Qualitative and Mixed Methods Social Media Research

Abstract

Social media technologies have attracted substantial attention among many types of users including researchers who have published studies for several years. This article presents an overview of trends in qualitative and mixed methods social media research literature published from 2007 through 2013. A collection of 229 qualitative studies were identified through a systematic literature review process. A subset of 55 of these articles report studies involving a combination of qualitative and quantitative methods. Articles were reviewed, analyzed, and coded through a qualitative content analysis approach. Overall trends are presented with respect to the entire collection of articles followed by an analysis of mixed methods research approaches identified in the subset of 55 studies. The most commonly used research approaches involved collecting data from people through interview, focus group, and survey methodologies. Content analysis was the second most commonly used approach whereby researchers use Facebook posts, Tweets (Twitter posts), YouTube videos, or other social media content as a data source. Many of the studies involving combinations of quantitative and qualitative data followed a design resembling Creswell and Plano Clark's basic mixed methods typology (e.g., convergent parallel, explanatory sequential, and exploratory sequential).Keywords social media research, Web 2.0, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, mixed methods, qualitative This article presents a descriptive methodological analysis of qualitative and mixed methods approaches for social media research. It is based on a systematic review of 229 qualitative or mixed methods research articles published from 2007 through 2013 where social media played a central role. Publication trends are presented for the entire set of articles followed by analysis of a subset of 55 studies that combined qualitative and quantitative approaches consistent with an established mixed methods typology (Creswell, 2014;Creswell & Plano Clark, 2011). The literature analysis is first contextualized by presenting a brief overview of related scholarly activity in the emerging field of social media research. This is followed by a discussion of publication trends and methodologies applied in this systematic literature review.Kaplan and Haenlein (2010) defined social media as '' . . . a group of Internet-based applications that build on the ideological and technological foundations of Web 2.0, and that allow the creation and exchange of User Generated Content'' (p. 61). The emergence of social media technologies has been embraced by a growing number of users who post text messages, pictures, and videos online (Duggan, 2013;Duggan, Ellison, Lampe, Lenhart, & Madden, 2015). Reports of worldwide social networking activity suggest that there were 1.96 billion users in 2015 with predictions of 2.44 billion users by 2018 (Statista, 2015). Of all the social networking sites, Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube are among the most popular ranking within the top 10 of a list of most heavily ...

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