Thesis Title: Subtitle

Sampling and Recruitment: Creating a Sample

In seeking to examine Facebook, I elected to examine the experiences and activities of Facebook users. In creating my sample I decided to use myself as the starting point. My recruitment strategy began in my immediate social network through my friends on Facebook. Two of the methods employed in this research, the structured questionnaire and the interview, were central to the recruitment process. Using the researcher’s personal

networks as a starting point for sample creation has been used in several studies (see for example, Biernacki and Waldof 1981; Duncan and Edwards 1999; Browne 2005).
However, utilising my social network as a starting point means that the range of people included in the sample is inevitably limited by my biographical characteristics; a female PhD student, in my mid-twenties, single and without children. This produced a sample which to some extent reflected some of these characteristics. Nonetheless, as recruitment continued the sample began to diversify from these characteristics.
The first step in creating a sample from my network was to ask my Facebook friends to circulate a link to the structured questionnaire through their Facebook pages.

Structured Questionnaire

To gain a sense of how participants are using Facebook they were asked to complete an online structured questionnaire consisting of 31 questions. The questionnaire (see Appendix 1) asked participants for demographic information including: gender, age, and educational attainment. The questionnaire also asked participants to ‘map’ their Facebook network by asking where they met their connections on Facebook and their location. The survey also asked participants if they used their real name on Facebook, how long they had held their account and how many friends they had on their Facebook account at that moment in time. I also asked participants if they had met everyone on their friends list in person, and what they primarily used Facebook for. The questionnaire also asked basic questions about frequency of use, mode of use (e.g. smart phone, computer) and place of use. The structured questionnaire was hosted on surveymonkey.com, an online survey creation and hosting tool that allows for access to the questionnaire once it has been activated. The questionnaire and participation in the study was limited to those above 18 years of age. Participants were asked basic demographic questions such as their age, gender, and education level. Participants were also asked about their usage of Facebook, including how many Facebook friends they have, whether they ‘lurk’ or actively participate, how often during the day they use Facebook and when and where they use Facebook.
Assessing levels and types of use is acknowledged as an important way of gauging how SNS fit into and affects users’ lives (Hargittai and Hsieh 2011).
The questionnaire remained open until a minimum of 100 participants had taken the questionnaire. The responses were used to guide and direct the selection of participants
for the semi-structured interviews and observational components of this study as well as sensitising me to differences and similarities across participants before interviewing (Olsen 2004). The data was used as background information to contextualise my qualitative analysis. Quantitative analysis was restricted to summary descriptive statistics in order to provide information about the sample.