Just Announced: "University of Oxford, OCLC Research to Study Digital 'Residents' and 'Visitors' in the Transition Between High School and University"

From OCLC Abstracts:

Titled “Visitors and Residents: What Motivates Engagement with the Digital Information Environment?” the pilot phase of this JISC-funded, collaborative international project began in January and will continue through the middle of 2011. Project directors are Mr. David White, Co-Manager (Development), Technology-Assisted Lifelong Learning (TALL), part of the University of Oxford, and Dr. Lynn Silipigni Connaway, Senior Research Scientist at OCLC. Dr. Donna Lanclos, Library Ethnographer at the J. Murrey Atkins Library, University of North Carolina at Charlotte, will conduct data collection and analysis efforts in the United States.
Digital residents spend a portion of their lives online, using the Web to develop an identity and maintain relationships. They tend to use the Web in many aspects of their lives, including as a venue for conducting their social life. In contrast, digital visitors use the Web as a tool for achieving specific goals as needs arise. They do not develop an online identity nor participate in online culture in the same way, or to the same extent, that digital residents do.

Much More In the Full News Release

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