Status update

So far, I have received 111 responses to my online survey; I suspect that this will be the final total of respondents. Most of the respondents have indicated a familiarity with most technology, with over 95% of them reporting to either be “completely dependent” on or using computerized technology “a lot” in their job or school work. I would seem to have honed in my targeted demographic (having posted my survey on the “geek” “technology” and “philosophy of science” subreddits described in my proposal). In fact, some of the more savvy respondents posted on the forums a concern that the survey would not be representative to the population – as I had explained the study was for a paper, but did not explicatively say the study was on cybernatives. One respondent even wrote:

"You should be very careful of bias in this survey. you're putting this survey on a website that is a much more advanced usergroup, and you will get significant differences between this cohort and the general population. At this point, even if the survey is flawed, it's going to have a huge skew to it and I don't think it's going to be generalizable to the general population."

It would appear that I reached my target study population, even based on consensus by that population.

While I was successful in finding the appropriate user population, in retrospect, the survey questions could have been focused differently given where I am at with my outside readings. Bearing in mind that I changed topics midway through my research, in future studies, I would approach the topic of “technophobia” in a different light. I first went into the subject under the concept that technophobia is akin to a state of existence. Older people had technophobia, young people did not; those unfamiliar with computers were scared of them, those who grew up with computers loved them. In my mind before my research, this condition was similar to being left or right handed – environmental factors may affect things, but once the situation is set, it is set for life. On the contrary, a much better analogy would be to compare technophobia to a disease.

The “technophobia” as a disease model works on several levels. I have found instances of technophobia being transmitted and induced, as with media hyped scares on technological issues (ranging from genetically modified foods, to the Y2K scare, to the fear about airport scanners indicated by my survey). Technophobia can be “cured” with enough enlightening facts, as demonstrated in Lusk’s article from an earlier blog entry. Finally, technophobia can be “vaccinated” against, as shown with myriad early education programs in school. I hope to expand on this disease model in my upcoming paper and structure some of my research around it. Personally, it has been an infinitely more useful paradigm with which to think of the subject.

Back to the revision on my survey questions: They have, so far, proven that those taking my survey are largely computer savvy (beyond where I found my subject pool). The survey indicates these cybernatives are not concerned about far flung technological catastrophes (like the 43% who think it is at least possible for computers to surpass humanity, yet over 90% agree we should not limit computer advancement to prevent this). However, the same group of people is awfully concerned about more “pop cultural” technological scares, like airport body scanners, online mentoring, and closed circuit televisions in public spaces. This goes a long way to show how media may have affected a group of people we normally think of as “immune” from the disease of technophobia. Had I had this disease model in mind earlier, I would have probably geared my questions more explicitly around it.

Overall, my research is going well. The responses have been useful (both in the survey and on the forums), and the literature review is turning up some themes which make for a useful model. Let me know what you think of the “disease” model; I was pretty darn happy with it.