Social media: a guide for researchers

14 February 2011

By Tristram Hooley

If you are interested in the use of social media for research you might want to download or pick up a new guide that I've been involved in writing. Social media: a guide for researchers is pubished by the Research Information Network (RIN) and aims to provide researchers with a practical starting point for their engagement with social media. As part of putting the guide together we interviewed 11 researchers who were active users of social media. This means that we are able to illustrate our discussion of the value of social media with read examples about how researchers in a range of disciplines are using social media.

The guide aims to provide a broad overview of the ways in which social media can be used in research. It isn't about teaching you the details of how to use a particular tool (like Twitter) but it is about explaining why researchers would want to bother with something like Twitter. We hope that people will find it useful.