Brittany Hanson, 21, studies Family Social Science at the
University of Minnesota. She currently interns with ReachOut.com in
Australia. In this article, Brittany writes about her observations
from using Yahoo! Answers to assist other young people seeking help
online.
Young people today are regularly using the Internet to connect
with others and get information. When we are in a tough situation
we look to online spaces to help us get through a problem or answer
a difficult question. Online services like Yahoo! Answers allow youth and people of
all ages to ask questions in a variety of different topics to
people from all over the world. From homework help to questions
about their mental health, you can get answers to the questions you
may be asking.
Yahoo! Answers is a service that yahoo.com.au offers that allows anyone with an
account to ask and answer questions. With this service you can post
or answer a question at any time, 24 hours a day, any day of the
week. After posting a question any Yahoo! user can submit an answer
for up to four days. Other users can rate the usefulness of the
answers submitted, and at the end of the four days the user who
asked the question can choose the best answer that was
submitted.
Yahoo! Answers is used by youth because of its accessibility and
anonymity. Young people don't have to filter what they feel in
their questions and are able to ask for help or look for
suggestions without having to reveal their identity. Getting help
for the first time can be a difficult process for young people,
Yahoo! Answers allows them to ask for help without having to
contact a GP or a counselor. The ease of Yahoo! Answers makes this
service appealing.
Of course, as with turning to any community for help, the
answers are not always appropriate or helpful. Yahoo! Answers is
accessible to people of all ages from all over the world and there
are legitimate concerns about the safety and appropriateness of the
website as a help seeking tool. Young people may use this service
as the first step in reaching out about the issues they may be
facing. Other users may give advice that is not supportive or
appropriate to the situation. Because it is not a controlled
environment the service may be detrimental to the user asking for
help. Therefore, it is always wise to encourage caution when
looking for help from an open and unmoderated community.
Providing real help via Yahoo! Answers -
Case Study
Knowing the high amount of young people that turn to Yahoo!
Answers for help, ReachOut.com works with Yahoo! Answers as
a knowledge partner. Being a knowledge partner means that answers
provided by ReachOut.com have consistently been rated highly by
users, and that the service has been acknowledged by Yahoo! as a
provider of quality answers to mental health questions. Users can
see this status when ReachOut.com provides answers to their
questions, encouraging them to give more weight to ReachOut.com's
answers. By going to the space where young people are already
asking questions, ReachOut.com directly helps young people who are
in need of help, and raises awareness of ReachOut.com as a place
where people can get more information on what they may be facing
and how to get help.
Yahoo! Answers gives young people the chance to take the first
step in reaching out. By having them access this online community,
ReachOut.com is able to interact with a large community of young
people who would not otherwise get the help they need.
Do you feel young people should be reaching out to
online spaces like Yahoo! Answers? Share your opinions and
experiences below.
More
information
For more information about online trends and the use of
technology by young people, visit the Trends in
Technology section of ReachOut Pro.