The World Wide Web is only around 20 years old, but it has transformed the way we work, collaborate, engage in commerce, participate in the political process and interact socially.  This course focuses on the contribution of social science to understanding life in the "Age of the Network".  While attention is paid to relevant insights or approaches from other disciplines, for example applied physics and computer science, the primary focus will be on theoretical and empirical contributions from economics, political science and sociology.  There is particular emphasis on the role of quantitative analysis of surveys of individuals and statistical network analysis of digital trace data (e.g. blog/social network service/web/email data) in understanding the social science of the Internet.

By taking this course, students will:

• Learn about the fundamental changes to society, politics and the economy resulting from new information and communication technologies.
• Learn how core social science concepts and methodological approaches can facilitate an understanding of life in the Internet Age.
• Learn about relevant online research methods that can be used for collecting and analysing data from the Internet.

Class participation online forum (20% - approx. 1250 words), critical review of journal article and presentation (20% - approx. 1000 words), essay (30% - approx. 2250 words), final exam (30%).

Two ninety minute sessions on campus per week.

DEMO8007 Statistics for Social Scientists or equivalent, DEMO8087 Online Research Methods.

A complete set of course notes, including additional readings will be supplied.

Students undertaking the "Social Science of the Internet" stream of the Master of Social Research must take this course and DEMO8087 Online Research Methods.

This course is available via distance learning.