"They are like personalized mini-Googles": Seeking Information on Facebook Groups

Abstract

Our study reports on everyday life information search (ELIS) practice using Facebook Groups. While previous research has examined social Q&A in the context of status message question asking (SMQA) on Facebook and Twitter, we discuss how people step outside their personal networks to find answers to questions while staying within the Facebook environment. We investigate two popular Q&A Facebook Groups in the city of Bangalore, India and ask why people turn to Facebook Groups for the information needs, the nature of costs of using these groups for information search, and how Groups are groomed to host social Q&A practices. Our findings suggest that Facebook Groups can be popular venues for information search because of its structural features as well as the networked sociality that it engenders.