Reflection on one Process Step
In choosing a research question about using technology in some way, I looked to a previous blog post for inspiration (Minni Essay (final copy): Is Virtual Rape Even Possible). This post got me thinking about how people feel when they have been sexually harassed on their computer. Also, a lot of our class discussions covered the topic about how some kind of trauma like rape can affect our lives and how this could affect an adolescent. One discussion, in particular, dealt with the issue of underage teens being virtually raped on Second Life, this triggered me to come up with a topic for research dealing with teens talking to strangers, not just in Second Life, but on other virtual mediums as well: MySpace, Facebook, AIM, chatrooms, etc. I wanted to know exactly what programs and websites teens were using to talk to people, friends and strangers alike. Also, I wanted to know how often teens talked to people they have not already previously known and how many of these people were older men or women pretending to be someone much younger. Upon digging for information about how often teens talk to strangers online, more and more sites came up with information about how to protect kids from online predators. I thought that adding something in about how kids could get sucked into talking with online predators would be something exciting to talk about. All of these different questions combined led to my research question “What makes teens and adolescents, who know about the dangers of online sexual predators, decide to talk to and confide in strangers online and how are teens using the Internet to talk to these people?”