Blogging in a region of conflict: Supporting transition to recovery

Ban Al-Ani, Gloria Mark, Bryan Semaan

Research output: Chapter in Book/Entry/PoemConference contribution

38 Scopus citations

Abstract

The blogosphere is changing how people experience war and conflict. We conducted an analysis of 125 blogs written by Iraqi citizens experiencing extreme disruption in their country. We used Hoffman's [8] stages of recovery model to understand how blogs support people in a region where conflict is occurring. We found that blogs create a safe virtual environment where people could interact, free of the violence in the physical environment and of the strict social norms of their changing society in wartime. Second, blogs enable a large network of global support through their interactive and personal nature. Third, blogs enable people experiencing a conflict to engage in dialogue with people outside their borders to discuss their situation. We discuss how blogs enable people to collaboratively interpret conflict through communities of interest and discussion with those who comment. We discuss how technology can better support blog use in a global environment.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Title of host publicationCHI 2010 - The 28th Annual CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, Conference Proceedings
Pages1069-1078
Number of pages10
DOIs
StatePublished - 2010
Externally publishedYes
Event28th Annual CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, CHI 2010 - Atlanta, GA, United States
Duration: Apr 10 2010Apr 15 2010

Publication series

NameConference on Human Factors in Computing Systems - Proceedings
Volume2

Other

Other28th Annual CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems, CHI 2010
Country/TerritoryUnited States
CityAtlanta, GA
Period4/10/104/15/10

Keywords

  • blogs
  • community
  • disrupted environment
  • empirical study
  • understanding the user

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Software
  • Human-Computer Interaction
  • Computer Graphics and Computer-Aided Design

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