Hi
the JISCMAIL spam detector routed this to me.  I reckon people maybe
interested.  So have forwarded.

steve

From: Amy Hogan <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Tue Jan 6, 2004  8:37:19 PM Europe/London
To: "" <[log in to unmask]>, "" <[log in to unmask]>, ""
<[log in to unmask]>, "" <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Request: Participants for Internet Study


My name is Amy Hogan and I am a Ph.D. student at the University of
Bath. My
research investigates how users utilise images and text when mentally
visualising the Internet. I would very much like you to participate in
my
online study - www.cyberviz.co.uk. Participation only takes 10- 15
minutes and
involves completing a fun, interactive puzzle using images or
descriptions of
the Internet.  Find out a bit more about it below, or go directly to
www.cyberviz.co.uk

****************************************
How do you envision cyberspace?

** Perhaps you see it as an urban landscape of skyscrapers of pulsing
information and circuitry? **
** Perhaps a multi-dimensional string puzzle emanating through a
hierarchy of
levels? **
** Or a dynamic, amorphous, gaseous cloud?**

Find out by participating in my online research - www.cyberviz.co.uk


What's the study all about?

Given the emergence of the Internet as critical infrastructure upon
which
businesses, organisations, institutions and consumers rely on its proper
functioning, it is increasingly important for cyberspace to be
understood.
The explosive growth of the Internet calls for the need to organise,
filter, and present information in ways which allow users to cope with
the
sheer quantities of information available.  The Internet's hypertextual,
abstract nature is unfamiliar to most; it is a space that is difficult
to
comprehend and mentally visualise.  Visual metaphors are employed when
users
try to make sense of this foreign environment by describing the
unfamiliar in
terms of the  familiar.  In doing so, the technology is made meaningful.

My research will illustrate the many ways cyberspace is being
envisioned by
users of this online service.  By combining pictorial representations
and Q-
Methodology, my resarch examines how these visualisations have important
consequences for ways in which users relate to, interact with and
understand
cyberspace.  I aim to investigate how such knowledge will help users,
service
providers and analysts to comprehend the various spaces of online
information,
providing understanding and aiding navigation.  This research has
significant
educational value by making complex spaces comprehensible.

Go to www.cyberviz.co.uk.  Thank you.

Amy Hogan


Ph.D. Psychology student
University of Bath
Participate in my online study! - www.cyberviz.co.uk