canineA new research from Northwestern university finds that college student’s choice of social networking sites, including Facebook, Myspace and Xanga, is related to their race ethnicity and parent’s education.

The research challenges the notion about the democratic nature of online interaction, and also the belief that all collage students use Facebook. The race, ethnicity and the education level of one’s parents can predict the social sites a student selects. This suggest there’s less intermingling of users from varying backgrounds on these sites than previously believed, says Eszter Harittai, author of “whose Spaces” the differences among users and non-users of social network sites.”

The study finds that Facebook is the social networking site of choice for white students, Hispanic students prefer MySpace, and Asian and Asian-American students are least likely to use MySpace. While prodigious user of Facebook, Asians students were found to use less popular social network sites Xanga and Friendster more than students from another ethic groups. It found no significant SNS choices for black students.

The study did find statistical relevance between parental schooling, and social networking sites preferences. There seems to be positive relationship between years of parental schooling, and Facebook and Xanga use, and negative years of parental education of MySpace use says Hargittai, assist professor of communication studies and sociology at northwestern university, and faculty associate at the institute of policy research.

Students whose parents have a college degree are significantly more likely to use Facebook than those whose parents have some college experience but no degrees. MySpace users, on the other hand, are more like to have parents with less than a high school education than those whose parents had some college experience.

Everyone points to the wonderful new Yorker cartoon of the dog at the computer telling a canine friend by his side that “on the internet nobody knows you are a dog” said Hargitaii “ in reality, however, it appears that online actions and interactions should not be viewed as independent of one’s offline identity.

The 2007 survey found Facebook the most popular SNS, with four of five students using it. MySpace was used by 54 percent of the students. One in 1,060 students claimed not to have heard of any of the six network sites included in the study

I personally don’t use any SNS, I don’t find them interesting. It might be because my parents were farmers and barely knew how to write their names, the word “computer” was Greek to them, not saying social networking. But the study is interesting whatsoever, and I have noticed a similar trend on Spanish and White high school students. Hispanics are more inclined to use MySpace or Hi5 for their social networking sites, while whites and Asians tend to use more Facebook as their SNS of choice.

On the poll below, please check your SNS of choice, if you don’t use any, simply check “none” if you use more than one, check them all.
[poll=2]

News source: Northwestern University (2007, November 22). Student Facebook, MySpace Use Predicted By Race, Ethnicity, Education. ScienceDaily. Retrieved November 22, 2007, from http://www.sciencedaily.com¬ /releases/2007/11/071119170137.htm