+Friend
Can people make quality friendships online?
About the Project
With the use of the Internet, the way people communicate and form relationships have changed. One such change is online friendship – a new form of friendship that occurs among people on social networking sites and utilizes computer-mediated communication (Ang 1891; Helmi et. al). With the lack of face-to-face interaction and the ability to hide one’s identity online, the legitimacy and quality of Internet friendships have been scrutinized. Although a number of studies have been done on the topic of virtual relationships, answers to whether or not online friendships are “real” and can be meaningful vary (Bülow and Felix; Helmi et al).
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+Friend is a senior capstone project that examines people's Internet friendship experiences. Its purpose is to gain a better understanding of online friendships and the quality of those relationships.
Results
A survey was conducted to gather data on people's online friendship experiences. A total of 327 responses were collected. For convenience, the responses were separated into three sections.
