Methods

           In order to study this phenomenon, I began by creating a ten question multiple choice survey.  The survey was focused on three main areas (which related to the three main sections of my hypothesis): If student organizations had Facebooks and how they were using them, how the members of these organizations felt about these uses, and how the members felt about their organizations as a result.  Each of the three areas had several multiple choice questions that related to it, and there were no “middle of the road” answers, so participants had to choose for example, whether or not they were required to modify their Facebook for their student organizations, and whether or not they liked to do this.  I chose to make a ten question survey because it was short enough that I could get a large enough sample to complete it, but it was also representative of all three of my main areas of study.  By eliminating the “middle of the road” answers, I required that participants have an opinion about the issue and ensured that I would be able to draw conclusive results for each section of my hypothesis.  

            I issued my survey to a test group of 20 University of California Los Angeles students in various student organizations to make sure that my questions were logical and representative of my hypothesis and the phenomenon in question.  After surveying my testing group, I found that Facebook had recently developed a new feature called a “Facebook Group” which was different than a Facebook Page and although it was not a part of my study or hypothesis, I clarified the distinction between a Facebook Page and a Facebook Group in my survey to make my survey more accurate and relatable to my hypothesis.  (I included some questions about Facebook Groups in my survey in order to be able to give additional insight about my findings at the conclusion of my research as well).  After this trial test, I had a survey of ten concise multiple choice questions that addressed each of the three main sections of my research that were directly relatable to my hypothesis.   

            I collected my data by gathering survey responses from 112 students at the University of California Los Angeles.  I chose to survey typical college-age students of both sexes in on-campus organizations.  By selecting typical college-age students of both sexes at the University of California Los Angeles campus, I was surveying a sample of individuals who were extremely likely to be familiar with and use Facebook frequently, because this is a social networking site that is very popular among college-age students.  By selecting students in on-campus organizations, I was able to measure how organizations use these members’ Facebooks, and subsequently how these students felt about these uses and their organizations as a result.  In order to recruit these subjects, I hosted my survey on the website kwiksurveys.com, and administered the link to my survey to various individual students in student organizations, and groups of student organizations, at UCLA via Facebook.  The link to my survey can be found here: http://kwiksurveys.com/?u=Facebook-PersonalorProfessional.  By hosting my survey online, and distributing in through Facebook, I ensured that I would be reaching subjects that have Internet access and used Facebook.  I sent it out to students who were involved in on-campus organizations and also to various student organization pages to be sure that the students I was reaching were in fact students that were involved in an on-campus organization.  By collecting my data in this was I was able to obtain a sample of 112 subjects (typical college-age, UCLA students of both sexes who were involved in on-campus organizations) who were able to answer each of the questions in the survey and generate data that allowed me to evaluate my hypothesis and make larger claims about the phenomenon in question.  

            I finished up my data collection with a series of 25 personal interviews.  Each of these interviews was with an individual who reported that he or she had completed the online survey previously.  The interviews consisted of several open-ended questions as to why the individual responded the way that they did, to several of the survey questions.  These responses were used to give some depth to the responses collected in the survey and to allow me to make a more informative conclusion as to the meaning behind that data that I collected in my surveys.  By conducting these interviews I was able to not only assess my hypothesis, but speculate as to why this was the case and what the potential consequences of these findings could be.

            Throughout the data collection process, little to no complications arose.  The only point of interest took place in the initial test run of the survey where I discovered a distinction between a Facebook Page and a Facebook Group.  I clarified this distinction in my survey and used several questions about Facebook Groups in order to be able to give even more insight to the phenomenon in question, even though Facebook Groups are not a part of my hypothesis or research question.  The development and distribution of the final survey went smoothly and by administering the surveys online to individuals in student organization and student organizations as a whole, I ensured that all of my subjects were typical college-age students of both sexes from the University of California Los Angeles who were in student organizations, that could answer each of the questions and allow me to collect a representative and reliable sample of data that could be used to assess my hypothesis and draw general conclusions.