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  1.  
    • CommentAuthorvoloch
    • CommentTimeSep 13th 2010
     
    I got a request from a grad student here at UT (this might have been a coincidence) to fill out an online survey about the reasons why I participate on MO. It looked legit and the questions were mostly harmless. We are being studied...
  2.  
    I got the same survey, so they are not just sending it to UT people.
  3.  
    I got it too. I filled it out, as an academic I feel it's only fair that to fill out surveys like this as the social scientists need to be able to do research too.
    • CommentAuthorVP
    • CommentTimeSep 13th 2010
     

    I wonder why all of a sudden all over the country social scientists decided to study MO. Did they mention who is sponsoring their research? Is it a government program?

    • CommentAuthorWill Jagy
    • CommentTimeSep 13th 2010 edited
     
    I think it is just one social scientist. The survey goes through a website, but the notices seem to be going by email. So someone who is successfully pseudonymous may not be asked, even people whose email address is slightly hard to figure out. Also, I think they try to take a random selection from out of what they define as the population of interest. I'm certainly pretty random all by myself.

    Anyway, here is part of the lead in letter, as I notice Anton deleted the site url let me just give some text from the email:

    Hello Will,
    I am contacting you because you have been making a large number of
    significant contributions to MathOverflow. I am a doctoral student in
    psychology at the University of Texas at Austin with a background in
    mathematics. I am conducting a study on successful online communities such
    as MathOverflow. If you have time I would appreciate your responses to a
    short questionnaire. The survey should take no more than 15 minutes; you
    must be at least 18. To complete the survey go to:

    url...
    Thanks!

    grad student name...

    Department of Psychology
    University of Texas at Austin
    phone number...

    This project has been approved by the Institutional Review Board at the
    University of Texas at Austin.

    from the "Consent Form"
    You are invited to participate in a research survey, entitled "Motivations in a small community dedicated to scientific collaboration"...
    The purpose of this study is to examine motivations for contributing to an online community of question answering. Your participation in the survey will contribute to a better understanding of individual's motivations and behavior in online volunteer communities. These communities have become an important resource (e.g. Wikipedia)...
  6.  

    They got my Berkeley email address, not the one I posted in my profile, so my guess is that they're looking for people who included a website of the form university.edu/~username.

    ... as I notice Anton deleted the site url ...

    I figured that perhaps I was interfering with their selection methodology by posting a link.

  7.  
    I also got this e-mail, and responded for the same reasons that Noah did. I am curious why they collected birth month and date. It makes the data much harder to anonymize and, unless they are testing astrological hypotheses, I don't see what it's good for.
    • CommentAuthorWill Jagy
    • CommentTimeSep 13th 2010
     
    Anton, that seems right, trying not to disrupt their selection.

    I just replied to the email, gave the link to my Meta comment above, and said "if you need me to delete my response i will do so." I don't think I was too detailed but one never knows.
    • CommentAuthorvoloch
    • CommentTimeSep 13th 2010
     
    I did not enter my birthday beyond the year. This was one of a few questions I declined to answer. They accepted my survey anyway.
    • CommentAuthorWill Jagy
    • CommentTimeSep 13th 2010
     
    No way of knowing why they want things, and if they believe, as indicated, that responders will be well-protected as far as various privacy issues, they may throw in questions where they have not fully thought out why they are curious. I think I did a survey once, at the time there was a theory connecting drug abuse with weight at birth. So I guess I looked up my birth weight somehow.
  11.  
    Thanks so much for those of you who have participated in our survey. At the moment we are recruiting users who have included a website with an email address or an email address in the about me section and who have made a significant number of contributions. Everyone is welcome to complete the survey though. Here is the link:

    http://www.utpsyc.org/MathOverflowSurvey/

    I would be happy to answer any questions individually about the survey if you message me.
    • CommentAuthorMariano
    • CommentTimeSep 14th 2010 edited
     

    I answered the questions. They seemed quite reasonable and a couple even fun :P

    I can see the interest in asking for our age, by the way; the day of birth can be useful to determine our chances to get a Fields medal :)

    The one question I thought was bad was «Do you participate in MathOverflow to gain reputation as a member of MO or to gain reputation as a member of the academic mathematics community?», because none of the options fit me at all: there is no neither answer in the offered list.

  13.  
    I got one too. I did one step better than Felipe: I didn't enter my birth date at all. I felt very uncomfortable giving someone I didn't know precise "login details". I think the survey would have been better off if it had just had a drop-down menu saying "are you: 0-15, 15-20, 20-30,30-40..." or whatever. I think I answered everything else though (apart from the usual issues, when none of the options were my answer, which happened twice and so I just left those ones out).
  14.  
    Aah--I see Mariano has highlighted one of the questions I didn't answer, and he didn't answer it for precisely the reason I didn't. I participate because I have relatively specialised knowledge that I can sometimes pass on in order to aid others. This seemed to be a million miles away from either option offered to us.
  15.  
    I think asking for our birth year is reasonable resolution. They probably should have also asked for the year in which we received our last degree and what it was: A 22 year old who graduated from college at 19 is probably more like a 25 year old than like a typical 22 year old.
  16.  

    Actually, what disturbs me most about this study is the URL of this discussion on it ...

  17.  
    I wouldn't have suspected you to be a numerologist, Andrew. :)
  18.  
    The reason we generally ask for a birth date rather than age is because when working with undergrads (18-22) it is worthwhile having more resolution in age. That is not necessary for this community. For those people who did include a birth date I will calculate age and remove this information from the final dataset. Thanks for all of your feedback.

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