would you wish to research as your questionnaires respondents or interviewees? Why?
What sorts of skills might you need?
How would you record and analyse your results?
What have you learnt from this activity about the challenges of researching the impact of social media? How can you overcome those challenges?

29. Upcoming…
What to do after collecting data?