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Would you send your boss a link, or ask him to friend you?  What if you worked in Israel?  Or China? A new study is examining the cultural differences in social media use in four countries. Some faculty members at NYIT (New York Institute of Technology) School of Management have won a $100,000 grant to examine how cultural dimensions affect the way people use social media to interact with work colleagues. They will investigate work relationships and social media in four countries: the United Arab Emirates (U.A.E.), China, Israel, and Canada.  The study scores national cultures on six “dimensions," including power distance, which is the cultural acceptance of unequal power relations (high score) versus people who question authority (low); individuality, the value a culture places on either individual preferences (high score) or collective needs (low), and uncertainty avoidance, a cultural value in favor of certainty and a single, shared Truth (high score), a...

Who would have thought? "Friending" your doctor on Facebook might not be such a good thing. For quite a while it's been an option for many physicians and patients.  I have to admit I like it.  But now a new study is saying that maybe, duh, we might want to reconsider. That's because, obviously, it can blur the lines in your relationship.  And not surprisingly, doctors may not like seeing your dog drinking Starbucks from a paper cup flash on their Facebook screens. The findings from Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health researchers suggest a disconnect between what patients expect and what physicians – concerned about confidentiality and being overwhelmed in off-hours – are willing to do when it comes to online dialogue. “The medical establishment needs to figure out how best to incorporate this reality into their practice while properly ensuring security safeguards,” says study leader Joy Lee, PhD, MS, a post-doctoral fellow in the Department ...