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Wayne State University Wayne State University Dissertations 1-1-2016 How Does Exposure To The nI ternet Affect Political Knowledge And Attitudes Among Rural Chinese?: A Field Experiment Wenwen Shi Wayne State University, Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.wayne.edu/oa_dissertations Part of the Political Science Commons Recommended Citation Shi, Wenwen, "How Does Exposure To The nI ternet Affect Political Knowledge And Attitudes Among Rural Chinese?: A Field Experiment" (2016). Wayne State University Dissertations. 1589. https://digitalcommons.wayne.edu/oa_dissertations/1589 This Open Access Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by DigitalCommons@WayneState. It has been accepted for inclusion in Wayne State University Dissertations by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@WayneState. HOW DOES EXPOSURE TO THE INTERNET AFFECTS POLITICAL KNOWLEDGE AND ATTITUDES AMONG RURAL CHINESE?: A FIELD EXPERIMENT by WENWEN SHI DISSERTATION Submitted to the Graduate School of Wayne State University Detroit, Michigan in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY 2016 MAJOR: POLITICAL SCIENCE Approved By: ________________________________ Advisor Date _________________________________ _________________________________ _________________________________ _________________________________ © COPYRIGHT BY WENWEN SHI 2016 All Rights Reserved DEDICATION To my parents, Xiangli Zhang and Huiping Shi, for their unconditional and unwavering love and support. To my baby daughter, TuTu, to whom I hope to influence with the same love and support I have been shown. ii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Writing this dissertation was more difficult than I expected, and I am glad that I was able to complete a product that met my goals. Not surprisingly, I lacked knowledge and experience in conducting field experiments when I first started the project. Yet, it is thanks to this inexperience that I finished the work at all. I firmly decided to collect first hand data through a field experiment without over thinking the difficulties. I was fortunate to have the trust and support of my professors, family, and friends, so I did not look overly crazy. Conducting the experiment in three rural villages in China presented substantial challenges, from acquiring approval from authorities for the research, recruiting subjects, and executing the intervention, to retrieving participants for post-treatment questionnaires. Analyzing data and writing the chapters was equally tough, especially with a newborn at home. I would not want to go through the whole process again; however, I definitely appreciate the opportunity to gain the knowledge, practice the skills, and push my limits to complete demanding tasks with limited resources. I was sometimes surprised by my commitment to the project. For example, in order to accommodate participants’ schedules, I drove from village to village in the dark, on narrow, curved mountain roads to extend the hours of the research sites. In order to decrease attrition, I walked two hours on mountain trails as well as went to the work zones of highway construction sites to find participants to fill out posttest questionnaires. I found that my commitment was bolstered iii by my education, which emphasized the value of research and the encouragement I received from people around me. I have a long list of people to whom I owe gratitude, the first of which is my advisor, Professor Yumin Sheng. When I decided to study the Internet’s political impact on citizens in China, I struggled to find systematic data that could be used to test my hypotheses. Professor Sheng suggested that I look at experimental methodology, which can be cost effective in collecting first hand data to test causal relationships. Before my departure to China, Professor Sheng told me “just be safe, even you do not collect the data as planned, that is fine.” I took this as the bottom line and was relieved each time this thought crossed my mind when I faced obstacles in the field. I also need to thank Professor Sheng for commenting thoroughly on my dissertation draft and organizing my dissertation defense while I was in California, as well as offering help throughout my years of study at Wayne State University (WSU). The second person I would like to express gratitude is Professor Strate, who is one of the best teachers I have ever had. He respects his students and really cares about their success. I took two courses with Professor Strate (Policy Analysis and Statistics II), and was a frequent visitor during his office hours, which were usually held before his evening classes. He always answered all of my questions even if there were only five minutes left when I showed up at the door. There was one time that I had too many questions and left no time for him to eat his Subway sandwich before the upcoming class. Professor Strate read through my draft chapters of the dissertation and promptly provided detailed feedback, from methods to grammar. His straightforward comments and iv constructive criticisms saved me from many mistakes and improved the dissertation. In addition to the comments, Professor Strate also encouraged me to “keep working and this project will get done.” I am indebted to his continuous encouragement and guidance. I also want to thank Professor Lean for her warm and kind manner in helping me. The topic of my dissertation was first formed in Professor Lean’s class. Without her encouragement and instruction, I would not have developed this topic for my dissertation project. As the director of the program, Professor Lean signed numerous forms for me and provided information regarding future opportunities. The first course I took at WSU was Professor Golebiowska’s Research Methods. The first semester was hard for me as an international student. Professor Golebiowska’s clear and organized class helped me overcome language barriers and adjust to the new study environment. I also developed an interest in experimental methodology in her class. Professor Swider is my outside committee member, and she provided significant guidance for my fieldwork. I would like to thank her for sharing her valuable experience in doing fieldwork studying migrant workers in China; I was certainly inspired by her experience (sharing a room with migrant workers, etc.). Despite the challenges, she assured me that collecting first hand data is rewarding (you know your data best), and fun. She also provided me with concrete advice on topics ranging from how to recruit participants to wearing plain clothes in rural villages. Additionally, when I was in China, she held a video chat with me at midnight (daytime in China) after nursing her baby so that she could provide guidance regarding the interviews. This encouraged me as I wrote the dissertation while taking care of my own baby. Professor Swider has been supportive v of me in my motherhood, reassuring me that the delay in finishing the dissertation was okay, and that taking care of my baby was my first priority. This eased the stress I felt during the first few months following the birth of my daughter. My deepest gratitude is to Professor Donald Green from Columbia University, who was my instructor at the Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR) summer program. This project would not have been possible without his instruction and support. Professor Green showed great interest in my project from the beginning and guided me through the design and implementation of the experiment, analysis of the data, and the writing of the dissertation. He lent me his wealth of expertise in field experiments, challenged me to meet every requirement of an experiment in order to generate causal analysis, and held me to a high research standard. I was impressed by his efficiency and productivity. Although he is an extremely busy professor, my questions were always answered promptly with brief but insightful comments that provided key guidance on analysis and the next step that I should focus upon. I am deeply indebted to him for spending time answering my questions through numerous Skype calls and email exchanges both while I was in China and after my return to the U.S. (he once had to Skype with me on a train in Europe before I printed out the questionnaires). Professor Green read my draft chapters and provided feedback throughout the writing. He also prevented many mistakes that would have been caused by my lack of knowledge and experience. I learned a great deal about experiment and data analysis from his expertise, commitment to research quality, and enthusiasm to promote the use of field experiments in political science. vi I would further like to acknowledge other professors who discussed and offered advice on the project. Professor Mingming Shen, the director of the Research Center for Contemporary China at Peking University, met me in Beijing during my field trip. Professor Yan Jie provided me with the questionnaires the Center used for their national surveys and gave me a book of data reports, which I brought with me to the villages. Professor Yang Zhong of the University of Tennessee discussed the survey he used to study rural villagers in the Jiangsu province. Professor Mary Gallagher of the University of Michigan advised me on books regarding doing fieldwork in China. Professor Gordon Chang of Stanford University shared his thoughts regarding the Internet and the conclusion of my study. I also wanted to thank participants at the Behavioral Models of Political Conference, West Coast Experiments Conference and Political Networks Conference for their feedbacks on this project. Additionally, I appreciate the financial support from the Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation and five other fellowships and grants from WSU’s Graduate School and the Humanities Center for the dissertation project. I would also like to thank assistants at the Research Design and Analysis Unit of WSU for answering my questions for data analysis, and Sara Tipton of WSU’s English Language Institute and tutors at WSU Writing Center for proofreading the dissertation draft.

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