PROCESO DE CERTIFICACIÓN

When exploring the research model and examining the expected psychological and workplace influences on PWU, the decision was made that the most appropriate sample would come from a population of adults who are in employment, have Internet access at work and use it. Additionally it was desirable that individuals not identify themselves predominantly as tertiary students. University students, although possibly in paid employment, were not seen as a typical representation of the working population with access to the Internet at work. At this stage it was not found appropriate to limit the population with regards to ethnicity, culture, or nationality, because the Internet and its use in workplaces is a phenomenon found in nearly all industrial societies. Additionally, the focus of the current research is on exploring conceptual relationships rather than investigating their cross-cultural applicability. Investigations of cultural or national differences, however, may be of interest at a later stage.

5.2.2 Recruitment of participants

In an effort to reach the desired population, the online questionnaires were posted for ten weeks on the Internet via a Massey University-hosted research website. Not all parts of these questionnaires were subsequently used in the present research, and the excluded parts are not discussed in this document.

Participants were recruited through what is traditionally called the snowball method (Goodman, 1961; Sudman, 1976). This involves contacting potential participants, inviting their research participation and asking them, in turn, to pass along the invitation email to people they know who might fit the participant profile. In the context of emails and on-line surveys the tendency of email recipients to forward/pass along emails that contain invitations to participate in surveys was recently termed the ‘pass-along effect’ (Kaye & Johnson, 1999; Phelps, Lewis, Mobilio, Perry & Raman, 2004; Witte, Amoroso & Howard, 2000). The use of pass-along data collection is consistent with the research of other authors in this area (e.g. Anandarajan & Simmers, 2004; Stanton & Weiss, 2000).

During the initial stage of recruitment, invitations to participate were emailed to three groups of. The first approach reached 80 individuals listed in the researchers email address book who were known to have Internet access at work. These people live in New

Research method

were sent (with permission of the respective Webmasters), in four fortnightly waves, to individuals who were subscribers to four different professional and academic networking lists of which the researcher is a member (Emonet, I/Onet, HRINZ, Psychwatch). The third, initial group of potential participants was approached via work email addresses posted on the Internet in the areas of politics and the media, as well as international commercial organisations. Each contacted person was also asked to forward the web link and invitation email to other individuals they know and who were using the Internet at work, thus getting the pass-along process to gain momentum.

At the start of the survey the participants were asked if they have, or had, Internet access at work during the last two weeks, were thanked for their interest in the study if this was not the case, and were advised that they did not qualify for the survey. Qualifying participants were than asked to continue with the survey questions.

At the completion of the initial survey the respondents were requested to indicate their interest in participating in a short follow-up survey one week later, by ticking the appropriate box. Interested respondents supplied their email address and received a second invitation letter by email with the web link to the second survey and their code number. This step was organised by the university’s Webmaster, who kept the email addresses secure and private, organised in such a way that the researcher could not trace responses back to any individual.

5.2.3 Characteristics of participants

During the ten weeks that the questionnaires were posted on the Internet, 325 people responded and attempted to complete the first questionnaire. However, 41 respondents either did not complete the survey, or provided data that showed extreme or systematic response patterns. These response patterns showed either all responses in the survey marked at the lowest level, or responses appearing in a diagonal pattern across each survey page.Their data was excluded from the survey. The majority of the remaining 284 respondents were employees with a certain level of experience in their jobs (34.7%, response option “experienced employee”), followed by middle management level employees (21.4%), entrance level employees (10.9%), and supervisor level employees (9.5%).

Because the objective of this research was to investigate personal web use at work, information from the 17 respondents who identified themselves as being primarily tertiary students (6%) was excluded from the subsequent data analysis, bringing the total of

Research method

participants with valid responses to 267. The demographic characteristics of these participants are summarised in Table 5.1.

Of the 267 participants, the majority of 160 (59.9%) participants were women, and 107 (40.1%) participants were men. About half (52%) were under the age of 40 (mean age 39.7), with the majority being between 26 and 35 years old. As can be expected with the characteristics of the target population, participants older than 60 were in the minority.

A summary of the written responses to an open-ended question enquiring about the cultural backgrounds of the participants suggested that the majority (44.1%) saw

themselves as New Zealand Europeans. A further 27.7 % identified with the culture of a European country (Germany, Finland, Denmark, Czech Republic, Sweden, Belgium, and Italy), and 10.5 % wrote ‘New Zealander’ in response to the question. The remaining 17.7 % indicated that they identified with a wide variety of cultures (in alphabetical order: Australian, Asian, Canadian, Chinese, Indian, Maori, Native American, US American, Pacific Islands, and South African). A total of 54 respondents declined to write their cultural backgrounds in the space provided.

Research method

Table 5.1: Demographics of Respondents

Variable Frequency (n) Valid percent (%)

Gender (0 missing) Males 107 40.1 Females 160 59.9 Age (5 missing) 20-25 23 8.8 26-30 44 16.8 31-35 43 16.4 36-40 27 10.3 41-45 34 13.0 46-50 31 11.8 51-55 26 9.9 56-60 26 9.9 60+ 8 3.1 Ethnicity (54 missing) NZ European 94 44.1 European 59 27.7 New Zealander 29 10.5 NZ Maori 5 1.9 Asian 4 1.5 Indian 4 1.5

Others (individually identified) 18 12.6

Place of work (9 missing)

University 92 35.7 Professional services 23 8.9 Government 23 8.9 IT/ Telecommunication 18 7 Education / Training 16 6.2 Healthcare 12 4.7 Hospitality / Tourism 13 5 Community services 7 2.7 Media 8 3.1 Banking / Finance 16 6.2 Legal professions 6 2.2 Engineering 5 1.9 Research institutes 4 1.5 Real estate 5 1.9 Retail 5 1.9 Insurance 3 1.1 General Administration 2 0.7 Tenure (1 missing)

3 months and under 15 5.6

4-6 months 16 6 7-12 months 23 8.6 13-30 months 71 26.7 31-60 months 66 24.8 61-96 months 22 8.3 97-180 months 34 12.8 < 180 months 19 7.1

Research method

A majority of just over one third of the participants worked in some capacity for a university (35.7%). At the time of survey completion the participants had held their current positions for an average of 61 months (5.1 years). The range for tenure in the job was wide, from the shortest time of one month to the longest of just over 31 years. The median time in the current position was 2.8 years for this sample.

The vast majority of participants (68.1%) filled the survey out at work, while 29.5% did so at home, and 2.5% at an unspecified location elsewhere.

Of the 267 participants, 73% (196) said that they would like to receive the link for the follow-up survey one week after completion of the main survey. Of those 196

individuals invited to participate, 77.5% (152) completed the brief follow-up questionnaire.