Great presentation and interesting topic! My comment is mostly an extension of the question I asked in class... Through my own work I've found that if you build a system in both Facebook and as a a stand alone system, people will use the different variations in different ways, with their use of the Facebook system being more Facebook-ish (e.g. shorter comments). I definitely see the benefit of looking at the pre-death and post-death comments left on Facebook, and I think that you could make some interesting initial design implications from this (as you did). However I think that if you want to present a strong redesign of the current memorial pages there are a few other steps that could be taken. 1) You opened up your presentation discussing grief; how does prior work on the process of grief inform your redesign? 2) By talking to people about the process (you mentioned there was work in progress in this area) you might also be able to learn completely new ways that Facebook could help with the grieving process without being constrained by the current tools offered by Facebook. Lastly, I think another potential interesting step would be to look at the effects that the actual memorialization of a page has on people's activity on the page. This could act as further evidence for some of you design decisions if you find out that the current memorial pages don't really support the type of grieving that people would like (so compare the use of memorialized Facebook pages and normal Facebook pages for those who are deceased).
This was an excellent presentation and quite an intriguing topic. Coming from a communication background, I have never put much thought into the applications and tools needed to memorialize a Facebook page, or even how to alter one's digital presence post-death. Your presentation reminded me of a tragedy that happened in my community in the summer of 2007. Five young women, who had graduated from high school days before, died in a car accident. I was not Facebook friends with any of them, however some of their profiles were open to the public. I have not thought about the incident for some time, but I remember visiting their pages every once in a while for months after the accident. I couldn't write on the wall, but it was comforting to see all the kind words and good wishes there. After your presentation I searched for the girls, and none of the pages have been memorialized. I find this a little surprising, but as we discussed in class, each family grieves in their own way. I wonder if they would choose to memorialize the pages if they had options like the ones you presented, or if they feel a sense of liveliness from the page today.
I wanted to start off by saying that I thought you had a really creative topic. It was something that had never occurred to me and is a very out-of-the-box, while still tying into what we learned. The part of your presentation that impressed me the most was the depth of your analyses of the words and word groups used in posts, you guys really thought of every way to analyze your data. I also think that noticing the differences in your results based on the type of death (chronic illness vs sudden sudden death). Having this finding opens doors for future research on digital grieving. The only thought that makes me think that your data may be skewed is the fact that facebook tends to trivialize many very important things. I am wondering if people would say different messages standing in front of the persons grave than they would on that person's facebook wall. That also brings up the fact that facebook allows for a level separation (typing your message from your couch while watching TV is different than staring that the grave saying a message). Does this level of separation also cause the emotions to not be as strong? Just giving you some other factors to think about but great job on your presentation!
I think your group are researching on a very interesting topic. It is definitely relevant and something to think about since a great deal of our identity is our on-line identity. This is especially true with the recent hardships surrounding suicides within the Cornell community. I agree with your team's assertion that information should be memorialized on a Facebook profile page. This totally reiterates the conflict between consumers of consumer produced content and the giant companies who want to control this content. In terms of your presentation, I thought there was smooth transition from one slide and presenter to the next.
I loved this presentation! I think one of the most interesting things about digital bereavement is considering how it might be changing as social networking sites become more ingrained into our lives. The thing about the people that you're looking at right now is that they're all so young, so their deaths are a different kind of death (when someone so young dies, even when it's expected, it's a big deal in the community). Something that's going to be really interesting in the future is digital bereavement in more traditional deaths. With more adults on sites like Facebook, we're seeing more networks of 50- and 60-year-olds. So in 30 or 40 years (I'm trying to give them lots of time to live with those estimates), when they pass away, how will people use their Facebook pages to grieve? If we give it 50 years, we have to think that maybe Facebook will be like a cemetery, with more memorialized pages than living, active pages. Still, the people who are 50 now have grown up with a certain traditional method of grieving. So I was also thinking: When the 20-year-olds of today are 80 or 90, will Facebook be a primary way of grieving? Since we're used to keeping in touch with friends via Facebook, will we turn to that?
I thought that your group presents a very interesting topic that has the potential for great applications. My main critique is that I think the basic research (before making applications) could be pushed further. I think a survey of the people who wrote on the walls could further enhance your experiment. Also, you made a comment in your presentation that all of the profiles you looked at had been memorialized, but I don't think that the profiles I gave you to use had been memorialized based on your description of the memorialization process. You may want to look into that. Additionally, I think you should include a gender component in your paper because there was such a difference between your number of male and female participants. If you could get another female profile before the paper is due, that would probably help. Overall, I think you guys made a great presentation.
What a great presentation! Your topic was extremely interesting and very relevant to current topics, especially at Cornell (though it may be a sensitive one). Your design suggestions were very well thought out and fully supported by your research. I especially liked the tab for “memories” and “dear john”. The one thing that peaked my interest was that families had to formally request to change a profile to a memorialized one. In doing so it takes down the person’s information, they are no longer friend-able on facebook, and they will not come up on your sidebar nor are you told to reconnect with them. However, this seemed strange to me. A deceased friend of mine’s facebook has not been memorialized even though it has been a year since his passing. Although it is weird that facebook suggest I reconnect with him from time to time, I think the fact that his facebook is still normal has helped people cope more. Though a year may be too long a time period to leave it as a real facebook (and memorializing it could help people move on), changing it directly to a memorialized one may be hard for people to handle. So maybe the amount of time after death that a facebook is memorialized is also something to take into account.
I thoroughly enjoyed listening to your presentation and think you handled a sensitive subject respectfully. It seems as though you've become very familiar with how memorialization works and the process that a family member must go through to memorialize a page. Although, I would have liked to hear more of your knowledge on how memorialization works during the presentation. How does Facebook decide who to grant the rights to memorialize to? During your presentation, I kept thinking that it would be interesting if individuals could choose for themselves whether or not they wanted their page memorialized by creating a Facebook last will and testament. Would it help the grieving process if family members didn't have to decide to memorialize the page or not? Because your sample included mostly men and some suicide cases, I think it would be beneficial to research the likelihood for males to commit suicide (I think it's greater than for females) in order to help make the case that your sample is more representative than it seems. Good luck going forward!
First of all, I thought you guys gave a great presentation, and I was very interested in your project (especially the implications) because this topic was so new to me, and up until this point, I would say I was totally uninformed on the matter. At first, I was a bit put off by the fact that grief, usually a "backstage emotion" is becoming more public. I thought about the families who saw the profiles of the deceased being commented on as if the person was alive. Would it further their pain? Would they view it as unethical? Was it too informal of a gesture, such as the way people write "Happy Birthday" on Facebook walls if they are not close enough friends to talk on the phone or in person? These are questions I wrestled with throughout your presentation. When you displayed your results, I was intrigued by the fact that people tended to use more verbs when they wrote on the walls of the deceased. This you mentioned, was a sign that people were being more narrative, sharing more stories. At this point I began to realize that my initial doubts about the ethics, etc. of Facebook grieving might not be as severe as I thought. If Facebook encourages the sharing of stories about loved ones that family members might never have heard, nor been given the chance to hear if not for the Facebook memorial, then this proved to be a very positive application. Lastly, I enjoyed your implications section depicting the redesigned Facebook memorial. I agree that it is a good idea to leave the information section up, as well as change the tabs so that one wall might be for stories, while another is simply for condolences, etc. Who knows, maybe some day, all memorials will be online. Until then, keep up the good work!
Great presentation. I remember walking into class and seeing the depressing black attire of your group and whispering to one of my partners that we should avoid looking like coffin bearers during our presentation. But then I realized that it suited your purpose perfectly, and made me more engaged in the topic. Additionally, your information flowed well from the general to the specific, very naturally expanding from the universal phenomenon of grief, to how it applies in a CMC context, and how you could apply our specific interest in language analysis. And while your sample size was small, it did not hurt your credibility because the phenomenon studied is relatively new, as well as extremely sensitive, meaning that your data pool was probably sufficient to draw basic correlations. I also thought your method of data analysis was interesting. I was curious how you would quantify the type of sentiment established in the pre/post death wall posts, and your presentation of “top/interesting” results was a credible and efficient way to show your results. I thought one thing to address additionally could have been the ethics of further research in the area, and how to collect larger data samples while still remaining sensitive to the deceased family, but your implications for future design were logical and well laid out. Great job again.
Hi guys, really fascinating presentation! I'm impressed with your work so far on this project and thought that your design implications were both thoughtful and creative. My first comment is just for simplicity's sake you may want to simplify and/or break up your results tables so that they're a bit easier for the reader to digest. In your discussion you may also want to speak to the differences between memorialized Facebook pages, group pages created by family and friends of lost loved ones, and the non-memorialized pages of the deceased. I think that a particularly good practical implication for this study would be to be able to provide suggestions to family members and friends of loved ones for which types of these Facebook pages to use, depending on their style of bereavement. This would help people to grieve in customized ways specific to their needs.
Lastly, I wanted to provide you with the below citation that might be useful. This paper looks at resilient coping styles and might be helpful in your theoretical rationale.
Bonanno, G., Rennicke, C., & Dekel, S. (2005). Self-enhancement among high-exposure survivors of the September 11th terrorist attack: Resilience or social maladjustment? Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 88, 984-998.
Great presentation, and tastefully done considering the subject matter and the recent events at Cornell.
I was at first skeptical of your design implications, by taking bereavement on Facebook a step further and formalizing it as an outlet. Posts on the walls of the deceased has always seemed inappropriate, but it seems from your presentation that this is steadily becoming the norm. It is only appropriate then for Facebook to address this trend and implement designs such as those you suggest to their services. While your sample size was small, your study opens the door for future research on this new phenomena as it describes exactly how people mourn online given the language they use. I would like to see more description of exactly who it is that mourns on Facebook; whether or not they were knew the deceased intimately or were casual friends. It could be that many people simply post to publicly show respect for the deceased in order to satisfy perceived social norms, while those truly mourning with hold comments, and find catharsis elsewhere. Facebook now offers relationship indicators (such as brother, mother, sister, father, girlfriend etc.) these are not widely used, but they could be indications of who is posting.
Fantastic presentation - very engaging, and astute observations on a sensitive and intimately observed study of digital grief and bereavement. I was particularly intrigued by your initial design implications emanating from the pre-death and post-death comments left on Facebook.
Against this backdrop, the inclusion of a survey would help solidify your results in allowing for a more comprehensive understanding as to why people post on memorialized pages - be it "to show respect," "to feel closer," or to "express love". You can also look at the increasing usage of online support groups (such as Facebook groups) for bereaved individuals.
Ultimately, the underlying question is whether these sites contribute to a significant difference in one’s adjustment to bereavement.
Is it that such online activities are more helpful than traditional rituals in which individuals usually engage in? It is within this framework that you can explore whether the memorialization of a page is corelated with a decrease in grief-specific symptoms over time in a growth curve analysis.
Very intriguing topic, and (unfortunately) relevant considering recent events in our community. I was very interested in how your project would progress based on your initial summary of your work a few weeks ago. I remember a close friend telling me how creepy it was that one of her friends kept writing on her deceased boyfriends wall. I always wondered what facebook did when a used passed away.
I know it's hard considering the nature of your research, but I would be interested to see the results from a larger sample. Also, maybe this is another project entirely, but comparing the language on people's walls who have terminal illnesses, as opposed to people who pass away suddenly. I know your group retrieved data from one person who was chronically ill, and the differences in language use was significant. Very very interesting topic.
Just today, I was posting on Facebook about the death of a public figure (legendary Detroit broadcaster Ernie Harwell) and realizing how comforting it is to be able to share in a memorialization of someone like that. I think public figure pages could be a fruitful and perhaps more accessible venue for data collection for you.
I couldn't help thinking also of a small design implication that you didn't mention. It felt weird to me that a memorialized page would still be in "Facebook" blue. A black bar, or some other visual indicator that you are on a memorial page would be a nice cue and set a respectful tone for the page.
I thought that you all did a great job presenting a difficult topic. You seemed very knowledgeable about the topic, and were able to explain in a comprehensible manner. Most importantly, I felt that many people could relate to the issue at hand. In addition, I felt that your relevant theories were spot on. A few days after you gave your presentation, I found out that a girl I graduated high school with died in a fire. Even though I did not know her extremely well, I was able to use Facebook to privately grieve. By looking at her tribute FaceBook page, and reading about her life and different stories, I was ultimately able to develop a stronger bond which supports the Continuing Bond and Uses & Gratification Theory. Finally, I thought that your redesign of a memorized FaceBook page was very thoughtful. While looking at my deceased classmate’s tribute page, I thought it could be better organized. As you suggested, it would be great if there was a section solely for memories and stories, another section more personal, and a section just for condolences. Again, great job.
I have never heard of memorialized Facebook pages until your presentation, but you guys did a good job explaining them in your presentation. In terms of the relevant theories, I certainly understand why Uses and Gratifications may apply. As a Communications major, this was no longer a difficult theory to grasp. Although I never really thought about it, the fact that post-death Facebook posts were more formal and positive in nature seems logical. I never thought of people going through the grieving process online as opposed to the traditional processes of close get-togethers with one’s extended family. Your presentation was well organized and well rehearsed. Initially, I was confused about the all-black attire, but once I realized the topic you were presenting it seemed like a clever idea.
As many have said before me, your presentation was very impressive. Logically organized, well rehearsed, and actually compelling (I wouldn’t consider myself a fan of PowerPoint’s on the latest in academia), you somehow turned a very morbid topic into a beacon of hope. I completely agree with your point that no matter what the medium, people will always be uncomfortable sharing their most profound emotions when a tragic loss strikes. However, your proposed Facebook page reconstruction is intuitive and helpful. It at once gives people the privacy to “communicate” with the deceased, if they feel Facebook is the appropriate method, via the private message. Although I was initially skeptical about the “remembrance gifts” I realize that with the growing popularity of giving regular “gifts,” this may be another method that people use to cope. By giving something to their friend, relative or acquaintance, even if it is virtual and, for lack of better words, trivial, if it aids in the grieving process then the means of doing so should absolutely be available to the general public. In the end, though I initially expressed my skepticism towards the idea of even further virtualizing a process that is meant to bring people together, not keep them distanced because technology might make their bereavement more convenient to express from home, I realized that this belief was shortsighted. In a growingly mobile society, the Internet may be an even more effective medium for sharing, connecting, and coping.
Great job with the presentation. A close family friend of ours passed away earlier this semester, and my father set up a website for people to go to to mourn and grieve as a community. I thought that a lot of the design implementations you suggested were similar to the ones that he had on the website, and doing it in a space where so many people are a part of would make it so much better. Also, I thought that while facebook is a nice place for people to grieve together, it is also a really nice way for his close friends and family to read about memories of the deceased member that they might not have known about.
I think your study was very well done and very well handled considering the topic. Bold move, but you guys made it work. One of my very close friends passed away after my freshman year. One thing I noticed is something that I was going to bring up in the Q&A session, but I believe someone else had asked it. I noticed that a lot of acquaintances used the Facebook group created (since there were no memorials at the time) to post memories. The closer they seemed to be to him, the more future-focused these posts were, saying what could/should have been. Also, those that were very close did not post at all, including myself. I think that would be an awesome direction in which to take the study.
The presentation was well put together and conveyed in a very clear orderly fashion. I thought it was interesting that despite a relatively small sample size, you were able to draw significant conclusions that will hopefully be reinforced with more data. I would be interested in a large scale survey asking people about their feelings regarding Facebook in mourning. It could involve whether someone would want their profile to be memorialized or whether other people would use Facebook as a method of mourning. I, personally, would not want to be memorialized on Facebook so I find it interesting to see why so many people would publicly mourn on Facebook. As someone said in class, I wonder if there is any peer pressure from the other public mourners to write a comment. People seem to think that mourning is a private experience but perhaps it also has a social component that is easily recordable and comes to the forefront in computer-mediated communication. This subject is a sensitive one but the results and analysis you were able to design were very well done.
I thought you had an excellent presentation--very well-rehearsed and well-thought-out. I also liked the focus on practical application of grieving practices on Facebook. I would be interested to see how logistical use of Facebook, and not just language use, change on Facebook profiles of the deceased, as well as how those pages are created and administered.
Uncommon Ground is a research group founded on February 10, 2010 in a language and technology communication class at Cornell University (AKA Team Awesome). Mixing undergraduate and graduate students from communication, economics, film, and information science, common ground was built upon uncommon ground. This semester we are researching Facebook profiles of the deceased. Stay tuned for more.
Thanks team for getting this posted so quickly. Looks great!!!
ReplyDeleteGreat presentation and interesting topic! My comment is mostly an extension of the question I asked in class... Through my own work I've found that if you build a system in both Facebook and as a a stand alone system, people will use the different variations in different ways, with their use of the Facebook system being more Facebook-ish (e.g. shorter comments). I definitely see the benefit of looking at the pre-death and post-death comments left on Facebook, and I think that you could make some interesting initial design implications from this (as you did). However I think that if you want to present a strong redesign of the current memorial pages there are a few other steps that could be taken. 1) You opened up your presentation discussing grief; how does prior work on the process of grief inform your redesign? 2) By talking to people about the process (you mentioned there was work in progress in this area) you might also be able to learn completely new ways that Facebook could help with the grieving process without being constrained by the current tools offered by Facebook. Lastly, I think another potential interesting step would be to look at the effects that the actual memorialization of a page has on people's activity on the page. This could act as further evidence for some of you design decisions if you find out that the current memorial pages don't really support the type of grieving that people would like (so compare the use of memorialized Facebook pages and normal Facebook pages for those who are deceased).
ReplyDeleteThis was an excellent presentation and quite an intriguing topic. Coming from a communication background, I have never put much thought into the applications and tools needed to memorialize a Facebook page, or even how to alter one's digital presence post-death. Your presentation reminded me of a tragedy that happened in my community in the summer of 2007. Five young women, who had graduated from high school days before, died in a car accident. I was not Facebook friends with any of them, however some of their profiles were open to the public. I have not thought about the incident for some time, but I remember visiting their pages every once in a while for months after the accident. I couldn't write on the wall, but it was comforting to see all the kind words and good wishes there. After your presentation I searched for the girls, and none of the pages have been memorialized. I find this a little surprising, but as we discussed in class, each family grieves in their own way. I wonder if they would choose to memorialize the pages if they had options like the ones you presented, or if they feel a sense of liveliness from the page today.
ReplyDeleteI wanted to start off by saying that I thought you had a really creative topic. It was something that had never occurred to me and is a very out-of-the-box, while still tying into what we learned. The part of your presentation that impressed me the most was the depth of your analyses of the words and word groups used in posts, you guys really thought of every way to analyze your data. I also think that noticing the differences in your results based on the type of death (chronic illness vs sudden sudden death). Having this finding opens doors for future research on digital grieving. The only thought that makes me think that your data may be skewed is the fact that facebook tends to trivialize many very important things. I am wondering if people would say different messages standing in front of the persons grave than they would on that person's facebook wall. That also brings up the fact that facebook allows for a level separation (typing your message from your couch while watching TV is different than staring that the grave saying a message). Does this level of separation also cause the emotions to not be as strong? Just giving you some other factors to think about but great job on your presentation!
ReplyDeleteI think your group are researching on a very interesting topic. It is definitely relevant and something to think about since a great deal of our identity is our on-line identity. This is especially true with the recent hardships surrounding suicides within the Cornell community. I agree with your team's assertion that information should be memorialized on a Facebook profile page. This totally reiterates the conflict between consumers of consumer produced content and the giant companies who want to control this content. In terms of your presentation, I thought there was smooth transition from one slide and presenter to the next.
ReplyDeleteI loved this presentation! I think one of the most interesting things about digital bereavement is considering how it might be changing as social networking sites become more ingrained into our lives. The thing about the people that you're looking at right now is that they're all so young, so their deaths are a different kind of death (when someone so young dies, even when it's expected, it's a big deal in the community). Something that's going to be really interesting in the future is digital bereavement in more traditional deaths. With more adults on sites like Facebook, we're seeing more networks of 50- and 60-year-olds. So in 30 or 40 years (I'm trying to give them lots of time to live with those estimates), when they pass away, how will people use their Facebook pages to grieve? If we give it 50 years, we have to think that maybe Facebook will be like a cemetery, with more memorialized pages than living, active pages. Still, the people who are 50 now have grown up with a certain traditional method of grieving.
ReplyDeleteSo I was also thinking: When the 20-year-olds of today are 80 or 90, will Facebook be a primary way of grieving? Since we're used to keeping in touch with friends via Facebook, will we turn to that?
I thought that your group presents a very interesting topic that has the potential for great applications. My main critique is that I think the basic research (before making applications) could be pushed further. I think a survey of the people who wrote on the walls could further enhance your experiment. Also, you made a comment in your presentation that all of the profiles you looked at had been memorialized, but I don't think that the profiles I gave you to use had been memorialized based on your description of the memorialization process. You may want to look into that. Additionally, I think you should include a gender component in your paper because there was such a difference between your number of male and female participants. If you could get another female profile before the paper is due, that would probably help. Overall, I think you guys made a great presentation.
ReplyDeleteWhat a great presentation! Your topic was extremely interesting and very relevant to current topics, especially at Cornell (though it may be a sensitive one). Your design suggestions were very well thought out and fully supported by your research. I especially liked the tab for “memories” and “dear john”. The one thing that peaked my interest was that families had to formally request to change a profile to a memorialized one. In doing so it takes down the person’s information, they are no longer friend-able on facebook, and they will not come up on your sidebar nor are you told to reconnect with them. However, this seemed strange to me. A deceased friend of mine’s facebook has not been memorialized even though it has been a year since his passing. Although it is weird that facebook suggest I reconnect with him from time to time, I think the fact that his facebook is still normal has helped people cope more. Though a year may be too long a time period to leave it as a real facebook (and memorializing it could help people move on), changing it directly to a memorialized one may be hard for people to handle. So maybe the amount of time after death that a facebook is memorialized is also something to take into account.
ReplyDeleteI thoroughly enjoyed listening to your presentation and think you handled a sensitive subject respectfully. It seems as though you've become very familiar with how memorialization works and the process that a family member must go through to memorialize a page. Although, I would have liked to hear more of your knowledge on how memorialization works during the presentation. How does Facebook decide who to grant the rights to memorialize to? During your presentation, I kept thinking that it would be interesting if individuals could choose for themselves whether or not they wanted their page memorialized by creating a Facebook last will and testament. Would it help the grieving process if family members didn't have to decide to memorialize the page or not? Because your sample included mostly men and some suicide cases, I think it would be beneficial to research the likelihood for males to commit suicide (I think it's greater than for females) in order to help make the case that your sample is more representative than it seems. Good luck going forward!
ReplyDeleteFirst of all, I thought you guys gave a great presentation, and I was very interested in your project (especially the implications) because this topic was so new to me, and up until this point, I would say I was totally uninformed on the matter.
ReplyDeleteAt first, I was a bit put off by the fact that grief, usually a "backstage emotion" is becoming more public. I thought about the families who saw the profiles of the deceased being commented on as if the person was alive. Would it further their pain? Would they view it as unethical? Was it too informal of a gesture, such as the way people write "Happy Birthday" on Facebook walls if they are not close enough friends to talk on the phone or in person? These are questions I wrestled with throughout your presentation.
When you displayed your results, I was intrigued by the fact that people tended to use more verbs when they wrote on the walls of the deceased. This you mentioned, was a sign that people were being more narrative, sharing more stories. At this point I began to realize that my initial doubts about the ethics, etc. of Facebook grieving might not be as severe as I thought. If Facebook encourages the sharing of stories about loved ones that family members might never have heard, nor been given the chance to hear if not for the Facebook memorial, then this proved to be a very positive application.
Lastly, I enjoyed your implications section depicting the redesigned Facebook memorial. I agree that it is a good idea to leave the information section up, as well as change the tabs so that one wall might be for stories, while another is simply for condolences, etc.
Who knows, maybe some day, all memorials will be online. Until then, keep up the good work!
Great presentation. I remember walking into class and seeing the depressing black attire of your group and whispering to one of my partners that we should avoid looking like coffin bearers during our presentation. But then I realized that it suited your purpose perfectly, and made me more engaged in the topic.
ReplyDeleteAdditionally, your information flowed well from the general to the specific, very naturally expanding from the universal phenomenon of grief, to how it applies in a CMC context, and how you could apply our specific interest in language analysis.
And while your sample size was small, it did not hurt your credibility because the phenomenon studied is relatively new, as well as extremely sensitive, meaning that your data pool was probably sufficient to draw basic correlations.
I also thought your method of data analysis was interesting. I was curious how you would quantify the type of sentiment established in the pre/post death wall posts, and your presentation of “top/interesting” results was a credible and efficient way to show your results.
I thought one thing to address additionally could have been the ethics of further research in the area, and how to collect larger data samples while still remaining sensitive to the deceased family, but your implications for future design were logical and well laid out. Great job again.
Hi guys, really fascinating presentation! I'm impressed with your work so far on this project and thought that your design implications were both thoughtful and creative. My first comment is just for simplicity's sake you may want to simplify and/or break up your results tables so that they're a bit easier for the reader to digest. In your discussion you may also want to speak to the differences between memorialized Facebook pages, group pages created by family and friends of lost loved ones, and the non-memorialized pages of the deceased. I think that a particularly good practical implication for this study would be to be able to provide suggestions to family members and friends of loved ones for which types of these Facebook pages to use, depending on their style of bereavement. This would help people to grieve in customized ways specific to their needs.
ReplyDeleteLastly, I wanted to provide you with the below citation that might be useful. This paper looks at resilient coping styles and might be helpful in your theoretical rationale.
Bonanno, G., Rennicke, C., & Dekel, S. (2005). Self-enhancement among high-exposure survivors of the September 11th terrorist attack: Resilience or social maladjustment? Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 88, 984-998.
Great presentation, and tastefully done considering the subject matter and the recent events at Cornell.
ReplyDeleteI was at first skeptical of your design implications, by taking bereavement on Facebook a step further and formalizing it as an outlet. Posts on the walls of the deceased has always seemed inappropriate, but it seems from your presentation that this is steadily becoming the norm. It is only appropriate then for Facebook to address this trend and implement designs such as those you suggest to their services.
While your sample size was small, your study opens the door for future research on this new phenomena as it describes exactly how people mourn online given the language they use. I would like to see more description of exactly who it is that mourns on Facebook; whether or not they were knew the deceased intimately or were casual friends. It could be that many people simply post to publicly show respect for the deceased in order to satisfy perceived social norms, while those truly mourning with hold comments, and find catharsis elsewhere. Facebook now offers relationship indicators (such as brother, mother, sister, father, girlfriend etc.) these are not widely used, but they could be indications of who is posting.
Fantastic presentation - very engaging, and astute observations on a sensitive and intimately observed study of digital grief and bereavement. I was particularly intrigued by your initial design implications emanating from the pre-death and post-death comments left on Facebook.
ReplyDeleteAgainst this backdrop, the inclusion of a survey would help solidify your results in allowing for a more comprehensive understanding as to why people post on memorialized pages - be it "to show respect," "to feel closer," or to "express love". You can also look at the increasing usage of online support groups (such as Facebook groups) for bereaved individuals.
Ultimately, the underlying question is whether these sites contribute to a significant difference in one’s adjustment to bereavement.
Is it that such online activities are more helpful than traditional rituals in which individuals usually engage in? It is within this framework that you can explore whether the memorialization of a page is corelated with a decrease in grief-specific symptoms over time in a growth curve analysis.
Very intriguing topic, and (unfortunately) relevant considering recent events in our community. I was very interested in how your project would progress based on your initial summary of your work a few weeks ago. I remember a close friend telling me how creepy it was that one of her friends kept writing on her deceased boyfriends wall. I always wondered what facebook did when a used passed away.
ReplyDeleteI know it's hard considering the nature of your research, but I would be interested to see the results from a larger sample. Also, maybe this is another project entirely, but comparing the language on people's walls who have terminal illnesses, as opposed to people who pass away suddenly. I know your group retrieved data from one person who was chronically ill, and the differences in language use was significant.
Very very interesting topic.
Just today, I was posting on Facebook about the death of a public figure (legendary Detroit broadcaster Ernie Harwell) and realizing how comforting it is to be able to share in a memorialization of someone like that. I think public figure pages could be a fruitful and perhaps more accessible venue for data collection for you.
ReplyDeleteI couldn't help thinking also of a small design implication that you didn't mention. It felt weird to me that a memorialized page would still be in "Facebook" blue. A black bar, or some other visual indicator that you are on a memorial page would be a nice cue and set a respectful tone for the page.
I thought that you all did a great job presenting a difficult topic. You seemed very knowledgeable about the topic, and were able to explain in a comprehensible manner. Most importantly, I felt that many people could relate to the issue at hand. In addition, I felt that your relevant theories were spot on. A few days after you gave your presentation, I found out that a girl I graduated high school with died in a fire. Even though I did not know her extremely well, I was able to use Facebook to privately grieve. By looking at her tribute FaceBook page, and reading about her life and different stories, I was ultimately able to develop a stronger bond which supports the Continuing Bond and Uses & Gratification Theory. Finally, I thought that your redesign of a memorized FaceBook page was very thoughtful. While looking at my deceased classmate’s tribute page, I thought it could be better organized. As you suggested, it would be great if there was a section solely for memories and stories, another section more personal, and a section just for condolences. Again, great job.
ReplyDeleteI have never heard of memorialized Facebook pages until your presentation, but you guys did a good job explaining them in your presentation. In terms of the relevant theories, I certainly understand why Uses and Gratifications may apply. As a Communications major, this was no longer a difficult theory to grasp. Although I never really thought about it, the fact that post-death Facebook posts were more formal and positive in nature seems logical. I never thought of people going through the grieving process online as opposed to the traditional processes of close get-togethers with one’s extended family. Your presentation was well organized and well rehearsed. Initially, I was confused about the all-black attire, but once I realized the topic you were presenting it seemed like a clever idea.
ReplyDeleteAs many have said before me, your presentation was very impressive. Logically organized, well rehearsed, and actually compelling (I wouldn’t consider myself a fan of PowerPoint’s on the latest in academia), you somehow turned a very morbid topic into a beacon of hope. I completely agree with your point that no matter what the medium, people will always be uncomfortable sharing their most profound emotions when a tragic loss strikes. However, your proposed Facebook page reconstruction is intuitive and helpful. It at once gives people the privacy to “communicate” with the deceased, if they feel Facebook is the appropriate method, via the private message. Although I was initially skeptical about the “remembrance gifts” I realize that with the growing popularity of giving regular “gifts,” this may be another method that people use to cope. By giving something to their friend, relative or acquaintance, even if it is virtual and, for lack of better words, trivial, if it aids in the grieving process then the means of doing so should absolutely be available to the general public. In the end, though I initially expressed my skepticism towards the idea of even further virtualizing a process that is meant to bring people together, not keep them distanced because technology might make their bereavement more convenient to express from home, I realized that this belief was shortsighted. In a growingly mobile society, the Internet may be an even more effective medium for sharing, connecting, and coping.
ReplyDeleteHi guys,
ReplyDeleteGreat job with the presentation. A close family friend of ours passed away earlier this semester, and my father set up a website for people to go to to mourn and grieve as a community. I thought that a lot of the design implementations you suggested were similar to the ones that he had on the website, and doing it in a space where so many people are a part of would make it so much better. Also, I thought that while facebook is a nice place for people to grieve together, it is also a really nice way for his close friends and family to read about memories of the deceased member that they might not have known about.
Deborah
I think your study was very well done and very well handled considering the topic. Bold move, but you guys made it work. One of my very close friends passed away after my freshman year. One thing I noticed is something that I was going to bring up in the Q&A session, but I believe someone else had asked it. I noticed that a lot of acquaintances used the Facebook group created (since there were no memorials at the time) to post memories. The closer they seemed to be to him, the more future-focused these posts were, saying what could/should have been. Also, those that were very close did not post at all, including myself. I think that would be an awesome direction in which to take the study.
ReplyDeleteThe presentation was well put together and conveyed in a very clear orderly fashion. I thought it was interesting that despite a relatively small sample size, you were able to draw significant conclusions that will hopefully be reinforced with more data. I would be interested in a large scale survey asking people about their feelings regarding Facebook in mourning. It could involve whether someone would want their profile to be memorialized or whether other people would use Facebook as a method of mourning. I, personally, would not want to be memorialized on Facebook so I find it interesting to see why so many people would publicly mourn on Facebook. As someone said in class, I wonder if there is any peer pressure from the other public mourners to write a comment. People seem to think that mourning is a private experience but perhaps it also has a social component that is easily recordable and comes to the forefront in computer-mediated communication. This subject is a sensitive one but the results and analysis you were able to design were very well done.
ReplyDeleteI thought you had an excellent presentation--very well-rehearsed and well-thought-out. I also liked the focus on practical application of grieving practices on Facebook. I would be interested to see how logistical use of Facebook, and not just language use, change on Facebook profiles of the deceased, as well as how those pages are created and administered.
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