KAUNAS UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY

FACULTY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES, ARTS AND

HUMANITIES

Connection between internet use and people’s trust

Qualitative and quantitative analysis report

DONE BY: EVA JAUGELAVIČIŪTĖ, SALLY

SAKANDELIDZE

Supervisor:

Aistė Blažienė

Kaunas, 2021

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Contents
Introduction ...................................................................................................................................................... 3
Search and analysis of public opinion surveys................................................................................ 4
Comparison over time:...................................................................................................................... 5
Frequency table: ................................................................................................................................ 5
Relations between two variables: ..................................................................................................... 6
Correlation analysis: ......................................................................................................................... 6
Online survey using Qualtrics:
(https://qfreeaccountssjc1.az1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_e50lRzPUHSNEYKO) ..................... 7
Research questions: ........................................................................................................................... 7
Questions: ........................................................................................................................................... 7
Conclusion .......................................................................................................................................... 7

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Introduction

Nowadays the internet is one of the most important and daily used things in the society. It allowed
people to connect with friends, family and new people all around the world without leaving home.
Also, for some people the internet is important for work purposes and it allows them to travel or
stay anywhere without being tied to one place. Without the internet a lot of people would not know
the newest updates on the things that are happening in the world. Having the opportunity to use the
internet allows people to have a better understanding of the society that they are living in and also,
to make new connections abroad. Even if the internet can be viewed as one the greatest inventions
that a human being created but as everything else it has its flows. One of them is people’s trust
towards making friends online and if online friends are trustworthy. The Internet is known as a
good way to meet people and also, for a lot of false information that one person can spread or share
with others not only about the fake news but at the same time about their persona. The aim of this
report is to analyze and have a better understanding of the connection between internet use and
people’s trust. Also, to find out if people on the internet can be trusted or a user can never be too
careful. The main research questions that guided through different perspectives of people’s opinions
and experience on meeting and making new friends online helped to have a better point of view on
connection between internet use and people’s level of trust. The questions were based on what
determinants trust between online friends, what are the red flags that show the person’s dishonesty
and other questions were related to how often the responders use the internet in their daily lives. It
helped to understand if the respondent's willingness to trust people online depends on usage level of
the internet on a daily basis. That concludes reports objectives as if frequent use of the internet can
have an impact on a person's ability to trust or keep the distance between people that were met
online. Moreover, to find out if online friendships can be determined in the same way as the ones in
real life. To have a clearer view on the situations - 3 databases were used. First database was
collected based on points of view of Lithuanians and international KTU students. The second one
was taken from a European social survey database that was in the media and social trust section.
“Internet use, how often “, “ Most people can be trusted or you can't be too careful”, “Country” data
was used to configure a table of people's answers and the percentage of it. The last database was
taken from ESS to understand how often a person socially meets with friends, relatives or
colleagues.

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Search and analysis of public opinion surveys
1. Comparison across countries: Internet use, how often?
According to ESS data it is visible that based on public opinion most of the people use internet
everyday in all the countries. Other common answer was most days and a few times a week. Also, it
is visible that only few countries such as Denmark, Norway and Sweden have the least number of
answers that included other options besides every day usage of the internet. Italy use internet the
most compeering to other countries.

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Comparison over time:
To find out the comparison over time was used European social survey data that answered the time
development changes of internet use and how it effects people’s trust on online. It is visible that
people who don’t spend a lot of time on the internet has more trust that people that do use internet
daily. These results are based on the experience that respondents gathered while using internet
constantly.

Frequency table:

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Relations between two variables:
Lithuania was choosing for the compare relations between two variables. First one is the percentage
of peoples trust online and another one is trust evolution in the scale from 0 to 15. It is visible from
the table that trust online In Lithuania is valued positively most of the time. In some it is visible
peeks of trust and distrust.

Correlation analysis:
Correlation between internet use and people’s trust is positive and very weak. with this table we
reject null hypothesis and we can conclude that people who never use internet tend to think that you
can’t be too careful while trusting others, while people who uses internet everyday tends to think
that most people can be trusted.

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Online survey using Qualtrics:
(https://qfreeaccountssjc1.az1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_e50lRzPUHSNEYKO)

Research questions:
What determines trust between online friends?
Does frequent use of the internet has impact on the willingness to trust people online?
How much time one person daily spends on the internet and what is the reasons?

Questions:

1 What’s your gender?

2 What’s your age?

3 How long have you been using social media?

4 How much time you spend using social media daily?

5 For what purpose do you mostly use social media?

6 Do you trust social media?

7 What determines the trust between online friends?

8 Do you have/had online friends?

9 How much do you trust your online friends?

10 What are the main red flags that make it hard to keep the trust?

11 What are the experiences of people who have or had online friends?

Conclusion

To sum up everything, most people choose to trust others online. The respondents gave a lot
examples of friendships that were created because of the internet. Of course, a lot of people are
willing to trust new online friends until they notice red flags such as lying about age, name or
similar things, avoiding video calls or meeting in person, asking too much questions about personal
things like address. It was the main key points that alerts about dishonesty. Also, the constant user
of internet is less open about their personal life with the strangers online then people who uses
internet not that much. It is the result of having more experience with strangers online. Most
common answer about the trust on internet is that it depends on the situation. That proved that
people trust others online on some kind of conditions. Also, most of the people use internet for
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social media and to connect with family, friends or new people. Average person spends 4 or 6 hours
per day using internet this shows that the internet is really important for the people. Internet brought
a lot of freedom and no need to travel far away to reach out others but it also can cause a lot of
damage if the person is not being careful. It is important to notice red flags while talking to
strangers but person shouldn’t be afraid of making new connections online because sometimes it
can turn in to a strong and close friendship.