Internet Could Help Mediate Negative Effects of Psychopathologies

Recent research suggests that people with depression will have levels of hostility reduced by going online

As technology has continued emerge as an incredibly huge part of the lives of many people, particularly younger generations, concerns have been raised about the negative effects that spending too much time using these groundbreaking developments has on users’ mental well-being.

Recent research suggests that technology may not affect everyone the same way, depending on whether or not they have depression or an internet addiction. A recent study released by a group of researchers examining college students in Taiwan’s behavior indicates that people as a whole do not necessarily get more hostile when going online.

Entering the study, the researchers had planned to examine how hostility online and in the real world differ, as well as if depression, internet addiction and internet activity would make a user more likely to have higher levels of hostility while online.

Contrary to what was hypothesized, the study found user’s self-reported levels of hostility decreased when going online across all measured dimensions of hostility. However, the study, which was released earlier this year, also suggests that subjects with depression and/or an internet addiction have higher levels of hostility while compared to those without these issues.

Depression decreases while online, but is still high

In every dimension of hostility either depression or internet addiction had the highest t-score and the other independent variable was the second highest. The only exception to this was when online gaming outpaced depression in regards to expressive hostility behavior when online.

10.4 percent of subjects were found to have depression based off of the criteria of the CES-D.

The study also found that depression was the most associated of the independent variables with hostility when examining hostility cognition, hostility affection, suppressive hostility behavior and total hostility in both real life, as well as online.

While those with depression had higher scores in each dimension of hostility than those who were using the internet for gaming and chatting, the depressed subjects’ total hostility was lower when online than in real life.

The most noticeable decreases in t-scores for subjects with depression came from total hostility which fell from 16.00 when in the real world to 10.06 when online.
The study also finds that the increases in t-scores for those with internet addiction when examining expressive hostility behavior, which rose from 4.07 in real life to 5.47 when online and hostility affection, which rose from 6.22 to 6.50.

According to the researchers, the high levels of hostility both online and offline that was found in subjects with depression fits in with previous research that suggests that hostility predicts depression.

In explaining a potential cause for the decrease in hostility while going online for depressed subjects, the researchers mention the possibility of social support that the depressed subjects get online that may not be available elsewhere as a potential cause for their lowered levels of hostility across all measured dimensions.

Online chatting and gaming users still hostile

In the study, the users that were utilizing the internet for chatting with other users or playing video games did not have as strong of a connection with hostility as the previously mentioned psychopathologies did.

Most of the t-scores found for the subjects who used the internet for chatting and gaming purposes were found to be insignificant. Out of all of the scores, the highest was when expressive hostility behavior of the gaming subject when online was given a score of 4.84, which was lower than nearly all of the t-scores for subjects with depression and internet addiction.

The researchers attributed the subjects who played video games online to the fact that they games often times involve competition and violence could explain not only the higher levels of hostility while online, but in real life as well compared to people who use the internet for other purposes.

A 2005 study by Browne and Hamilton-Giachritsis found that the more people are exposed to violent images through the media, the more likely that they are to engage in violent behavior.

However, the researchers also stated that the users who used the internet for gaming and chatting purposes still had higher levels of hostility than the subjects who were using it for other reasons.

The study also finds that those who use the internet primarily for gaming or chatting purposes do not show a great deal of variability in expressed hostility behavior between the real world and when online. On the other hand, the also study found that those who use the internet primarily for other purposes have a more marked decrease in expressed hostility behavior when they are online compared to in real life.

Previous research suggests that people may be more hostile when utilizing the internet because of the anonymity that it provides any user who wants it. The findings of the study go against this theory of deindividuaton, which is the separation between a user’s true self and who they are online.

The researchers suggest that while a person does have a fair amount of control over their identity on the internet, they still want to maintain a good reputation on websites such as Facebook and Twitter, which forces them to have user IDs, and thus has kept them from being fully anonymous.

They also suggested that the friends that he subjects had online are likely to be skilled socially and anxiety in the users that they are chatting with.

It is also suggested that the entertainment features of the internet, such as the capability of watching movies online is also something that allows users to better relax, and consequently leads to lower levels of hostility for the people not gaming or chatting online.

There is still much that this study does not address

One particular limitation of the study is that it is based in. While the measures used do better examine the subjects’ response, it remains to be seen how the
findings of this study would relate to other cultures.

It is important to note that due to the structure of this study, it is impossible to determine causality from the results. The researchers also acknowledge that their data is reliant on self-reports from college students, which may not be fully accurate.

The study drew 1,124 males and 1,224 for a total of 2,348 subjects from eight colleges located in rural, suburban and urban Taiwan.

Researchers used the Chen Internet Addiction Scale, the Center for Epidemiological Studies for Depression Scale and the Chinese version of Buss-Durkee Hostility Inventory to measure subjects in this study.

As online news becomes more popular, slight differences between groups remain

Recent research indicates that people with higher levels of education are more drawn to political news

As computers and mobile devices have grown increasingly popular in America, practically every news outlet in the country has begun to post news content on their websites and anyone with access to internet has a myriad of choices at his or her news-seeking fingertips. Recent research indicates that how people decide what news to look at online may be influenced by their level of education.

A study conduced by University of Maryland senior journalism major Christopher Grady examines how education level affects how frequently people use the internet to find news on politics, sports, business, entertainment and local news.

The research showed that regardless of educational level, the internet has become a vital means for people to receive their news, as 40 out of 46 subjects stated that they read news online at least once time per day. None of the respondents stated that they read news online less than two to three times per week.

Politics and educational level have strongest relationship

The research also indicates that those who have more advanced education are more likely to utilize the internet to find out about current events involving pressing worldly issues, such as politics.

Given that level of education did not create large differences in read news online, none of the correlations between education level and a how frequently subjects looked at a particular topic of news were found to be significant.

However, two of the larger insignificant correlations found that after survey data was reverse coded there was a correlation of .150 between how frequently subjects read political news and educational levels and a correlation of .130 between education level and interest in politics, which suggests that those who only attended high school or college read less political news than their more educated counterparts.

More educated people less interested in sports and entertainment news

The only two significant correlations between subjects’ level of education and how much interest they showed in a particular topic came as correlations of -.317 and -.310 were found for an item that asked how much subjects looked at sports news compared to other topic and how high they rated their interest in sports respectively.

The study also found a reverse scored correlation of -.193, which indicates that educated subjects are less likely to be frequent readers of sports news. There was also a -.907 correlation between subjects reported interest in politics and sports, which was found to have a strong statistical significance.

More educated participants were also less interested in entertainment news as well as the research found that was a -.118 correlation between education level and how much subjects went online for entertainment news compared to how much they looked at other types of news online. Unlike the negative relationship between sports and politics, the study found that interest in entertainment and politics had no correlation. This finding indicates that interest in politics and entertainment are not as mutually exclusive as sports and politics.

In general, subjects are not interested in using the internet to view local news as there was essentially no correlation between education level and any of the items asking about local news. In total 31 out of 46 subjects stated that they were either significantly or slightly less interest in local news than other subjects.

A possible explanation for this is that these subjects are using the internet to fully explore what is going on in the world that they would have difficulty finding out about otherwise.

There is much that is still unknown about why people pursue different types of news online

Given that this study involves correlational data it is impossible to definitively state that someone’s level of education will dictate how frequently someone seeks out news on a particular subject via the internet. A confounding variable of the study could be that difference in interests exists between age groups, according to Grady.

Grady, who was the sole researcher in the study, relied on a convenience sample, as he sent the survey to friends at the university, his family members as well as his colleagues at Education Week.

The biggest limitation of the study was that the sample overwhelmingly favored those who did not pursue their education any further than their undergraduate career. Of the 31 male and 15 female participants in the study, 34 were either pursuing an undergraduate degree or had completed it, but did not continue their education.
Only four subjects ended their educations at high school, six attended a masters program and one subject had a doctorate.

Research suggests that the U.S. has historically made up a small portion of terrorist attack targets

One day has changed how Americans think about terrorism.

Sept. 11, 2001 was a day that certainly struck fear into the hearts of Americans and is a day that will be impossible to forget. However, recent research indicates that while the United States was the victim of a terrorist group on that fateful day, the U.S. is not a frequent target for terrorist attacks on U.S. soil or abroad.

Data in the 2009 study “Trajectories of Terrorism” points out that the 53 groups that the U.S. State Department consider special threats to the U.S. as a whole commit their acts of terrorism domestically. However, because of the magnitude of Sept. 11, the U.S. government has spent billions of dollars to prevent further attacks, according to researcher Dr. Gary LaFree, who runs the National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism at the University of Maryland.

“Sept. 11 is what some researchers would call a black swan," LaFree says. “It has had a huge impact on our thinking on terrorism. It has had a huge impact on policies, but what the data shows is that it is pretty darn unusual,” LaFree says.

The study looked at the 53 anti-U.S. groups acts of terrorism from 1970 until 2004. In total, the researchers analyzed 16,916 terrorist attacks that lead to 42,056 fatalities over the time span.

From this data, the researchers found that a little more than three percent of all anti-U.S. terrorist groups’ attacks that have occurred between 1970 and 2004 were directed at the U.S. At the same time, the U.S. also accounted for more than nine percent of fatalities related to terrorist attacks.

“We are spending a good amount of time and money and energy,” LaFree says. “We have adopted essentially a zero-tolerance mission. We’re spending billions of dollars to keep safe. Not everything being done has been effective, but if you look at it in its entirety, it’s definitely having an impact.”


There is a far greater tendency for domestic attacks within non-U.S. countries


The study also found that 90 percent anti-U.S. groups’ attacks occurred domestically and accounted for 84 percent of terrorism related fatalities.

Thus, the U.S.’ effort to root out terrorist groups greatly helps to save foreign, lives as well as American lives, according to LaFree.

“I think it ends up being the case that it is pretty difficult to pull of a transnational attack,” LaFree says. “Like crime, it is local. If terrorist groups have more resources, they would be militaries.”

The heavy concentration of terrorist attacks occurring within a group’s own country is very comparable to criminals perpetrating criminal acts against people who live nearby, according to LaFree.

“Terrorism is extremely territorial,” LaFree says. “It seems to happen locally.”

Terrorism has tended to affect countries around the world on cycles
The study also indicate that the amount of terrorist attacks both against U.S. targets and has cycled between periods of high annual numbers of attacks and low numbers three times over the data’s time span.

“A group finds a weakness and they exploit it until the home group reciprocates
and finds a way to counter it,” LaFree says.

The cycling between periods of a high volume of terrorist attacks and periods of relative inactivity are not accurately portrayed by the media, which has caused the findings of the study to surprise some readers, according to LaFree.

“You get the idea from the media that terrorism groups are always around and never disappear, but we find the opposite,” LaFree says. “...They are like business start-ups. They are often very short lived because it is not that easy to do.”

The results have also surprised readers given that the overwhelming majority of terrorist attacks are occurring domestically.

“I think when all people hear about this research they are surprised about how lopsided the attacks are in favor of domestic attacks,” LaFree says. “They aren’t even attacking U.S. targets in their own country.”

The U.S. has spent a significant amount of money during the time span of the study to prevent terrorist attacks which in part explains the low percentage of attacks against the U.S., according to LaFree.

The 1980s were the most active period for terrorist attacks

The researchers divided the groups included into the study into four trajectory groups. The 1980s boom accounted for 85.2 percent of the attacks on non-U.S. targets, while the 1970s onset only accounted for 9 percent.

However, the 1980s boom accounted for 56.5 percent of attacks directed at the U.S, while the 1970s onset accounted for 30 percent and the 21st-Century boom made up 5.1 percent. Of the groups that researcher placed in the 1980s boom trajectory, 57.1 percent of the groups were in both the U.S. and non-U.S trajectories.

The researchers consequently categorized the organizations not fitting into any of the waves as the sporadic group.

Researchers categorized 99 percent of the groups into their correct category, according to LaFree.

“Basically what this trajectory analysis does is takes ... each of the attack patterns of each group and asks the question ‘What’s the simplest way of combining these different attack patterns into broader categories,” LaFree says. “Once it gets to the end of categorizing them, it answers the question of ‘If you’re trying to put each of these groups into ...one of these four categories. How likely are you to be that you picked the right category?’...Essentially, instead of looking at 53 groups, we are looking at four broader groups.”

While there were the ratio between attacks against the U.S. and attack against other countries was above one in 1971, the ratio has not been above .20 at any point after the 1970s, according to the study. Between 1980 and 2004 the ratio between U.S. and non-U.S attacks has only reached 7.9 percent and above in 1993, 1998 and 2004., according to the study.

The bust cycles that are described in the study can also be explained by people growing tired of terrorism, according to LaFree.

“I think... people get tired of terrorism,“ LaFree says. “I mean, it is an incredibly divisive, destructive force... nobody is sad to see the end of the Tamil Tigers. So I think people essentially wear out.”

Readers focus on the qualities within news stories

Reserach defies previous research that suggests that audiences reactions are based on the media source

University of Maryland journalism students have released a study suggests that despite the frequently debated issue of bias in the media may not be as much of an issue as it is made out to be.

Student researchers conducted the study using data from NewsTrust, which is a website that allows reviewers to rate and comment on news stories to see if they are good journalism, such as accuracy, fairness and quality of facts. The researchers found that the majority of observed reviewers erred away from discussing the issues of the stories reviewed. Rather reviewers tended to focus more on the technical merits and downfalls of the story, according to the results of this research.

The hypothesis of the study was that some of the reviewers would rate the story based on the issues in the story rather than the journalistic quality of the story
The findings of this study fly directly in the face of what has been found in other research regarding hostile media effect, according to lead researcher and Maryland journalism student Tony Herman.

Researchers examined content of the stories as well as the subject’s comments

Previous research on hostile media effect created the expectation for the researchers that audience members will view mass media outlets as publishing or broadcasting stories that go against their beliefs. Based on this theory the researchers examined the content of the comments that NewsTrust users left on four stories.
“We were looking for pretty obvious examples,” Herman says. “We expected a lot of people to be like ‘Well this is from so and so media source so naturally it’s selected like this.’ It didn’t turn out that way.”

The study also examined how often reviewers mentioned the media source in their comments. Given that reviewers did not engage in hostile media effect, very few reviewers mentioned the name of the media outlet, which was one of the things researchers were looking at in reviewer’s comments.

The researchers also assessed the perceived credibility rating that reviewers gave each story and if the review focused on the quality of the story or the issues within the content of the story and found that reviewers were more likely to review the journalistic qualities of the story rather than the issues at hand.

Previous research suggests that people are affected by the source of news stories

If the study played out as the researchers had hypothesized then people would have automatically felt an article went against their beliefs because of the source it came from, according to Herman.

The findings indicate that the reviewers in this study tended to review the stories based off of the hard facts and quotes that were contained in the stories.
The reviewers also tended to overwhelmingly believe that all four of the stories included in the research were at least somewhat credible, with a propensity for believing that the story was very credible.

This aspect in particular goes against Hostile Media Effect directly, as the theory suggests that those who espouse the effect will automatically feel that a story is biased against their beliefs even if the story has been considered to be unbiased by researchers.

The subjects may not be like everyone else

However, the research was not without some limitation as the sample size was only 22 subjects who were predominantly college students and friends of students in two courses taught by the professor. Regardless, this research might still give some pause to those who suggest that people do not judge the credibility of the news they receive from its source, but rather the qualities within each story.

NewsTrust, which was founded in 2005, appears to attract a different type of user than most news website, which is a potential explanation for why the results of Herman and Betty Klinck’s report “Assessing Audience Perceptions of Credibility Using Hostile Media Effect” differ from previous work.

Another issue with the study was that it only focused on four stories, some of which had less than 10 comments that explained the scores given to the stories.
Herman says he does not put a lot of weight in his study’s findings despite them putting a widely researched theory in dispute as he believes that NewsTrust is not an accurate representation of those who leave comments on a regular news website.
“I think our results are limited enough that I really don’t think it is applicable,” Herman says.

One possible explanation for the unexpected results is that research subjects did not put much effort into reviewing the stories and just completed the project out of a favor for the researchers, according to the study.

The ethics of using social media as a source

Popular social networking websites such as Facebook have certainly made finding information about some people significantly easier for not just journalists, but the public as a whole. However, given that 78 percent of people in a recent survey would change the content that appeared on their accounts if they knew that the mainstream media would use it clearly indicates that using this information is a very relevant ethical issue.

On the other side of the coin, if the people who did not want media outlets to use the content available on their profiles, they could easily change the privacy settings so that that information would be much more difficult for someone to find without the user’s consent. If people were more aware of this then the ethical issue would be far less pronounced because people who allowed their accounts to remain public would be knowingly allowing the content that they post to be exposed to anyone.

If one were to change their account settings to prevent everyone with access to the internet from seeing what they post, then the issue of using information on these sites becomes afar negative issue given that the user have purposefully chosen not to share their account with everyone. Using deceptive means to access this information would be no different from stealing someone’s personal journal taping a private conversation without consent, which are both unethical tactics.

The biggest issue facing user is that many do not think before they begin posting whatever comes to mind onto the internet. There needs to be a better understanding for users that what they post on the internet can be found and used against them if its content is questionable or condemning.

However, whenever I encounter a story that has referenced something that appeared on someone’s page, it always gives the impression that the reporter has not done a good job of trying to use human sources as a means of breaking stories. The only time that writing about what people post onto their accounts would be if a public figure made an announcement via this medium or in the case of a criminal investigation where the authorities had used content posted on someone’s account to solve a crime.

The Wilting Climate Change Debate coding data

It is very apparent that this article is written from a liberal writer when coding for the bias of the author. For this article I decided to code for how many paragraphs were based in opinion and how many were based in fact. I calculated that of the 10 paragraphs of the story, seven were reliant on facts. Consequently this shows that despite the author very strongly stating his opinion in the article, there is a very significant amount of factual evidence to back his argument up rather than simply bemoaning the Republicans for ignoring the climate issue. This is useful to note given that only four out of 15 reviewers ranked the story below a 3.0, which indicates most reviewers think that the story is at least relatively goo journalism. In addition it is important to note that the facts of the story were rated by all of the reviewers as a 3.7 in total.

Opinion on NewsTrust

At first I was incredibly skeptical of NewsTrust. It seemed as if it was simply going to be a site that anyone could post one without having any sort of differentiation about who was a qualified poster and who was not. It would have been somewhat useful for people to be able to post reviews of articles as a way of allowing them to be more involved with media outlets. However, I believe that it is very useful that the people who are reviewing articles on the site are reviewed as well. Doing this allows there to be a far greater element of credibility to the site rather than having it be made up of people who trash articles that they do not agree with.

I think the system that requires members to build up their credibility is very important given that as can be seen many places on the internet, that there are people who are not necessarily qualified to comment on certain subjects. Consequently, I would not change anything about the site. In it’s current state there seems to be enough oversight. If the site flourishes as it should, however, there will obviously be a need for greater oversight.
I feel that in order to help the site thrive and attract more traffic, the management of the site should try to establish relationships with media outlets around the country that will allow for there to be a NewsTrust link on every story on the media outlets’ websites. In addition to raising the profile of the website, it would also help out the news organizations providing the links because they are openly having their writers work examined.

I am very interested in finding out the political leanings of the people who review different articles, how they choose to rate them and how the higher level members of NewsTrust view their reviews. This would be an interesting topic to look at given that I feel that there is a huge risk for people to give stories negative reviews based on what they believe.