Debunking the myth of the Nintendo generation: How doctoral students introduce new electronic communication practices into university research

Current research on the influence of electronic communication technologies such as electronic mail, World Wide Web, electronic journals, bibliographic databases, and on-line card catalogs suggest that they broaden academic research communities and change the ways researchers work. However, it is less well-understood how these changes take place. One explanation is that the mechanism for change is generational: doctoral students transform research disciplines as they apply new electronic communication skills they “grew up with.” This article examines this explanation and related claims through evidence from a study of 28 graduate students and their advisors in four disciplines at eight U.S. research universities. Although all the doctoral students used electronic communication technologies in various ways, their work practices reinforced existing patterns of work and resource use in their disciplines. Students used electronic communication to (1) mimic the electronic communication patterns of their advisor, (2) differentiate or specialize their research with respect to their advisor or research specialty, (3) enhance the social connections and material resources their advisor or institution provided to them, and/or (4) ease or improve “hands-on” research techniques (textual analysis, wet lab work, programming, statistical analysis) that their advisor or research group delegated to them.