Netnography: Understanding Online Communities

 



Netnography, or virtual-ethnography as it is also known, originates from ethnography and emerged with the growth in relevance of the internet.

Netnography itself is categorised into four types: Symbolic, Auto, Digital and Humanist

Symbolic netnography is the most commonly used type and sets out to understand the thought-processes and practices of a particular online community, often through social media interactions. 

Auto netnography requires the researcher to be a member of the online community in question and forces them to look inward into their own thoughts and emotions to develop a documented understanding of said community. On top of the researcher’s reflections, external data is used to develop a clearer understanding of context as well as decreasing the influence of the researcher’s natural bias

Digital netnography is the practice of tying statistical data analysis with cultural information using mostly publicly available social data. The researcher must be somewhat discreet in their observation of a community to ensure that natural behaviour is practiced and accurate insights are gathered.

Humanist netnography is the situation in which the researcher acts as an advocate and often an activist to use data from social media as a catalyst in encouraging social change.

As stated in Morais et al (2020), netnography collaborates with the idea that human beings must be studied in depth, resisting the tendency to reduce humanity to numbers, decontextualizing its constituent elements and descriptors.

There are twelve phases in the effective implementation of netnography, as outlined by netnography’s inventor, Robert Kozinets in 2015: Introspection, Investigation, Informational, Interview, Inspection, Interaction, Immersion, Indexing, Interpretation, Iteration, Instantiation and Integration.

Technological determinism is a term used to describe the idea that technology has a huge impact on society, and even moulds our culture as well as being a leading influence in the shaping of the current zeitgeist. Those who argue against technological determinism tend to argue in favour of the idea of social determinism, which poses the opposite theory to the former term. Social determinism posits that society completely moulds technological development. (Hauer, T., 2017)

Regardless of somebody’s stance, there appears to be a shared understanding among all that society and technology do not exist independently of each other. They share somewhat of an interdependence, but technology is just “one of the many social processes”. (Hauer, T., 2017)

While some may argue that the lack of physical interaction, social cues and tone of voice may skew the authenticity of activity among online communities, the contrary could also be the case. The internet often allows an additional sense of security and sometimes anonymity, which could influence more genuine and honest personal reflections than any physical interaction ever would. Regardless of one’s stance, technology, and specifically the internet, are too large an aspect of our society to not be researched thoroughly and utilised properly.

#socialmedia #community #ethnography #culture


Author: Jamie Carty

 

References

  • Morais, G., Santos, V. and Gonçalves, C., 2020. Netnography: Origins, Foundations, Evolution and Axiological and Methodological Developments and Trends. The Qualitative Report; Fort Lauderdale, 25(2).


·       Hauer, T., 2017. Technological determinism and new media. International Journal of English, Literature and Social Science, 2(2), p.1.



Comments

  1. Author: Deirbhile
    Netnography is regarded as one of the most important research tools today, As it can truly provide highly in-depth insights into consumers, which helps so many industries. It and can be argued that relying only on digital sources can harm studies. A trademark of genuine Netnography is where each detail consists of true human interactions, stories and understandings of individuals using technology. To avoid relying only on digital approaches to Netnography it is important to first truly define what type of online/ digital studies are being conducted. A more consistent and strong approach to create genuine studies is key to continue helping industries give a better understands of critical fields like psychology and education.

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  2. Author: Elizabeth Duffy

    Digital netnography is a prominent part of how we understand the events that happen in today's society particularly social media. Informal news channels and tv shows are using any form of social media, Tweet's and TikTok's, as credible evidence to back up the stories they're presenting. Audiences have accepted this as a credible form of research without a second thought about who was harvesting that information because it was made public and they must be aware of research teams for these programmes. Marketer's use digital netnography to conduct 'social listening' to build personas of their customer types. Harvesting interests, hobbies, values and sentiments about their brand and products. It is an invaluable resource in this respect and can be of very low cost to businesses. As you stated, it can also be discreet or annoymous and the business's persona can be upheld in every interaction with the community in the process. It was not something that was available before but is now more important than ever to remain competitive. During my research about generation Z as consumers, I found digital netnography is used to help understand this new generation by analysing the changes in culture and technology and how these have shaped their behaviour as a consumer. Generation Z are the most diverse consumer yet, more cultured and concerned about things like the environment, inclusivity and diversity. In this respect, digital netnography is key to connect the gap between data and the consumer.

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