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CHAPTER 6. ANALYZING THE TALK.ABORTION NEWSGROUP 84 erage message contains 58.75 original words. Half of the messages contained between 17 and 66 words, while only 2.5 percent had more than 275 words. The correlation between number of messages and length of message was -.07, suggesting that frequency of authorship was only rather weakly related to length of message, and that more frequent authors posted shorter messages. In other words, the size of the participatory act was relatively equal within the newsgroup, while the quantity of participatory acts was not. Additional analysis of authorship is based on seven categories of authors, developed from the rank ordering of authors by number of articles written, or, in two cases, by the specific number of articles written by an author: Very Frequent authors includes the most prolific one-half of one percent of authors (15 authors, each of whom wrote at least 594 articles). This group accounts for 45 percent of all posts written to the newsgroup during the year of study. Included in this group is one author who wrote 5,476 messages, or 11 percent of the content being studied. Frequent authors includes the next most prolific two percent of the authors (60 authors, each of whom wrote at least 81 articles). This group accounts for about 25 percent of all posts written. Occasional authors includes the next most prolific two and one half percent of the authors (75 authors, each of whom wrote at least 34 articles). This group accounts for about eight percent of all posts written. Infrequent authors includes the next most prolific five percent of authors (150 authors, each of whom wrote at least 15 articles, accounting for about seven percent of all posts). Very Infrequent authors includes the authors who wrote between three and 14 articles (692 authors, 23 percent of all authors, nine percent of posts). Two time authors wrote exactly two posts (423 authors, 14 percent of authors, two percent of posts) One time authors wrote a single article to the newsgroup (1,575 authors, 53 percent of all authors, three percent of posts).
CHAPTER 6. ANALYZING THE TALK.ABORTION NEWSGROUP 85 Table 6.2: Categorization of Authors by Number of Messages Author Type # of Authors Cum. Authors % of Authors Cum. % of Authors % of Total Posts Cum. % of Total Posts Min. # of Posts Per Author Mean # of Posts Per Author Very Frequent 15 15 0.5% 0.5% 45% 45% 594 1,392 Frequent 60 75 2.0% 2.5% 25% 70% 81 196 Occassional 75 150 2.5% 5% 9% 79% 34 51 Infreqeunt 149 299 5% 10% 7% 86% 15 22 Very Infrequent 692 991 23% 33% 9% 95% 3 6 Two-time 423 1,115 14% 47% 2% 97% 2 2 One-time 1,575 2,989 53% 100% 3% 100% 1 1 The complete categorization scheme based on frequency is provided in Table 6.2. Additional descriptive statistics summarizing key measures, are provided in Table 6.3 on the following page. This analysis is supplemented by Figures C.1, C.2, C.3 and C.4 in Appendix C on page 167. All measures are strongly correlated with the number of messages posted, but individually provide additional description of the nature of behavior associated with each author type. The first measure to be examined is the number of threads contributed to. The number of threads contributed to (hereafter, simply threads) is an indicator of an author’s breadth of discussion. A larger number of threads may indicate a wider range of engagement and discussion than a smaller number of threads. As shown in Table 6.3 on the following page, all authors contributed to an average of 8 threads; however, 75 percent of all authors contributed to only one or two threads. The median number of threads declines by nearly 85 percent as we move from very frequent authors to frequent authors, by 70 percent as move move from frequent to occasional authors, and by 50 percent as we move from occasional to infrequent authors. Nearly identical patterns are seen as we move down through the categories along the 75th percentile. The high correlation between threads and number of messages posted (r=.98, see Figure C.2 on page 169 indicates that posting behavior to threads may be similar for different types of authors. However, a contrasting pattern emerges when comparing the ratio of messages to threads across different author groups. This ratio is a measure of depth of discussion;
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Contents Acknowledgements 7 1 Compu
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CHAPTER 1. COMPUTERS, CONVERSATION
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CHAPTER 2. THE PUBLIC SPHERE 15 2.1
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APPENDIX B. DENSITY SCORES 165 Tabl
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Appendix C Supplemental Analysis 16
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APPENDIX C. SUPPLEMENTAL ANALYSIS 1
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BIBLIOGRAPHY 177 Best, Michael L. 1
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BIBLIOGRAPHY 179 Fisher, Bonnie, Mi
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BIBLIOGRAPHY 181 Hiltz, Starr Roxan
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BIBLIOGRAPHY 183 Mansbridge, Jane.
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BIBLIOGRAPHY 185 Pateman, Carole. 1
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BIBLIOGRAPHY 189 U. S. Congress, Of
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