Social Media, Collaboration, and Scientific Organizations

Bibliographic Data

ID4940256
AuthorsDhiraj Murthy (0000-0001-9734-1124, Goldsmiths College, University of London, UK), Jeremiah P Lewis (Bowdoin College, Brunswick, ME, USA)
Year2015
Volume59
Issue1
Pages149-171
Publication date2015-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueAmerican Behavioral Scientist (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0002-7642 • E-ISSN: 1552-3381
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/0002764214540504
OpenAlexW2042380919
LanguageEN
Citations received7
References cited34

The use of social media by collaborative organizations has been studied in a variety of contexts, including virtual teams, enterprise organizations, and social movements. However, social media are not often examined within the context of scientific organizations. This article explores how an organization of 122 life scientists and science-related professionals-anonymized as Science City Network (SciCity)-combine monthly symposia with social media, including Twitter, Facebook, and blogs. Using an online survey, we found that younger SciCity members are more interested in using social media to support a collaborative community, whereas older members are more interested in social applications. Social media use was not found to significantly differ by gender. Using social network analysis, we found several individuals who act as hubs of information who keep the SciCity Twitter network alive. However, the hierarchical structure of the network reveals that it is better suited for information dissemination than innovation and collaboration. Our examination of this scientific organization ultimately offers insight into how a coalition of multiple social media technologies is used differentially by organizational members and that there is ultimately no general consensus of the utility of social media to scientific collaboration. This finding tempers some claims of the utility of social media for scientific collaboration

Context (archaeology) · Knowledge management · Political science · Public relations · Social media · Social network (sociolinguistics) · Social network analysis · Sociology · Variety (cybernetics) · World Wide Web · Computer Science · Digital Marketing and Social Media · Knowledge Management and Sharing · Wikis in Education and Collaboration

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