Edinburgh Napier University

  The Centre for Social Informatics (CSI) at Edinburgh Napier University in Scotland has built a track record for its research into information behaviours and social media use. Early projects completed in the mid-noughties focused on the value of social media platforms for promoting reflective learning in classroom settings, and the risks and opportunities of the adoption of social computing tools within corporate environments for collaborative work purposes, as perceived by information and knowledge professionals. Over a decade later, in 2017, three on-going CSI projects have social media as their foci. The first is concerned with personal online reputation management; the second is an investigation into the information behaviours of young jobseekers; and the third explores online information and knowledge sharing practices amongst public sector workers. In the period since the members of CSI started to lead research projects on social media for information and knowledge sharing, attention has turned to social media as tools for academics to develop their own personal online profiles for the purposes of promoting their research. In this presentation the Director of the Centre for Social Informatics will outline the main findings of the three social media related research projects currently undertaken by colleagues within the group. She will then discuss the impact of involvement in such research on personal decisions to build and maintain profiles on a range of online platforms for academic work purposes.

Presentation slides can be viewed from slideshare - https://www.slideshare.net/HazelHall/research-into-social-media-practices-and-social-media-practices-for-research