How does an online social networking site assist young mothers who experience social isolation?
Motherhood is one of the most significant transitions in a woman’s life, and social support is critical to the experience. Even so, research reveals a reduction in informal social networks during early motherhood. With the growing availability of online social networking, Diana Parry, the principal investiator of this project, and Troy Glover set out to explore how Momstown.ca, a social networking site exclusively for mothers, connected geographically heterogeneous mothers and created a community of caring and information-sharing.
In particular, the project focused on online social networking sites as sources social capital for mothers. Social capital is the consequence of investment in and cultivation of social relationships allowing an individual access to resources that would otherwise be unavailable to him or her. In focusing on social capital, the project added to the growing literature on how social capital formation occurs when online and offline connections are closely coupled.
Additional reading
Parry, D. C., Glover, T. D., & Mulcahy, C. M. (2013). From “stroller-stalker” to “momancer”: Courting friends through a social networking site for mothers. Journal of Leisure Research, 45(1), 23-46.
Mulcahy, C.M., Parry, D.C., & Glover, T.D. (in press, 2015). From Mothering without a net to mothering on the net: The impact of an online social networking site on experiences of postpartum depression. Journal of the Motherhood Initiative, 6(1).
Valtchanov, B., Parry, D. C., & Glover, T. D. (in press, 2015). “A whole new world”: Mothers’ technologically-mediated leisure. Leisure Sciences.
Valtchanov, B., Parry, D. C., Glover, T. D., & Mulcahy, C. M. (2014). Neighborhood at your fingertips: Transforming community online through a social networking site for mothers. Gender, Technology & Development, 18(2), 187-217.
Acknowledgements
Special thanks to the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada for funding this project and to Momstown.ca for its support.
