Projects / Programmes
Social and cultural aspects of virtual lifestyles
| Code |
Science |
Field |
Subfield |
| 5.03.00 |
Social sciences |
Sociology |
|
| Code |
Science |
Field |
| S210 |
Social sciences |
Sociology |
| S265 |
Social sciences |
Press and communication sciences |
| S274 |
Social sciences |
Research methodology in science |
| S213 |
Social sciences |
Social structures |
| P160 |
Natural sciences and mathematics |
Statistics, operations research, programming, actuarial mathematics |
life-style, class, class differences and uses of internet, cultural capital, social interactions, social support, ego-centred social networks, communication patterns, media consumption
Researchers (10)
Organisations (1)
Abstract
The proposed research extends notion of a lifestyle from a sum of individual practices/attitudes to a concept of cultural articulation of the social class differences. Besides the consumption of culture, food, leisure, fashion, media, new technologies etc., the general wellbeing, social networks and social capital are also closely observed. The “virtual” lifestyles are thus studied here as a manifestation of general (off-line) life-style principles. The key research questions are as follows:
The implementation of well-elaborated postmodern (off-line) life-style strategies: How they determine the on-line life-styles?
What is the basic typology of the on-line life-styles? What is their relation to traditional media - do new media replace or complement the traditional ones?
The impact of on-line activities on social wellbeing, social networks, social capital and social isolation: Is this impact positive, negative, or only spurious (due to interaction with socio-demographics)?
The virtual life-styles and virtual participation: What is the impact on the involvement in political participation?
Proposed research continues and extends the activities of the members of team (three centers cooperate here: Social informatics, Media and communication studies, Spatial sociology). The members of the team already performed the first profound national empirical study (2001/2002) on lifestyles. They also conduct the leading Slovenian continuous research on social consequences of the Internet (RIS, 1996-2005, http://ris.org), where in May 2005, together with the Statistical Office of Slovenia, in-depth empirical face-to-face survey (n=1,400, age: 10-76 years old) studied on-line activities, life-styles and social networks (http://surs.ris.org). The members of the team also participated in national studies on social networks (2001) and the conduct the leading national research on digital divide.
The research thus builds on previous studies. It starts with the elaboration of contemporary theoretical concepts, which are tested on above-mentioned empirical survey (http://surs.ris.org, 2005). In addition, various qualitative studies will be performed among the specific life-style segments.
