Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender & Queer Interest Group
2022 Abstracts
Extended Abstract • Faculty • Rhonda Gibson; Joe Bob Hester • The social identities of Pete Buttigieg: How Twitter addressed counter-stereotypical attributes of a presidential candidate • Analysis of 8,705,300 tweets about presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg from 2019-2020 showed that only 6.8% addressed his sexuality. Most instead dealt with daily campaign occurrences, such as polls, candidate statements, and debate performances. Of the tweets that addressed his sexuality in a substantial manner, 10.2% referenced religion, with the majority discussing homosexuality as a sin. Counter-stereotypical tweets that presented Buttigieg’s Christianity and sexuality as congruent accounted for just 20.5%. Tweets were also likely to describe Buttigieg’s sexuality as a political liability. Using social identity theory as a framework, it was determined that Twitter conversation related to Pete Buttigieg repeated traditional God-vs.-gay stereotypes and did not produce a more nuanced discussion of the intersection of politics, sexuality and Christianity.
Research Paper • Student • Patrick Johnson, University of Iowa School of Journalism and Mass Communication • Snake in the Grass: Adapting sex and sexuality from journalistic truth to the silver screen • This paper uses a case study approach to discuss issues of sexuality explored in James Franco and Justin Kelly’s King Cobra by dissecting the line that exists between fact and fiction when a creator bends the foundational truth of a story in an effort to maximize the pleasure of his audience.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • Tien-Tsung Lee, University of Macau; Jared Tu, University of Macau • Cultural values and media use: Do they predict support for same-sex marriage in Taiwan? • In 2019, Taiwan became the first society in Asia to legalize same-sex marriage. Based on a survey of 2,028 Taiwanese citizens, this study identified the predictors of support for same-sex marriage, including a younger age, being female, having more education, having gay friends or relatives, disobeying traditions or customs, being open-minded and curious, having a stronger sense of fairness and justice, using Line less often, and having a higher level of online search diversity.
Research Paper • Student • JungKyu Rhys Lim, University of Maryland, College Park; Hyoyeun Jun; Victoria Ledford, University of Maryland, College Park • Stigmatized groups with infectious diseases: Korean LGBTQ+s’ intersectional stigma and risk communication during COVID-19 outbreaks • Stigmatized groups may not engage in infectious disease testing and treatment, because of intersectional stigma and discrimination. In South Korea, the COVID-19 pandemic surfaced stigmatization when governments and media attempted to communicate COVID-19 risks that stigmatized LGBTQ+ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or queer-identifying) individuals. Using qualitative in-depth interviews (N = 21), this study examines the intersectional stigma, discrimination, and risk communication that LGBTQ+ communities experienced during the COVID outbreak. Implications for public health are discussed.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • Newly Paul, University of North Texas • Framing analysis of the Indian media’s coverage of Section 377, decriminalization of same sex relationships • On September 6, 2018, the Supreme Court of India ruled unanimously to overturn Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code which was introduced in 1861 in British-ruled India and criminalized consensual homosexual sex between adults. This paper examines the major frames that emerged from the Indian media’s coverage of the court’s decision. Specifically, I examine the main frames that were used to discuss the event, the sources quoted most prominently in the stories, and the prominence given to the issue in the media.
Research Paper • Faculty • Joseph Schwartz; Josh Grimm • Investigating the Content of #U = U on Twitter • Undetectable = Untransmittable (U = U) is the scientific fact that HIV cannot be transmitted when an individual is virally suppressed. This breakthrough discovery has the potential to greatly reduce HIV stigma and its negative effects. However, U = U is not widely known. Given that Twitter has the potential to raise awareness of health issues, the purpose of this study was to analyze the content of the #U = U on Twitter. The results showed that mentioning sex and mentioning love were strong predictors that a tweet would be liked and retweeted. This information could help to spread the message of U = U more widely and potentially lessen HIV stigma.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • YOWEI KANG, NTOU; KENNETH C.C. YANG, UTEP • [EXTENDED ABSTRACT] A Computational and Longitudinal Text Mining Study of Gay Marriage Legalization in Taiwan • Homosexuality and gay marriage have been considered a taboo topic in Taiwan where LGBTQIA+ minorities are marginalized. Despite the landmark ruling by Taiwan’s Constitutional Court in May 2017, the legalization of gay marriage is claimed to polarize its society. On May 17, 2019, Taiwan’s Parliament passed the law to legalize gay marriage. This computational text mining study provides a descriptive and longitudinal examination of media framing of gay marriage legalization in Taiwan. Our preliminary findings of 232 media discourses from Lexis/Nexis database (Nexis Uni). We reported statistically significant topical framing variations among all nine extracted topics before and after the landmark passage of marriage bill on May 17, 2019. Discussions and implications are provided.
Graduate Student Interest Group
2022 Abstracts
Research Paper • Student • Julie Aromi, Rutgers University School of Communication and Information • Race on the debate stage: Senators Booker and Harris’s discussions of Blackness in Democratic primary debates • Senators Kamala Harris and Cory Booker both frequently discussed their experiences as Black Americans during the Democratic primary debates throughout 2019. Both Senators acknowledge the ways Black voters are often used as a tool to elect white Democrats, and use their personal experience to establish solidarity with Black audiences. This textual analysis of the Senators’ remarks about race throughout the debates, focuses on how each talks about their own racialized experiences, and the narratives they construct about who they are as Black politicians, advocates, and Americans.
Research Paper • Student Member • Diane Ezeh Aruah, University of Florida • Struggling to fit in: Understanding difficulties faced by African international graduate students in a Predominant White Institution (PWI) in the United States • Every year, thousands of African students apply to graduate programs in the United States with the hope of experiencing quality and standard education unobtainable in their home countries. However, difficulties encountered by African students while settling into the educational system in the United States can impact their pursuit of the “American dream”. This article examines these difficulties using a qualitative phenomenological study of African graduate students in a predominantly white institution in the U.S. In-depth interview was used to collect data from 16 Ph.D. and master’s students. The students encountered inter-personal-based, community-based, and institutional-based difficulties, which often led to feelings of isolation, depression, and low self-esteem. The students managed their difficulties through online and offline support, as well as self-developed skills. Predominantly white institutions in the United States must include the needs of African international students in their recruitment, orientation, and mental health support programs.
Research Paper • Student • Laura Canuelas-Torres • Young Activists or Misguided Children? American Adults’ Perceptions on The March for Our Lives Teen Activists • The efforts of young people to advance gun control measures media coverage from all across the political spectrum. The current project used Q Methodology to further understand American adults’ perception of these activists. Results indicate that three camps emerged: those who recognized the teens as activist, those who see them as mislead and confused and those who see their efforts as the result of adolescent naivety. Relationships with media consumption are discussed.
Research Paper • Student • Sera Choi • The Use of Non-Verbal Cues to Express Apology and User Perception on Influencers’ Apology • This qualitative study examines how YouTube influencers use non-verbal cues in their apology videos and how users perceived these non-verbal cues displayed in the videos. This study utilized facial expressions via different arrangements of upper and lower facial structures, body and hand gestures, and speech rate to analyze how influencers used non-verbal cues. The study observed four different themes of users’ perceptions of non-verbal cues used in apology videos (i.e., sincere, fake, aggressive, and disappointed).
Extended Abstract • Student • Carl Ciccarelli, The University of South Carolina • A critical qualitative analysis of response framing of the COVID-19 pandemic across higher education. • The present study is timely and aims to employ a mixed method research design to extract meaningful insights to inform future practices in higher education through studying responses from a sample of five large public universities located in the southeast United States. This analysis will include in-depth interviews, content analysis of statistical COVID-19 dashboard data for each university, and a textual analysis of the framing and tone of response statements disseminated by each university.
Research Paper • Student • Nina Gayleard • Audience Member Twitter Discussion About Netflix’s Unbelievable (2019) • This research focused on themes amongst audience member discussions of crime entertainment media by examining tweets about Netflix’s Unbelievable (2019). The research aimed to identify major themes amongst audience discussions and see how those themes compared to current themes in crime entertainment media texts. The themes that appeared in the tweets reflected those in Unbelievable (2019) and those currently found within crime entertainment media texts, indicating that audience members actively discerned and discussed relevant themes.
Research Paper • Student • Lingshu Hu • Boosting Texts: Improving Text Classification Performance on Small-Sized, Imbalanced Datasets • Communication scholars, who traditionally focus on text messages, can benefit from adopting recently developed machine learning algorithms on text classification. This study introduced three methods—boosting, SMOTE, and Bert embedding—and tested their performance on small-sized, imbalanced datasets. Results show that SMOTE effectively increases the accuracy of classifying the minority class; Bert embedding can enhance the overall testing accuracy but may not improve minority class recognition; Boosting did not work well with text classification tasks.
Research Paper • Student • Shudan Huang, University of South Carolina; Max Bretscher, University of South Carolina • Motivation to Purchase Organic Foods, Message Clarity, and Information Processing from a Heuristic-Systematic Perspective • This study utilized a construal frame manipulation of an organic product and applied a heuristic-systematic model (HSM) as the theoretical foundation for testing people’s attitude, the brand, and purchase intention of the organic product with different levels of involvement and skepticism. The finding revealed that skepticism will have negative effects on participants’ cognition and acceptance of organic food. And frames were found to be a significant predictor of ad attitude, brand attitude, and purchase intention.
Research Paper • Student • Jeff Hunter, Texas Tech University; Koji Yoshimura • Are there Partisan Differences in the Moral Framing of News? • “Abstract
This study investigated the relationship between moral framing of news media headlines
and the political ideology of the source using moral foundations theory and the model of intuitive
morality and exemplars (MIME). A content analysis assessed the moral framing of 1,100 news
headlines sampled from major news sources. Results indicated that moral foundation framing did
not differ according to the political ideology of the news source, but framing was associated with
the issues examined.”
Research Paper • Student • Yanru Jiang, University of California, Los Angeles • Understanding Triggers of Problematic Internet Uses in Casual Mobile Game Designs • There is evidence that players can become addicted to casual mobile games. This study identified seven elements that are frequently adopted in casual mobile game designs and could trigger game addictions. The study used a seven-item game addiction scale (GAS) to access the addiction level of casual mobile gamers. Adverse effects on addicted players, such as being isolated from social contacts, neglecting important activities, and undermining psychological conditions, were identified through the GAS.
Research Paper • Student • Sarah Johnson • Credibility from the Source: Comparing traditional celebrity endorsers with YouTube endorsers • This study examines the relationship between an endorser’s expertise, trustworthiness, and brand attitude using Source Credibility Theory, by looking at traditional celebrity and YouTube endorsers. A representational survey of the U.S. adult population was used. The research model was analyzed using mediation analysis; the results were determined to have significant direct and indirect effects. Based on the results, there was a slight increase in the strength of the mediator on brand attitude for YouTube endorsers.
Research Paper • Student • URSULA KAMANGA • Assessing the Implications of Cervical Cancer Information Sources and its Barriers Among Latinas • Cervical cancer is preventable, yet screening levels remain low among Latinas, contributing to a 40% mortality rate in the U.S. Health information-seeking behavior among this population remains low. Few studies have assessed channels used while investigating perceived uncertainty for health information-seeking among Latinas. This case study will test the Theory of Planned Behavior through semi-structured interviews to understand the health information-seeking behavior among Latinas and where new channels could be made to assist them.
Research Paper • Student • hakan karaaytu • Independent Journalists Reporting on Political Issues in Turkey, using Traditional and New Media • In this study, while the role and journalistic ideal imputed to the media in contemporary democracies are considered, the changes in the Turkish media sector, which have been structurally transformed since 1980, and the reflections of this change on the identity of the journalists are revealed. As the historical process of the media structure that has been transformed is described, the effects of the experiences in relationship between media and politics on the journalistic profession are illustrated with concrete examples. The research paper consists of interviews with 10 people who are selected from journalism academics and press-journalists in the profession.
Extended Abstract • Student • Yihan Li, School of Journalism and Communication, The Chinese University of Hong Kong • Health code for datafied mobilities in China: Framing of datafication, algorithmic governance and dataism ideology • This research adopts critical discourse analysis to analyze the construction of health code discourse by Chinese governments and its social consequences. This research finds the frame of the health code as an objective tool for orderly mobilities, which is produced by the hierarchical relation between the state and local governments. And this discourse contributes to the emerging of a new mode of algorithmic governance and a dataism ideology with some doubtful assumptions.
Research Paper • Student • Paige Nankey; Rhea Maze • Social Media and Marine Plastic Pollution: A Study of Social Media Messaging on Engagement • This 2 (emotional appeal: hope vs. guilt) x 2 (call-to-action (CTA): presence vs. absence) between-subjects experiment randomly exposed 76 college students to one of four Instagram-type messages about marine plastic pollution: Guilt with no CTA (N = 18), guilt with CTA (N = 20), hope with no CTA (N = 19), or hope with CTA (N = 19). The results were not significant but revealed an interesting interaction pattern when combining hope appeals with CTA’s.
Extended Abstract • Student • Victoria McDermott; Drew T. Ashby-King, University of Maryland • Extended Examining Institutional and Instructional Support of Communication Graduate Students Academic and Social Needs During COVID-19 • Rhetorical and relational goal theory posits that students have academic and relational needs in the classroom that need to be met to facilitate student success. By conducting focus groups with communication graduate students, this study explored how institutional/departmental and instructor communication met students’ needs during the COVID-19 pandemic. We suggest that rhetorical and relational goals are intertwined concepts that contribute to supporting students’ academic and relational needs and success.
Research Paper • Student • Adriana Mucedola, Syracuse University • Royal baby boom: How British tabloids covered Kate Middleton and Meghan Markle’s pregnancies • This study used an intersectional approach to understand how media coverage during Kate Middleton and Meghan Markle’s first pregnancies differed from one another. A content analysis that coded 240 British tabloid articles revealed that Markle received a greater amount of press negativity and negative weight-related attitudes, while Middleton’s body was objectified to a greater extent. Findings suggest that media continue to objectify women in different ways depending on their identities, and reinforce the thin ideal.
Research Paper • Student • Christina Myers • Toward a Conceptual Model of Implicit Racial Bias and Representation of African Americans in Media • “The purpose of this paper is to propose a conceptual model to explain how societal, cultural and historical circumstances contribute to the creation of meaning assigned by content creators and its subsequent understanding, particularly as it relates to the media’s portrayal of African Americans. The author suggests implicit racial bias, stereotypes and ideology, which are shaped by the historical, cultural and societal influences of content creators, allow for inherently prejudiced belief systems to be disseminated and reinforced by mass media. To the author’s knowledge, there is a paucity in mass communication literature that seeks to explain the cognitive processes involved in content creation by members of mass media.
Keywords: Implicit Racial Bias, Ideology, Stereotypes, Black representation, mass media”
Extended Abstract • Student • Nhung Nguyen, University of Kansas • Strangers helping strangers in a strange land: Vietnamese immigrant mothers and expecting mothers in the USA use social media to navigate health acculturation • Drawing from acculturation, this study analyzes 18 in-depth interviews with immigrant Vietnamese mothers and pregnant women in the United States on the role of online social support through Facebook on their pregnancy and motherhood in a strange land. Findings show that immigrant mothers seek out both informational and emotional supports. “Bonding” levels are low and unlikely to transcend into real-life friendships. Social media, however, allows community members to develop and thrive during enculturation.
Extended Abstract • Student • Jeffry Oktavianus, City University of Hong Kong; Yanqing Sun; Fangcao Lu • Extended The episodes of health crisis information response process among migrant domestic workers during COVID-19 pandemic • Guided by Crisis Response Communication Model (CRCM), this study examined how Indonesian migrant domestic workers in Hong Kong digested and responded to health crisis information amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Through in-depth interviews involving 32 workers, this study discovered that the participants went through four stages of crisis response process, including observation (i.e., information gathering), interpretation (i.e., filtering information and verification), choice (i.e., adopting adaptive and maladaptive preventive measures), and dissemination (i.e., information sharing).
Research Paper • Student • Runlei Ren; Xinyu Dai; Mengyuan Wei • The Impact of Internet on Public Trust in Government: Assessing the Mediating Effect of Subjective Social Justice • Over the past decade, public trust in the government (PTG) in developed countries has continued to decline. At the same time, the rapid development of the Internet has changed people’s perceptions. The decline of PTG will pose a challenge to government governance. Given the coexistence of the decline in PTG and the gradual popularization of the Internet, can the Internet explain or partially explain the fluctuations in PTG among citizens? Previous research pointed out that the negative effects may play a leading role. However, existing literature ignores that the relationship between Internet use and public trust in government (PTG) can be mediated by contextual variables such as perceived social justice. Thus, this study uses the 2018 Chinese Social Survey (CSS 2018) and household survey datasets in 2015 (CGSS 2015) to explore the influence of internet usage on PTG and its mechanism. Multivariate regressions and instrumental variable estimates support that: Besides playing a negative role directly (β=-0.0467, t=-3.0304, p<0.001), the internet can also affect PTG by polluting subjective social justice. Diverse applications of the internet have different effects on PTG. From the perspective of different government levels, it conforms to the characteristics of differential trust in government. This conclusion provides a reference for the governance of Internet public opinion. The department of management could treat the Internet as a platform to carry out effective communication between the government and the public to improve political trust.
Extended Abstract • Student • Zoey Rosen, Colorado State University; Channing Bice, Colorado State University; Stephanie Scott, Colorado State University • Extended [Visualizing the Invisible: Visual-Based Design and Efficacy in Air Quality Messaging] • This study examines the effect of efficacy and visual design for messaging for air quality. The following study is a 2 (efficacy: high vs. low) × 2 (message design: visual vs. text) between-subjects experimental design, assessing the effects of these variables on students’ visual comprehension, source credibility, self-efficacy, and protective behavioral intention. Hypotheses were partially supported, finding that there were some statistically significant effects for efficacy and message design on the variables of interest.
Extended Abstract • Student • Andrea Smith, Syracuse University; Adriana Mucedola, Syracuse University; Jian Shi, Syracuse University • Partisan Pride: How Cross-Exposure to Partisan News and Emotions Toward Trump Leads to Civic Engagement • The purpose of this study was to examine the link between consuming either liberal or conservative media, partisans’ emotional reactions to news about Donald Trump, and their level of participation in civic engagement. A sample of U.S. adults (n=813) completed the relevant measures in an online survey. Results indicated that when participants consumed counter-attitudinal media, they experienced negative emotional reactions to news about Donald Trump, which in turn, led them to become more civically engaged.
Research Paper • Student • Courtney Tabor, University of Oregon • “What a 13-year old girl looks like”: A feminist analysis of To Catch a Predator • This paper examines three key episodes of early-2000s sensation To Catch a Predator and situates them within crime media and journalism literature. Based on the analysis, To Catch a Predator represents the apex of crime media as demonstrated by the treatment of women and girls as bait, claims of ownership over women and girls’ bodies, lack of nuance in reporting, and the liberties taken in their journalistic practices.
Research Paper • Student • Jingyue Tao • The Influence of Message and Audio Modalities in Augmented Reality Mobile Advertisements on Consumers’ Purchase Intention • Evidence shows that AR technology is an effective advertising approach to raise a brand’s awareness, so many big brands implement AR into their marketing strategy. However, the effectiveness of AR mobile advertisements on consumers’ purchase intentions remains unclear. To fill this dearth in the literature, this study examined how message and audio modalities of AR mobile advertisements influenced consumers’ purchase intentions through an experiment. Based on the uses and gratifications perspective, this online experiment manipulated the message type (emotional/factual) and audio-verbal appeal (present/absent) of AR advertisements to investigate their impact on consumers’ attitudes towards buying a watch. The results showed that audio-verbal appeal played a salient role in the emotional message to positively influence consumers’ perceived entertaining gratification and intention to buy the watch. However, the audio-verbal emotional message negatively influenced consumers’ purchase intention and did not influence their perceived information gratification. Future research should test other multimedia such as images, video, or animations to better understand the interaction effect between AR mobile advertisements and consumers’ purchase intentions.
Research Paper • Student • Taylor Thompson • Trust in media in the era of fake news • This study explores how political ideologies, media bias, and media credibility affect trust in the media. This research uses an ATP survey from Pew Research Center. The analysis found that people who identify as Democrats have a significantly higher trust in the media, and think the media is doing their job well and effectively. Republicans were less trustful of the media, which suggests a problematic relationship between the media and people who identify as Republicans.
Research Paper • Student • Yue Wang, University of Leuven • Why are smartphones a thief who steals time? An Empirical Study of Smartphone Dependence in China • With the rapid spread of smartphones worldwide, the negative effects of overuse and dependence on smartphones have attracted more and more public attention. To explore how people’s psychological motivations affect smartphone dependence, this research expands the motivation of media-system dependence and adds two psychological characteristics of loneliness and FoMO. The results showed that “recreation”, “orientation”, “loneliness” and “FoMO” had significant impacts on smartphone use, while “understanding” did not have a direct effect on smartphone dependency.This survey provides important information for academicians concerning smartphone dependency, which is still rarely explored in China.
Research Paper • Student • Tian Xinhe • Research on Online Social Support Related to Gender Issues from the Perspective of Communication-An empirical analysis based on Zhihu, an online question-and-answer community in China.docx • The COVID-19 outbreak in early 2020 has highlighted the importance of social caring, and the related gender issues have attracted more attention online. This paper studies the posts related to the “sanitary napkins in loose packing” in Zhihu Community, and examines the impact of online social support on gender issues, from the perspective of communication and through social network analysis, content analysis and text analysis. Findings: Users have not developed a tight social network, but the Matthew effect is significant; online social support strengthens connections between users on gender issues; “otherization” for female is found users in agenda setting; intensified online gender contradiction reflects the polarization effect of network. Misogyny is found in China’s male-oriented online society. On this basis, the paper argues that gender inequality is an objective, deep-rooted existence in Chinese society, and that gender antagonism is becoming increasingly prominent in China’s online society. In the long run, however, we should avoid grafting gender contradictions into class contradictions, with efforts made to coordinate gender relations and seek equal rights for men and women.
Research Paper • Student • Wanjiang Zhang; Jiayu Qu; Jingjing Yi, School of Journalism and Communication, Chinese University of Hong Kong • Stripped from society abruptly: Effects of physical social isolation on people’s emotional expression and well-being • The study employed a quasi-experiment with 1,398 users’ 1,376,718 posts on Weibo. Three computational methods (SA, ITS, STM) were used to investigate the influences of physical social isolation on people’s emotional well-being during the quarantine. Results showed that quarantine brought a sharp fall in people’s emotions immediately without sustained effects. STM-generated topics implied social media’s role in fulfilling three psychological needs. Heavy Weibo users expressed more positively, whereas light users expressed negatively.
Visual Communication Division
2022 Abstracts
Research Paper • Student • Crisis Management in this Visual Era: How People Perceive a Crisis-hit Brand Through News Media Pictures • Mohammad Ali, Syracuse University; Dennis Kinsey, Syracuse University • Visuals in a crisis phenomenon remain largely understudied. This paper analyzes the post-crisis pictures relating to the 2020 Mauritius oil-spill incident. Utilizing Q Methodology, designed to understand people’s subjective perceptions, we identify at least two groups of people who had variant perceptions of recognizing various pictures as (un)forgiving of this crisis-hit Japanese company. The Attribution Theory is used to explain what pictures are more likely to shift people’s perceived crisis responsibility attributions toward the company.
Research Paper • Student • Video [Dis]Convergence and Discernable Logocentrism: Visual Journalists’ Experience during Video Implementation • Christopher T. Assaf, UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT AUSTIN • This project examines visual journalists’ experience with legacy print leaders’ logocentrism during video platform implementation. Recognizing video’s potential as a digital-disruption solution, with prospects for increasing revenue and reaching new audiences, organizational leaders chose individual photojournalists for still and video platform convergence. Adhering to a word-centric ideology, leadership underestimated guidance, communication, and knowledge factors, creating uncertainty and slowing adoption. Collected through 14 interviews with visual journalists and viewed through Rogers’ (2003) diffusion of innovations theory.
Extended Abstract • Student • Extended abstract – From “Betty, la fea” to “Betty in NY” – the impact of digital storytelling on telenovelas • Alejandro Bruna, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile • This work investigates whether digital narrative (or “digital storytelling”) affects visual language and structure of Latin America’s most relevant television product: telenovelas. Using the most successful telenovela in television history (Ugly Betty) two versions were analyzed at a dramatic and narrative level: the original Colombian version (Yo soy Betty, la fea) and its most recent adaptation (Betty in NY). Findings show that digital narrative influences the melodramatic matrix of telenovelas, themes, motivations, plot and situations.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • Extended Abstract: Cognitive and Attitudinal Processing of Visual Frames in 360-Degree Environmental Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Messages • Sungwon Chung, Ball State University; Johnny Sparks, Ball State University • This experiment examined the influence of visual content frames (gain vs. loss) and presentation modality (non-360 vs. 360-degree videos) on cognitive and attitudinal processing of environmental corporate social responsibility (eCSR) messages on viewers’ memory and attitudes. Frame and modality influenced storage (cued recall) of company names, but only modality influenced encoding (recognition) of company names. However, neither frame nor modality affected encoding of company logos. Content frame also impacted perceived message effectiveness.
Extended Abstract • Student • Visualizing criminal jury trials: A quantitative content analysis of images in U.S. news outlets • Umberto Famulari, Indiana University Bloomington; Lesa Hatley Major; Osman Mohamed Osman • “This study will contribute to the scholarship of visual framing and journalism by analyzing for the first time how U.S. news outlets visually represented criminal jury trials in the last eighty years. Drawing from visual framing theory (Coleman, 2010; Bock, 2020), the images that accompanied all the news stories about criminal jury trials from 1940 to 2020 were analyzed at the denotative and stylistic level (Rodriguez and Dimitrova, 2011).
Preliminary findings showed differences between different types of news outlets (national U.S. televisions, cable news, local news outlets and newspapers) in relation to how defendants, victims and jurors were portrayed in terms of gender, race, emotions and camera distance used. Implications of the study were discussed and analyzed.”
Research Paper • Faculty • Paradise or propaganda? Jack Delano’s FSA images of public housing in Chicago • Robin Hoecker, DePaul University • This study looks at Jack Delano’s 1942 photographs of the Ida B. Wells homes in Chicago, and how they shaped narratives of public housing and wartime propaganda. Delano’s photographs show well-dressed Black families in immaculate, furnished apartments, with structured community programs. These images are part of the U.S. government-sponsored photography project of the Farm Security Administration, later Office of War Information, that documented life among working class Americans between 1935-1944.
Research Paper • Student • Revealing the Veil in Internet Memes and GIFs: A Comparative Framing and Stereotyping Analysis • Omneya Ibrahim, The University of Texas at Austin; Shahira Fahmy, The American University in Cairo • This study bridges a gap in visual communication research based on an integrative framing analysis of internet memes and GIFs using the hashtag #Hijab following the 2019 attacks on Muslim mosques in New Zealand. We analyzed both the textual and visual elements used in these digital tools to unravel their framing and stereotyping of veil. While significant differences between memes and GIFs existed, both tools displayed support for the hijab, revealing clear patterns regarding a new progressive image of hijabi women in the contemporary digital environment. Findings show that memes and GIFs challenge the traditional stereotyping and submissive image of Muslim women that has long been portrayed in media. They also suggest that memes and GIFs are each unique and, although sometimes regarded as one by scholars, ought to be evaluated and examined separately and independently from each another in future research.
Research Paper • Faculty • Crisis of Cosmopolitan Citizenship in Hong Sang-soo’s Films • Jin Kim, The College of Saint Rose • Drawing on complex narrative as a heuristic tool, this study aims to provide one reading about narrative structure of Korean director Hong Sang-soo’s films. While his movies seemingly lack logic and coherency, the Korean auteur creates a unique sense of meaningless, intuition, and fragile memory in his movies. Examining similarities and differences among his 2017 and 2018 movies (The Day After, Grass, Hotel By The River, and Claire’s Camera), one of the major arguments of this study is that Hong’s film narratives consist of repetition, fragmentation, looped causalities, lucid subjectivities and, multiple universes. While Hong might defy ideological-social analysis of his films, one of the major arguments in this study is that is resistance against spatial-temporal linearity and narrative consistency is symptomatic to understand crisis of citizenship within global pandemic and political turmoil.
Extended Abstract • Student • Truly Korean? A Quantitative Study of Film Style Under a Colonial System • William Kohler, Southern Illinois University; Yuhosua Ryoo, Southern Illinois University • Was Korean cinema identical to or distinct from Japanese cinema in its use of film techniques during the colonial period? Using a statistical style analysis, we demonstrated that the two are different in every stylistic category, including sound, cinematography, editing, and mise-en-scene. We concluded that Korean films retained their own film style and identity under colonization and should be considered just as truly Korean as films from any other period.
Extended Abstract • Student • A powerful, spiritual, win-win situation: Commercial authenticity in professional birth photography • Anat Leshnick, University of Colorado boulder; Rivka Ribak • Online repositories of professional birth photography present a radical alternative to the medicalized depiction of birth in commercial reality programs. Arguably, birth photographers allow women to see birth and learn about it, document it from their own perspective, and share this personally significant event in the public sphere. However, these images are produced and consumed within a market economy in which notions of resistance – and compliance – appear naïve (Banet-Weiser, 2012). From this perspective, rather than medicalized as opposed to natural, and rather than passive as opposed to resistant, we propose to see birth photography as a site of commercial authenticity, in which birth photographers and birthing women co-produce a neoliberal birth story that is at once liberating and cynical. Drawing on interviews with nine birth photographers and nine women who hired photographers to document their birth, we explore the ways in which these artisans develop professional and aesthetic practices that distinguish them from others in the delivery room, highlighting the complicated ways in which authenticity is created and sold in contemporary cultural production.
Research Paper • Student • Constructing Love: Visual Representation of Blackness in the Obama Marriage • Ajia Meux, University of Oklahoma • A content analysis of 346 images was employed to study differences in racial presentations of Barack and Michelle Obama between the White House and African American media. The literature on symbolic interactionism, presidential and first lady presentation, African marriage, minority media, framing and visual representation suggested that there would be differences by medium in portrayals of the president and first lady on racial variables (egalitarianism, marital affection, racialist, ethnic/cultural, kinship, political). Findings indicate that, across White House and African American media, the couple were often presented as egalitarian and affectionate. Statistical testing indicate that African American media were significantly more likely to depict Michelle Obama with racialist elements and the Obamas as a happy and affectionate married couple than the White House. A contradictory finding indicated that the White House was significantly more likely to focus on the extended family bonds of African Americans by depicting the Obamas in the presence of other black people. This study is important because the Obamas are the first ethnic minority to hold the offices of president and first lady of the United States, and this study is the first to explore the two as an African American married couple. Findings extends research on how minority media help construct reality for their audiences and have implications for new White House image management strategies of presidents and first ladies.
Research Paper • Faculty • A Winning Combination: Effects of Visual Frames in Solutions Journalism Stories • Danielle Kilgo, University of Minnesota; Robert F. Potter; Ryan Comfort, Indiana University • Solutions journalism approaches in recent years have tried to combat pessimistic and avoidant responses in audiences by producing stories about social issues that also focus on attempts to solve the problems. Although scholarship on visuals in solutions journalism has lagged behind research about text, some studies have shown that visual framing emphasizing solutions leads to higher levels of narrative engagement and behavioral intentions (Dahmen, Their & Walth, 2019) and lower levels of negative affect (McIntyre, Lough & Manzanares, 2018) than visual framing emphasizing problems. This study adds to theory about visual frames in solutions journalism with an online 2 (story topic: drug addiction, homelessness) x 4 (visual frame condition: no photo, solutions only, problems only, combination) mixed design experiment that investigated the question of what visual frame might arouse the ideal mix of affective responses to leave people concerned and interested in solutions journalism stories. The results have implications for visual communication theory and for photojournalism practice.
Research Paper • Faculty • Frames and Journalistic Roles in Chinese Reporting on HIV: Insights from a Content Analysis and Qualitative Interviews Focused on the Verbal and Visual Modalities • Chunbo Ren, Central Michigan University; Viorela Dan • Extant work largely neglects visuals’ contribution to news framing and how journalists perform their professional roles. We address this research gap in two studies, and use HIV reporting in China as a test case. Study 1, a content analysis in seven newspapers (2000-2015), shed light on how words and visuals suggest different frames and journalistic roles. Study 2 used in-depth interviews with journalists to contextualize the findings in Study 1, especially on the word-visuals rapport.
Research Paper • Student • Cross-Platform Visual Framing: Climate Visuals on News Websites and Twitter • Yimeng Sun, New York University; Hiu Yan Ping; Lei Guo; Boqi Chen, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; David Assefa Tofu • To examine how the U.S. news media visually frame climate change, the study investigates how news media of different political orientations frame the issue differently across media platforms. We used content analysis to analyze 761 images covering climate change from news websites and Twitter. The results show that major U.S. news media of different political orientations used different visual elements to frame the issue, including various image types and image subjects.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • What “Lens-Based Workers” Are Owed: An Exploration of the Photo Bill of Rights • Keith Greenwood; Ryan Thomas; Cory Macneil • This study will examine the Photo Bill of Rights, a recent initiative that centers the rights of “lens-based workers” and which presents an opportunity to evaluate the position of photojournalism within an evolving society. Through a textual analysis of the Bill’s contents, and a comparison with traditional ethical codes, the paper argues that the Bill represents a challenge to existing frameworks about what journalists owe the public by focusing on what journalists are themselves owed.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • Extended Abstract: Ye Olde Europa Gin Mill: How war looked in isolationist cartoons of 1941 • Darryl Frazier; Fred Vultee, Wayne State University • This paper uses fantasy theme analysis to examine the rhetorical vision created by cartoonists for three major isolationist newspapers in the months leading up to US entry in the Second World War. These cartoons draw on both indexical and allusive properties to challenge or reinforce interpretations of current events, whether it is Uncle Sam stumbling toward a fight in someone else’s bar or a brave Charles Lindbergh landing at an unfriendly field.
Research Paper • Student • Multimodal Analysis: Researching Short-form Videos and the Theatrical Practices • Yiting Wang, University of Hawai’i at Mānoa • “Short-form video is one of the major approaches for people to present themselves on visual social media, such as TikTok. What is behind this type of visual communication? With the emerging field of social media and performance studies, can theatrical or performative discourse make sense of the video data? What would be a good method to study user-generated short-form videos (UGSVs)?
Digital living is performative, and theater is often integrated with social or political practices. This paper uses multimodal analysis for video analysis and draws concepts and practices from Chinese and western theater. Building on three theories (situation, suspense, and mimesis) in which the ontology of theater is often discussed, this paper demonstrates the modes and modalities of five videos originating from TikTok. The preliminary findings suggest three types of suspense and three types of mimesis practices that respectively answer how attention of audiences is retained, and how and why videos are reproduced and disseminated. We argue that imitation as a phenomenon and as a process can generate memes, and memes in turn invites more imitation. The crux at the back are the video practices that ridicule and critique, when different levels of resistance to politics, authority, or societal classes are shown.
Video analysis, under today’s ubiquitous visual data, requires robust updates. In addition to the contribution of a performative and theatrical perspective for the sense-making of short-form videos, this paper also contributes to the methods of video analysis in general and video analysis by using modes and multimodalities.”
Extended Abstract • Student • Extended abstract: [Multifaceted protest paradigm: the visual coverage of the 2019 Hong Kong protests in international news] • Frankie Ho Chun Wong • This study probed into the intersection between the protest paradigm and influence from national interests in news images, crucial in nonverbal news framing, in international news. International outlets’ visuals in reporting an iconic episode in the 2019 Hong Kong protests were comparatively investigated through framing and critical discourse analysis. Results suggest visual news frames consisted of spectacles but not explaining underlying causes, yet showing a between-outlet variance where frames reflected outlets’ political values at home.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • That’s a Good Sign: The Typography and Design of Political Yard Signs • Shannon Zenner, Elon University • Most political communication researchers have focused on the textual content of political messaging, while ignoring how that same text is conveyed visually. This study is a content analysis of yard signs (n=151) posted in North Carolina during the November 2019 and March 2020 elections and the typography and colors used in those yard signs. Preliminary analysis indicates an overall preference for sans serif, all “caps” treatments but with some compelling differences by political party.
Political Communication Division
2022 Abstracts
Research Paper • Faculty • Engaging with vilifying stereotypes: The role of algorithmic use in perpetuating misinformation about Muslim congresswomen • Saifuddin Ahmed; Teresa Gil-Lopez • We examine the role of algorithmic use in believing and sharing misinformation about US Muslim congresswomen. Analysis of survey data suggests that those with more frequent algorithmic use and lower cognitive ability were more likely to believe and share misinformation. Those high on nationalism and prejudice against Muslims were also likely to believe misinformation. Most importantly, higher algorithmic use tends to strengthen such beliefs. The study highlights the role of algorithms in perpetuating misinformation.
Extended Abstract • Student • Iran and the U.S. Elections: Building an Agenda of Anxiety and Concern • Osama Albishri, University of Florida; Ghada Alwaily, University of Leicester; Ahmed Alqarni, Virginia Commonwealth University; Wyne Wanta • This study investigates the relationship among political candidates’ messages, news coverage, and congressional legislation regarding Iran’s related issues during four U.S. presidential elections between 2004 and 2020. A dictionary-based approach and sentiment analysis were conducted to explore the three levels of agenda-building. The preliminary analysis shows that U.S. interests in the Middle East was the most salient issues for media and Congress, while Iran’s nuclear program was the most emphasized issue in the presidential debates.
Research Paper • Student • To share or not to share? Political actors and the spread of political misinformation on Twitter • Shola Aromona, University of Kansas • The continued interest in misinformation remains unarguably relevant, given the political climate not just in the US but all around the world. In a post-truth era, social media has not only been used to spread information that are untrue, but it has also been used to counter false narratives. Also, the connectedness of the world makes information travel faster and social networks and social media play a role in how misinformation is spread. Nowadays, it is easier for information to be shared within one’s close social networks which usually consist of friends and family, especially if the information originated from someone in that network. However, little is known about other potential sources of misinformation, such as political elites, who are not necessarily one’s friends or family and who do not belong in one’s close social network, but who are opinion leaders and are influential in the information that an individual consumes on social media. This pilot study used an online experiment to investigate individuals’ likelihood to spread political misinformation based on whether a political leader or non-political leader is the initiator of the [mis]information. By looking at the political attribute of a misinformation initiator, this study contributes to scholarship on misinformation as it extends our knowledge on how misinformation is diffused on social media.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • Polarization, Emotion and Race in Social Media: Innovative Methodologies and Challenges of Affective Discourse Analysis • megan boler, University of Toronto • In the context of the so-called “post-truth” crisis, emotions have resoundingly replaced facts in our fast-moving, affectively-driven internet-based culture. Scholars are challenged to develop innovative methods for studying emotion and affect within studies of popular culture, social media, and political communications. This talk presents methodological innovation and research findings from our cross-platform digital ethnography of social media from Twitter, Gab, and Facebook, and qualitative discourse analysis of 1800 social media posts related to Black Lives Matter and the Capitol Riots. Our work provides a significant contribution to a nascent field of studies by specifically engaging an interdisciplinary theoretical framework that includes affect theory or politics of emotion alongside qualitative research of social media.
Research Paper • Faculty • The 2016 presidential election coverage: Use of Twitter as a source and the media framing of the race • Porismita Borah; Rico Neumann • Informed by gatekeeping, agenda-setting, and framing theory, the main purposes of this paper are to examine (1) the use of Twitter as a source in the media coverage, and (2) the media content of that coverage to better understand how they framed those stories, and if there was any relationship between the two. Findings show that compared to Clinton, Trump’s Twitter posts got more attention, and the media coverage continue to be more strategically framed.
Research Paper • • “Strong enough to battle the liberals”: How social identity solidified White evangelical Christian women’s support of Donald J. Trump and sustained their distrust of news outlets • Gayle Jansen Brisbane • This research examines White evangelical Christian women’s social/religious identity and how this distinctiveness influences their political standpoints, voting behaviors, and opinions of perceived out-groups, including news outlets. While appreciating that numerous theoretical aspects are at play in this complex subject matter, an analysis of social/religious identity can provide focal insight and understanding when deliberating Christianity, politics, gender and the media in reference to the nature of evangelical Christian women’s support of Donald J. Trump as the United States President.This qualitative study employed focus groups and semi-structured in-depth interviews with evangelical Christian women. The participants in this study consider their religious identity as such a vital aspect of their character, it motivates their viewpoints in numerous aspects of their lives, including individual motivations, group stimuli and political impulses. Consequently, how they construct their religious identity, as well as how and why they react to in-group threats is a focal element for this exploration.
Research Paper • Faculty • The Anxiety Factor: Moral Traditionalism, Interpersonal Contact Diversity and Support for Transgender Candidates and Rights • Xiaoxia Cao, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee; Atinc Gurcay, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee • An online survey was conducted to investigate what influence public support for transgender candidates and rights. It found that moral traditionalism was negatively associated with support for transgender candidates and rights. The diversity of interpersonal contact with transgender individuals not only was positively related to the support but undermined the negative relationships between moral traditionalism and the support. More importantly, the study showed that anxiety toward transgender people mediated all the relationships observed here.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • (Extended Abstract) The Contagion of Political Incivility in Response to Donald Trump’s Election Campaign Videos on YouTube • Yingying Chen, University of South Carolina • This study examines what factors predict the contagion of political incivility in response to a highly polarized political campaign video on Donald Trump’s official YouTube channel. It perceived incivility as a behavioral contagion process and examined the formation and the evolution of incivility in YouTube comments. I used dynamic network analysis to track the temporal changes in the uncivil comments from the most controversial presidential election campaign video on Donald Trump’s official YouTube page. The study contributes to the current literature by understanding what explains online political incivility. Findings also provide implication to the platform intervention to the spread of uncivil behavior.
Research Paper • Faculty • When exposure to fake news and fact-checking promote fake news sharing: The moderating role of partisan strength and need to evaluate • Hsuan-Ting Chen, Chinese University of Hong Kong; Wai Yin, Ivy Fong • Using data from a panel survey, this study examines the extent to which exposure to fake news and fact-checking lead to fake news sharing and investigates the moderating roles of partisan strength and need to evaluate that represent motivated reasoning in the relationship. The findings suggest that exposure to fake news not only directly but also indirectly affects fake news sharing through fact-checking. In addition, partisan strength enhances the direct effect of exposure to fake news on fake news sharing, while need to evaluate strengthens the indirect effect of exposure to fake news on fake news sharing through fact-checking. This study highlights the threat of exposure to fake news, but also calls attention to the risk of politically motivated and biased fact-checking for the spread of misinformation and disinformation.
Extended Abstract • Student • Extended Abstract: [Understanding Citizens’ Reaction to Political Scandals in Taiwan: A Survey Study] • Yujia Cheng, Department of Journalism, Hong Kong Baptist University • Previous research on public opinion towards politicians’ scandals shows that citizens may have different perceptions on them: some scandals may have severe consequences while some may not. Based the theory of motivated reasoning and literature on media influence, this article constructs a model that draw political attitudes, media use, perceptions on scandals and evaluation of the politicians together to explain the underlying mechanism of political psychology and media preference. Most of the hypotheses are supported.
Research Paper • Student • Behavioral Effects of Partisan URLs sharing on Social Media Users: How Partisan Coverage of Vaccines receives differential Networked Sharing and Interaction on Facebook • Shreenita Ghosh, University of Wisconsin -Madison; Porismita Borah • Vaccination is widely known as one of the most successful methods of preventing communicable infectious diseases (Andre, Booy, Bock, Clemens, Datta, John, Lee, Lolekha, Peltola, and Ruff, 2008). However, researchers have noticed a hesitation in many individuals to take the vaccine ranging from cautious adapters to outright deniers (Puri, Coomes, Haghbayan, and Gunaratne, 2020). Researchers argue that an individual’s information consumption (Dixon, 2021) and political affiliation (Krupenkin, 2020) may impact both how they perceive the vaccine and have a behavioral impact on whether they get vaccinated. Past research has concentrated self-reported behavioral impact of self-reported surveys (Krupenkin, 2021), social media data (Puri et. al. 2021; Jennings, Stoker, Willis, Valgardsson, Gaskell, Devine, McKay and Mills, 2021), or news media data (Dixon, 2021) on people’s Covid-19 related behavior. However, given the hybrid hyper-partisan media ecology which engulfs citizen, it is important to analyze the interaction between traditional media and social media coverage on Vaccines to understand its impact on public’s thoughts, affect and behavior. This study fills this gap in current literature by analyzing the articles by 23 publications (8 left-leaning, 7 right-leaning, and 8 centrist). A triangulation of topic modeling, Facebook link sharing analysis, and ANOVA analysis help the study conclude that partisan news URLs with differential topic prevalence have varied sharing patterns and emotive responses from the public.
Research Paper • Faculty • Pathways to Political Persuasion: Linking Online, Social Media, and Fake News with Political Attitude Change Through Political Discussion • Homero Gil de Zúñiga, University of Salamanca/Penn State University; Pablo González-González, University of Salamanca; Manuel Goyanes, Carlos III University • “There is a vast research tradition examining the antecedents that lead people to be politically persuaded. However, political opinion and attitude change in social media has received comparatively scarcer attention. This study seeks to shed light on this strand of the literature by theoretically advancing, and empirically testing a structural equation model linking online, social media, and fake news exposure, with political discussion, and political persuasion in social media. Drawing on autoregressive causal tests from a two-wave USA survey panel data collected in 2019 and 2020, results indicate that online, social media, fake news and political discussion are all positive predictors of individual political attitude change. Furthermore, structural equation tests reveal that online and social media news lead individuals to be exposed to fake news which, in turn, predict higher levels of political discussion, ultimately facilitating political persuasion in the social media realm. Limitations and further suggestions for future research are also included in the study.
Keywords: Fake News, Misinformation, Online News, Social Media News, Fake News, Political Discussion, Political Persuasion.”
Research Paper • Faculty • Effects of the News Finds Me Perception on Algorithmic News Attitudes and Social Media Political Homophily • Homero Gil de Zúñiga, University of Salamanca/Penn State University; Zicheng Cheng, Pennsylvania State University; Pablo González-González, University of Salamanca • Prior literature on political filter-bubbles suggests an overall positive association between social media use and political news diversification. Sometimes, this might not be the case. There is a burgeoning literature examining three important but distinct strands of scholarship: news finds me perception (NFM), people’s attitudes toward algorithmic news, and political homophilic discussion and information networks. For the first time in the literature, this study theoretically and empirically connects these independent but interrelated issues. We argue that NFM or the perception that ‘one’ can be well informed about public affairs without actively seeking information as news will find ‘me’ through ‘my’ networks, also tend to nurture a positive attitude towards news being presented by algorithmic decisions, rather than human editorial ones. We also contend that the NFM’s over-reliance on news generated from peers within one’s social network support the development of homogeneous political networks in social media (political homophily). Results based on a variety of OLS regression models (e.g., crossectional, lagged, and autoregressive) from a US representative panel survey, as we all as autoregressive structural equation model tests, indicate that this is indeed the case. This study serves to specifically clarify when and how social media and the NFM facilitate politically homogeneous filter-bubbles.
Research Paper • Student • Examining how digital platform diversity contributes to social media news engagement in China • Jing GUO, Chinese Univeristy of Hong Kong • This study examines how digital platform diversity contributes to social media news engagement in China with an on-line survey among mainland Chinese adult netizens regarding their reading of China-U.S. trade war news on-line. Moderated mediation analysis of the data shows that pro-attitudinal exposure and news elaboration are mediating the positive relationship between platform diversity and social media news engagement while inner political efficacy is playing a moderating role on the relationship between the two mediators.
Research Paper • • Wealth Mindset and Political Division • Mark Harmon • “The researcher investigates “attitude toward wealth” as a marker containing implicit assumptions that connect politicians with voters. The researcher notes conservative or right-wing individuals, much more than liberal or left-wing individuals, see poverty as a person’s moral failing and wealth as consequence of good choices and moral uprightness.
This research examines the universality of that difference by looking at corollary extrapolations on the source, value, and public policy toward wealth. These examinations are done through secondary analysis of five major public opinion surveys: U. S. General Social Survey, 1972-2018; American National Election Study 2016; World Values Survey wave six, 2010 to 2014; European Social Survey, round nine, 2018; and Latinobarómetro, 2018. The researcher also tests corollary extrapolations on four smaller domestic U.S. polls.
The connection between political philosophy (left v. right, liberal v. conservative) robustly correlated with the vast majority of 70 measures of wealth-related opinions across all nine surveys analyzed.
The researcher cautions these rather consistent correlations do not imply causation. Instead, political communication should consider wealth attitudes as a globally relevant marker of left-right differences, and an important message factor signaling to voters a shared worldview about the nature, source, value, and desirable public policy about wealth.”
Research Paper • Faculty • Due and undue impartiality. How context policed BBC reporting during the UK and US elections • Ceri Hughes, Cardiff University; Marina Morani, Cardiff University; Stephen Cushion, Cardiff University; Maria Kyriakidou, Cardiff University • Democracy presupposes an informed electorate, an electorate which largely must rely on media sources to relay the requisite information from the politicians on the ballot. In the UK media ecology, how such information is relayed is strictly mandated during elections and thus often typically operationalised with a “she-said-he-said” style of reporting. This research, with an examination of BBC reporting of the four leading politicians involved in the 2019 UK and 2020 US general elections, questions whether such a model remains apposite when two of the he-saids have a propensity for misinformation. This research further examines the contexts and ways BBC journalists interact with politician’s claims and the manner they employ correctives to instances of misinformation. An uneven employment of fact-checking style reporting is found and a continued employment of balance masquerading as impartiality.
Research Paper • Student • Conspiracy Mentality, Motivated Reasoning, Conspiracy Adoption: Effects of Ideology and Participation on Electoral Conspiracy Endorsement • Yanru Jiang, University of California, Los Angeles • From voting fraud to Russian interference, electoral conspiracy theories have circulated on social media since the 2016 presidential election with alarming magnitude. This study selects popular conspiracies reflecting various political ideologies and conducts multiple survey rounds (n=500) to compare and contrast the effect of partisan affiliations on conspiracy endorsement. Based on econometric modeling and the theories of conspiracy mentality, motivated reasoning, as well as the social aspects of conspiracy adoption, the results indicate that higher levels of political affiliation and knowledge correlate to stronger conspiracy endorsement for conservative conspiracy beliefs over liberal ones. Additionally, increased political participation heightens the endorsement of liberal conspiracy theories among both Republicans and Democrats.
Extended Abstract • Student • Effects of Hong Kong Local Identity on the Intention to Use Health Code during COVID-19 • Xin Jin, Department of Media and Communication, City University of Hong Kong; Zimeng An; Yanru Jiang, University of California, Los Angeles • Combining Kong Kong local identity scale and health belief model, this study proposed an integrative model and confirmed the indirect and negative effect of Hong Kong people’s local identity on their intention to use the health QR code during COVID-19 through the mediation of perceived benefit of using the health code
Research Paper • Student • Macedonian Name Dispute: Contentious Securitization and the Perceived Role of Media and Journalists in Greece • Minos-Athanasios Karyotakis, School of Communication HKBU • While research into securitization studies have focused extensively on all the essential elements of Securitization Theory (securitizer, emergency acts, securitized object, acceptance of the audience, and the successful securitization process) the connection amongst the securitization process and the role of the media and journalists are still under-researched. This paper situates itself in that gap. For examining this gap, interviews with 42 important political actors were conducted, such as anti-fascists, Greek parliamentarians, and their staff members. The interviews focused on researching the events associated with the Macedonian Name Dispute (MND), which overshadowed the Greek discourse from 2018 to 2019, leading to solving one of the oldest and the most potent territorial name disputes of the globe. This research paper shows that the process of securitization can be contentious, as there were at least two securitization processes in the MND. One that was promoted by the government and the other one by the dominant right-wing opposition party of New Democracy, which became the new government eventually after the national elections on the 7th of July 2019. In this contentious process, the side that controlled the media and the journalists resulted in successfully maintaining longer its securitization.
Research Paper • Student • Communicating the Macedonian Name Discourse on the Candidates’ Websites in Northern Greece‘s Regional and Municipal Elections of 2019 • Minos-Athanasios Karyotakis, School of Communication HKBU • Territorial name disputes are used as political tools at a national or international level to attract people’s interest and to shape the relevant discourse. These disputes can lead to the empowerment of specific actors in political competitions. There are differences though amongst these disputes. For instance, some do not have actual territorial claims, such as the Arabian/Persian Gulf or the Macedonian Name Dispute (MND). Besides, even if there are actual territorial claims, these disputes are represented and perceived as independent entities in the countries’ discourse, primarily when they become a tool in political competition. Nevertheless, they have not been studied in-depth through the lenses of the communication field. Thus, this research paper employed critical discourse analysis (CDA) to study the use of the MND on the websites of the eight most prominent candidates of the regional and municipal elections of 2019 in Thessaloniki and Central Macedonia, as MND is one of the oldest territorial name disputes in the world. Furthermore, it has been used in the political competition of Greece for almost 30 years, primarily through the last years (2018 & 2019) due to the ratification of the “Prespes Agreement” amongst Greece and the country now-named North Macedonia. This study revealed that politicians employ this communication tool for provoking powerful emotions linked with the Greek identity. After all, MND, like other territorial name disputes, seems to preserve a dominant discourse in which the emotional factor dictates the truth and goes against those who oppose this existed regime of truth.
Extended Abstract • Student • Extended Abstract: Reason and Emotion in Right-Wing Media Critique: A Qualitative Study of Affect and Trust in Twitter, Facebook and Gab • Gordon Katic, University of Toronto: Ontario Institute for Studies in Education; megan boler, University of Toronto • Alternative media – especially right-wing media – often critiques mainstream media (MSM) for not being trustworthy. Through a digital ethnography of right-wing Twitter influencers, we investigate what role emotions play in their media critique. We find strong emotions are frequently used, though influencers sometimes assume detached objectivity and lambasted their opponents for supposed emotionality. These findings suggest a paradox: emotions are a powerful tool in fomenting media distrust, but deriding emotionality is too.
Research Paper • Student • Do Twitter Comments Influence Credibility Perceptions of News Posts? Exploring MAIN Model • John Kelsey • Online comments continue to offer a means through which media users can gain information and learn from others as well as express opinions and participate in global conversations. Comments can lead to thoughtful deliberation and present new ways of thinking, but have also demonstrated themselves to be divisive and exacerbate polarization. Collectively, social media networks (SMNs) such as Twitter, Facebook, and Reddit hold almost 3.5 billion users and provide commenting, liking, and sharing as featured affordances through their platforms. Due to such large audiences likely being influenced and learning socially through online comments, an online, 2 X 2 experiment (N = 250) informed by the Modality-Agency-Interactivity-Navigability (MAIN) model tested how susceptible to the effects of user generated comments (positive vs. negative) and metric cues (likes and shares) readers are in their evaluations of credibility, issue importance and comment position. Findings indicate the valence of a comment to be highly predictive as to how credibility may be assessed and the likelihood that a comment position will be adopted; however, engagement cues vary in their influence and predictive ability. Study results also indicate the MAIN model’s bandwagon concept to be a robust tool in explaining information processing and the relationship between identity, collaborative filtering, and credibility.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • The Self-Censoring Majority • Devin Knighton, Brigham Young University; Christopher Wilson, Brigham Young University; Alycia Burnett • This study examines the spiral of silence theory in the context of social media and political communication. It finds that the majority of self-censoring to the hardcore minority on both ends of the political spectrum. This study is in progress; however, all data has been collected and most of the analysis is complete.
Research Paper • Faculty • Creative self-efficacy, political decision-making, and offline and online political participation: Findings from a cross-national survey • Matthew Kushin, Shepherd University; Francis Dalisay, University of Guam; Jinhee Kim, Pohang University of Science and Technology; Amy Forbes, James Cook University; Clarissa David, University of the Philippines, Diliman; Lilnabeth Somera, University of Guam • This study examined the role of creative self-efficacy in political engagement and civic outcomes. A cross-national survey of participants living in Australia, South Korea, the Philippines, and the U.S. (U.S., Hawaii and Guam) (N = 807) was conducted. Findings suggest that creative self-efficacy was positively associated with political efficacy and skepticism and negatively associated with apathy. Creative self-efficacy was indirectly associated with offline and online political participation through political efficacy and skepticism.
Extended Abstract • • The Antecedents and Consequences of Conspiracy Beliefs Around COVID-19 • Taeyoung Lee; Melissa Santillana; Ivan Lacasa-Mas, Universitat Internacional de Catalunya; Ivy Ashe • This study examines several factors that may contribute to COVID-19 related conspiracy beliefs, and the relation between conspiracy beliefs and attitudes toward protective health behaviors. Findings from a U.S. nationally representative, two-wave online panel survey (W1: N= 1,119; W2: N= 543) showed a negative relationship between conspiracy beliefs and mask-wearing attitudes, indicating harmful, real-world consequences hindering global preventive behaviors. We also found the reciprocal causal relationship between trust in scientific institutions and conspiracy beliefs.
Extended Abstract • Student • Users’ Engagement to Online Forum in Social Crisis • Danielle Ka Lai Lee, Washington State University; Tsz Wa Yip; Mina Park; Kyu-Min Lee • Civil resistance is facilitated by online discussions and citizens’ engagement is crucial to bring forth collective actions. Under the backdrop of Anti-ELAB movement in Hong Kong, we investigated online discourse that contributed to user’s engagement to forum discussions. With content analysis of 329 posts from a popular online forum, we found that posts that reflected collective intelligence contributed to users’ engagement, whereas posts that purely expressed emotions did not affect the engagement. Implications are discussed.
Research Paper • • Which Way Do I Go? Need for Orientation, Media Use, and Knowledge about COVID-19 • Taeyoung Lee; Tom Johnson; David H. Weaver, Indiana University • The present study explores the relationship between the need for orientation (NFO) and knowledge/misperception about COVID-19 using a two-wave national representative survey (W1: N= 1,119; W2: N= 543). The findings suggest that moderate-active NFO rather than high NFO better explains individuals’ level of knowledge and misperception. We also found that different media use (vertical media and horizontal media) and individuals’ epistemic beliefs (intuitionism and rationalism) have distinct implications for knowledge and misperception about COVID-19.
Research Paper • Faculty • Platform-dependent Effects of Incidental Exposure to Political News on Political Knowledge and Political Participation • Sangwon Lee, New Mexico State University; Andreas Nanz, University of Vienna; Raffael Heiss • Encountering news on social media is common even for individuals not actively looking for it – a phenomenon referred to as incidental exposure to political news (IE). A growing body of research has explored how IE on social media relates to political knowledge and participation. Yet, little research has considered that the effects of IE may differ across platforms. This study examined platform-dependent effects (across Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube) of IE on political knowledge and participation using panel data collected during the 2020 U.S. election. We found that IE might not be entirely beneficial. While IE on Facebook and Twitter does not affect knowledge or participation, findings suggest that IE on YouTube can dampen political learning. However, at the same time, IE on YouTube leads to more political participation, especially for those with higher level of need for orientation. This raises important questions of the consequences of uninformed political participation.
Research Paper • Student • How Fans Become Nationalists in China? Effects of Idol Adoration and Online Fan Community Engagement • Xining Liao, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Alex Zhi Xiong Koo, School of Journalism and Mass Communication, University of Wisconsin-Madison • While some studies about Chinese fandom politics see Chinese fan groups as a potential force that may challenge the existing political orders, others scholars argue that the Chinese government has been co-opting fan groups and idols to transform fans into nationalists. By utilizing online national survey data collected in 2019 (n=510), this study seeks to test these competing claims. The findings suggest that among individuals who have participated in online fan community activities, stronger idol adoration is associated with stronger nationalistic sentiments, and eventually leads to more frequent online pro-government expression. Moreover, the degree that a fan participates in online fan community activities positively moderates the effect of idol adoration on nationalistic sentiments. While among individuals without online fan community engagement, the aforementioned indirect effect almost disappeared. The implications of these findings to our understanding of fandom nationalism in China are discussed.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • Examining the Effects of Social Media Fact-checking and Political Knowledge on False Beliefs • Juan Liu, Columbus State University; Bruce Getz, Columbus State University; Lydia Ray, Columbus State University; Florence Wakoko-Studstill, Columbus State University • This study examines the interplay between two mechanisms (e.g., fact-checking and political knowledge) on misinformation belief during the 2020 Presidential Election. Results show that political knowledge acts a moderator between the effect of exposure to false claims on perceived credibility and belief in misinformation. Participants, who possessed higher levels of political knowledge and were exposed to misinformation with a fact-checking label, perceived the message as less credible and less likely to believe in that claim.
Research Paper • • All’s (Un)fair in Trade and War: Linguistic Framing Effects in News about U.S.-China Tariffs • Jo Lukito • This study examines news framing of tariff policy during the U.S.-China trade war using two methods: a computational content analysis and a survey experiment. The results of the former show that outlets varied in their sentiment towards tariffs; however, the majority of articles about U.S.-China used war metaphors. Results of the experiment reveal how pro-tariff framing devices and war metaphors can subsequently affect people’s perceptions of China and language use.
Extended Abstract • Professional • Pre-Election Confirmation Bias vs. Informational Utility: Election Outcome Prediction Affects Selective Exposure • Kate Luong; Silvia Knobloch-Westerwick, The Ohio State University • Extant research theorized a reduced preference for ideologically consistent information for partisans who anticipated the opposite party to win an upcoming election, here termed election prediction. The current study explicitly measured election prediction immediately before the 2020 election and tracked selective exposure to consistent and discrepant information. Additionally, stimulus sampling was employed to increase the generalizability of the findings, which provided the first direct evidence for the influence of election prediction on pre-election confirmation bias.
Research Paper • Student • Citizen Videos vs. Legacy Media Visual Reports: The Coverage of the 2019 Iranian Oil Protests • Douglas Porpora, Drexel University; Afrooz M., Drexel University • In response to nationwide protests to a government hike in the price of petrol, the Iranian government shut down the internet for over a week during November 2019. The only information to make it out were some 500 citizen videos of the protests. This paper shows how those citizen eyewitness imageries were an important adjunct and corrective to what the Western legacy press otherwise reported.
Research Paper • Student • Social media engagement against fear of restrictions and surveillance: The mediating role of privacy management • Macau K. F. Mak, School of Journalism and Mass Communication, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Alex Zhi Xiong Koo, School of Journalism and Mass Communication, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Hernando Rojas, University of Wisconsin-Madison • As various countries implement restrictions on online speech and online surveillance programs, their impact on social media engagement was widely investigated in communication studies. However, these studies did not capture the moment when these restrictions and programs were just implemented and citizens experienced a high level of uncertainties. Addressing the implementation of national security law in Hong Kong, this study uses two-wave panel data to understand political engagement on Facebook shortly after the implementation of new legal restrictions. The analysis showed that pan-democratic and localist users (those who tend to oppose the government) were less likely to engage on Facebook, compared with pro-establishment users (those who support the government). Meanwhile, we also found a serial mediation path in which pan-democratic and localist users showed greater fear, which encouraged more active privacy management and subsequently a higher level of engagement. This mediation path is moderated by political disagreement encountered on Facebook.
Research Paper • Faculty • Strategic issue management and COVID-19: Analysis of Twitter from 50 governors • Michael McCluskey, U. of Tennessee, Chattanooga; Nagwan Zahry, University of Tennessee at Chattanooga • Governors used Twitter to communicate strategic issue management of COVID. Analysis of 51k tweets from 50 governors demonstrated politically polarized differences among followers, with Democrats favoring COVID themes and Republicans liking non-COVID themes. Pandemic fatigue explained less emphasis on COVID tweets over time. Evidence suggests stronger polarization among followers than among the governors’ messaging.
Research Paper • • In a Hurry, Bored, Angry at Professors: How Punitive Populism Infiltrates Media Education • Mike McDevitt • This study explores how professional enculturation channels anti-intellectualism into the formative attitudes of college students as they begin to identify with populist conceptions of the press. In this first study of how punitive populism infiltrates media education, data are drawn from questionnaires distributed to undergraduates at five US colleges. A concluding section contemplates implications for cross-national research on media education and for illuminating the hidden curriculum that gives traction to punitive populism.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • Fox News, political comedy, and (motivated?) reasoning in beliefs about global warming: Evidence from a large-scale panel survey • Patrick Meirick, University of Oklahoma • A panel survey (N = 6,862) examined the roles of media use, party, political knowledge, and their interactions in the dynamics of belief in global warming. After controlling for prior belief and a host of covariates, 2012 Fox News viewing was negatively related and 2012 political comedy viewing and other news viewing were positively related to belief in global warming in 2016. All three findings were moderated by three-way interactions with party and political knowledge.
Extended Abstract • Student • Differential Outcomes of Political Meme Exposure and Engagement: A Path Towards Political Trust and Participation • Milos Moskovljevic, City University of Hong Kong; Muhammad Masood, City University of Hong Kong • The aim of this research is to illuminate both expressive and reception effects of political memes. Most scholars nowadays link online political memes with the qualities of participatory civil culture since they are often seen as a form of political and social critique. The survey data collected from Hong Kong in February 2021 (N = 933) proves that political meme engagement and exposure is correlated to political participation.
Research Paper • Student Member • Gender and Presidential Candidates’ Self-presentation on YouTube Videos • Dinfin Mulupi, University of Maryland, College Park; Linda Steiner, University of Maryland • This study interrogates gender differences in the self-presentation strategies of entrants in the 2020 U.S. Democratic Party presidential primaries via campaign advertising-style videos posted on their official YouTube accounts. A qualitative analysis of videos of 18 candidates indicates men and women employed similar props, tropes, and rhetoric, and self-presented as friendly. However, women emphasized their motherhood status more. Women candidates also used clothing to establish professionalism while men did not.
Research Paper • Student • Seeing Political Information Online Incidentally. Effects of First- and Second-Level Incidental Exposure on Democratic Outcomes • Andreas Nanz, University of Vienna; Joerg Matthes, University of Vienna • We distinguish two levels of incidental exposure (IE) to political information, first-level (mere scanning) and second-level (effortful processing). In three panel surveys (N1 = 450, N2 = 524, N3 = 901), we investigate the effects of the two levels of IE on multiple political outcomes. We find null effects on political knowledge for both levels. However, second-level IE affects online political participation, social media use for political information, and political expression positively. Implications are discussed.
Research Paper • Student • Vice-presidential candidates, language frames and functions across two continental divides: An analysis of acceptance speeches • Nana Kwame Osei Fordjour, University of New Mexico; Godwin Etse Sikanku, Ghana Institute of Journalism • Given calls for the more inclusion of women in the political space and political studies, we analyze the nomination acceptance speeches of two female vice-presidential candidates, from countries with different socio-economic backgrounds. Our analysis builds on two institutionalized theories for studying political discourse. The authors uncover in both speeches, four similar and salient feminine language frames synonymous to women in the political space. We advance the argument that the similarities in the language frames employed by both candidates can be attributed to the biological orientation of women as well as the connection between the role of a vice-presidential candidate and the traditional role of a spouse. Our findings also highlight a slight difference in the salience of functions of political campaign discourse between both politicians. Our findings provide insights into the implications of the language frames employed by both politicians and reinforces the possibilities of comparative studies across continental divides.
Research Paper • Student • The Politics of Resistance: An Ethnographic Examination of Political Alienation and Radical Disengagement of the Rural Underclass • Danny Parker, University of Wisconsin-Madison • This study is an examination of the political identity of the rural White American underclass. Topics investigated were political beliefs, information consumption and sharing, and the influences of deprivation and institutional trust on political identity formation. To accomplish this, this study conducted observations daily for a month of a small rural underclass community and conducted five extensive interviews with low-income, rural White people to understand how their lived experiences have shaped their perceptions of democracy.
Research Paper • Faculty • Perceptions of Media Bias in Reporting on the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: On The Influence of Antisemitic Attitudes in Seven Non-Partisan Countries • Philip Baugut, U of Munich; Sebastian Scherr, Texas A&M University • News about the Israeli–Palestinian conflict is of global relevance, and it has been the focus of communication studies aiming to expand our understanding of hostile media perceptions. Drawing on the different faces of antisemitism, this study explains hostile media perceptions among a sample of N = 7,001 individuals from seven non-partisan nations (Austria, Denmark, France, Germany, Hungary, Poland, and the USA). The findings indicate that both traditional Judeophobic attitudes and anti-Israelism, a contemporary expression of antisemitism, lead news audiences to perceive media hostility towards Palestine, particularly when the issue has greater subjective importance. However, in line with motivated reasoning, we also observed that anti-Israelism was associated with perceived media hostility towards Israel. These findings demonstrate that individuals may simultaneously perceive hostile media bias towards two parties in a conflict. Arguably, if observers of a conflict are hostile towards one party in the conflict, they will side with the party’s enemy and may be motivated to perceive their hostile attitudes as consistent with mainstream media coverage.
Research Paper • Student • Asking the Enemy of My Enemy for Help: Transnational Grassroots Outreach on Twitter in #HongKongProtests • Cheryl Shea, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Yanru Jiang, University of California, Los Angeles; Wendy L.Y. Leung, The Chinese University of Hong Kong • This study extends the organizational-centred transnational advocacy network by presenting how grassroots users strategically utilize social media platforms for achieving their diplomatic and individual-centered engagement with foreign actors. The network analysis and natural language processing of Twitter outreach on Hong Kong protests (N = 88,800) identify the key opinion leaders and the grassroots narratives under three core themes: geopolitics, moral values and humanitarian concern. The low threshold of Twitter participation provides extra direct channels for grassroots users to engage with foreign politicians and get their narratives heard. The grassroots found to tailor more emotion-charged discussions to trigger sympathy, rather than appealing by traditional moral values. The digital grassroots advocacy network also found to have more actors such as corporates and celebrities being involved, given the ability to instantly respond to political incidents and controversies.
Research Paper • Student • The Politics of Behaving Badly: How Ingroup-Outgroup Conditions Affect Individuals’ Perceived Credibility and Partisan Ambivalence • Jian Shi, Syracuse University; Adriana Mucedola, Syracuse University; Tong Lin; Kandice Green • This study inquired how political ingroup biases affect judgments of politicians when they address sexual misconduct allegations. 198 participants viewed a news article about an accused politician in a 2 by 2 between-subjects posttest only factorial design. Results indicated a positive relationship between ingroup perceptions and politician credibility, and a positive relationship between ingroup perceptions and perceived ambivalence. Ingroup-outgroup conditions also moderated the relationship between perceived credibility and perceived ambivalence. Implications are discussed below.
Research Paper • Student • Perceiving Affective Polarization: How Media-Induced Meta-Perceptions Drive Affective Polarization • Christian Staal Bruun Overgaard, The University of Texas at Austin • Two studies establish perceived affective polarization, or perceptions about affective polarization, as a theoretically important concept. A nationally representative survey (n = 1,010) reveals that Americans think their political opponents dislike them more than is the case. I theorize a conceptual framework, positing that news and social media content drives perceived affective polarization, which then fuels affective polarization. An experiment (n = 549) provides preliminary evidence of this causal pathway. Theoretical implications are discussed.
Research Paper • Student • Living is Easy with Eyes Closed: Avoidance of Targeted Political Advertising in Response to Privacy Concerns, Perceived Personalization and Overload • Marlis Stubenvoll; Alice Binder; Selina Noetzel; Melanie Hirsch; Joerg Matthes, University of Vienna • The following study investigated the effects of privacy concerns, perceived personalization and overload on three different avoidance behaviors in response to targeted political advertising. Findings of a two-wave panel study (N = 428) in the context of the [EUROPEAN CITY] election showed that privacy concerns increased attention withdrawal and privacy protective behaviors. In contrast, perceived personalization decreased avoidance through attention withdrawal and blocking. Attention withdrawal behaviors further inhibited privacy protective behaviors over time.
Research Paper • Student • The conditional indirect effects of traditional and social media news use on political participation in Hong Kong: Examining the communication mediation model • Yan Su • In Hong Kong, multiple political activities have attracted the world’s attention recently. However, the extant evidence about the conditionalities under which traditional and social media news use could affect political participation in Hong Kong remains sporadic rather than conclusive; mixed results have abounded. Against this backdrop, the current study is anchored by the communication mediation model and analyzed the 7th wave of the World Value Survey (WVS) data. Findings suggested that both traditional and social media news use were positively associated with political participation in Hong Kong. Moreover, political discussion was a significant mediator between traditional media news use and political participation. Additionally, post-materialistic value was found to be a significant moderator upon which the indirect effect of traditional media news use on political participation was contingent. Findings provided insights into nuanced media effects as well as understanding of social movements in Hong Kong.
Research Paper • Faculty • Speak Up or Quiet Down? The Spiral of Silence, Opinion Leadership, Social Capital, and Presidential Candidate Support on Social Media • Alec Tefertiller, Baylor University; Jacob Groshek, Kansas State University; Raluca Cozma, Kansas State University • Recent polling results suggest voters might be hesitant to express their voting intentions in presidential elections, despite the vibrant social media activity of candidate supporters. Using a national, representative survey, this study sought to determine if the spiral of silence influenced social media sharing, or if other factors encouraged the sharing of political endorsements. Based on the study findings, the best predictors of social media sharing intentions were opinion leadership and bridging social capital.
Research Paper • Student • Anti-Muslimism in a Partisan Hybrid Media Environment: Examining the Relationships Between Media Exposure, Biased Views, Social Trust, and Acceptance of Muslims • Yu Tian, Syracuse University; Lars Willnat, Syracuse University • This study examines how media exposure might influence Americans’ acceptance of Muslims in a partisan hybrid media environment. Results indicate that Republicans exhibit significantly lower acceptance of Muslims compared to Democrats and Independents. Conservative news reduced acceptance by soaring biased views toward Muslims whereas liberal news increased acceptance by cultivating more social trust. Furthermore, frequent social media use fostered acceptance of Muslims via the mediation of social trust. Thus, social trust functioned as an important mediator between media exposure and higher acceptance of U.S. Muslims.
Extended Abstract • Student • Victimhood, Morality, and Identity Politics in Social Media: Understanding Affective Polarization during the US Election • Amanda Trigiani; megan boler, University of Toronto • As people use social media to discuss the US Election and Jan 6 2021 Capitol riot, often in conjunction with the BLM protests from Summer 2020, polarized narratives surface as people try to make meaning of the circulating views and position themselves within those discourses. This cross-platform digital ethnography of social media from Twitter, Facebook, and Gab, and qualitative discourse analysis of 1800 social media posts from the political left and right related to Black Lives Matter and the Capitol riots. We engage the concept of ressentiment to deepen our understanding of affective polarization on social media and how the binary oppositions of “us/them” within social media debates reinscribe collective identities rooted in “victimization”, virtues, and perceptions of “others” as perceived threats. The different stories told by in-groups and out-groups shed light on the affects surrounding moral judgment, influenced by race relations, which distinctively shape affective polarization.
Research Paper • Student • Tracking Moral Divergence with DDR in Presidential Debates Over 60 Years • Mengyao Xu, Missouri School of Journalism; Lingshu Hu • This study discovered the formation of one crucial challenge that US presidential debate is facing – lack of real clash and issue discussion – from an institutional perspective, manifesting how the transformative process in politics caused by mediatization contribute to this challenge drawing upon Moral Foundation Theory as a prism, and therefore shedding lights to the development of more pointed and fruitful political conversations that may better serve our democracy.
Research Paper • Faculty • An Examination of Social Media Use and Campaign Participation from Cross-Cutting Communication and Social Identity Perspectives • Masahiro Yamamoto, University at Albany; Jay Hmielowski, University of Florida • This study, drawing from the literatures on cross-cutting communication and social identity theory, tests the interactive effects of political use of social media, partisan-ideological sorting, and social media network heterogeneity on campaign participation. Data from a two-wave web survey show significant three-way interaction effects. The relationships news consumption and opinion expression on social media have with campaign participation are contingent on levels of sorting and network heterogeneity, such that the relationships are positive for those whose have an aligned political identity and heterogeneous social media networks.
Research Paper • Faculty • Risk Governance during The COVID 19 Pandemic: A Quantitative Content Analysis of Governors’ Narratives on Twitter • Michael McCluskey, U. of Tennessee, Chattanooga • We content analyzed 7000 governors’ tweets using the CDC’s Crisis Emergency Risk Communication model. We found that the most salient communication objectives included addressing rumors and misunderstanding, followed by describing response efforts. Acknowledging crisis with empathy and segmenting audience were the least communication objectives. Our results suggested that the salience of communication objectives vary by political partisanship and crisis phases. New emergent sub-categories included attention to mental health, call for social influencers, and hope for the future.
Newspaper and Online News
2022 Abstracts
Research Paper • Student • Open Competition • Deceptive Power of Fake News: Perception of Believability Centers around Visuals, News Media, Social Media and Shared Values • Mohammad Ali, Syracuse University; Dennis Kinsey, Syracuse University • This paper examined a sample of 32 different types of fake news items to understand people’s perceptions of deception in various types of fake news items, regardless of communicators’ intend to deceive. Using Q Methodology, this study yielded five types of fake news content (e.g., visuals, social media, congruence, news media, and unknown sources) that different groups of people perceive as (un)likely to be deceptive. Findings should help better understand and combat fake news.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Rethinking hybridity in diaspora journalism: A study of exiled Syrian journalists’ advocacy networks and role perceptions • Rana Arafat, City University of London • Using digital ethnography and in-depth interviews, this study offers a comprehensive understanding of how diaspora journalists maintain connections with their authoritarian homeland and advocate for transnational human rights and political reforms after fleeing its repressive political sphere. To this end, the paper examines how anti-regime Syrian diaspora journalists engage in transnational advocacy practices through building hybrid digital networks that blur boundaries between journalism, activism, human rights advocacy, social movements, and civil society work. The paper further investigates how these advocacy practices shape the diaspora journalists’ perceptions of their roles as well as their understanding of the different political, economic, procedural, organizational, and professional factors that influence how they perform them. Findings demonstrate that diaspora advocacy journalism poses various challenges to traditional journalism paradigms as journalists’ roles go beyond news gathering and publishing to include petitioning, creating transnational solidarity, collaborating with civil society organizations, and carrying out various institutional work. Sensational coverage, state intervention, journalists’ political leanings, funding pressure, and accessibility of sources also pose serious limitations to diaspora journalists’ advocacy efforts. An advanced theoretical model that maps out the influencing factors on news reporting and advocacy networking in the unique transnational conflict context is further proposed.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Elite Journalists’ Narrative Evolution in the 2018 Midterm Elections on Twitter and in Print • Mitchell Bard, Iona College; Michael Mirer, University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee • A qualitative textual analysis of tweets and articles by elite newspaper journalists on and after election night in 2018 relating to the shifting narratives relative to whether or not the Democrats enjoyed a “blue wave” victory in the midterm elections. Results show that frames set on Twitter on election night persisted for five days in the New York Times, Washington Post, and Wall Street Journal before a new narrative took hold.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • The Impact of Public Transparency Infrastructure on Data Journalism: A Comparative Analysis between Information-rich and Information-poor Countries • Jason Martin, DePaul University; Gerry Lanosga, Indiana University • This study surveyed data journalists from 71 countries (N=345) and analyzed 483 data journalism projects from 50 countries to compare how transparency initiatives influence data journalism process and product. Differences in data journalists’ attitudes toward data from public institutions, types of data used, and topics covered in data-driven projects were examined. We find cross-national differences are explained by contextual factors related to transparency infrastructure, which influences the potential of data journalism to hold government accountable.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • Open Competition • The Best of Times, the Worst of Times: The Impact of Covid-19 on Digital Subscriptions • Hsiang Iris Chyi, University of Texas at Austin • A persistent problem facing U.S. newspapers is users’ lukewarm response to their digital offerings. The print edition, despite continued disinvestment and dramatic price hikes, remained the most consumed format for most newspapers. Has COVID-19 changed this and narrowed the persistent print-digital gap? Among the 20 newspapers under study, most reported substantial growth in digital subscriptions. However, the quickened declines in print circulation and the gigantic print-digital price gap have caused a decline in overall revenue.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • Open Competition • Promises granted: Venture philanthropy and the tech industry’s increasing authority over the journalism field • Brian Creech, Temple University; Perry Parks, Michigan State University • The past half-decade has seen the rise of venture philanthropy as specific kind of charitable giving in the journalism industry driven by actors in tech industry, primarily Google and Facebook. This paper interrogates venture philanthropy as a specific kind of shift in the journalistic field, discursively intervening in order to define sustainability and market success as partially dependent on actors and structures from the tech industry.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • Open Competition • Diversity Sourcing Tool: Intentions, Self-Observation and Learning • Lucinda Davenport, Michigan State University; Joseph Grimm, Michigan State University • By intentionally engaging the diverse groups that comprise a community, journalists build trust that all people are being represented and informed. This research used mixed methods to learn if a new sourcing tool helps students in real-time to intentionally include diverse sources in their coverage. Preliminary results appear to indicate that the sourcing tool is successful, which could have implications for building trust with audiences and helping journalists analyze sources real time instead of after-the-fact.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Reciprocal Journalism’s Double-Edged Sword: How Journalists Resolve Cognitive Dissonance after Experiencing Harassment from Audiences on Social Media • Danielle Deavours, University of Montevallo; Will Heath; Kaitlin Miller, University of Alabama; Misha Viehouser; Sandra Palacios Plugge; Ryan Broussard • Reciprocal journalism is a daily practice for most American journalists. Previous studies have shown this practice benefits journalists, their newsrooms, and the audience (e.g. Coddington, Lewis & Holton, 2018; Barnidge et al., 2020). Although scholars like Lewis, Zamith, and Coddington (2020) provide evidence that journalists experience harassment when interacting with audiences online, causing them to view audiences less favorably, further explanation is needed as to why journalists would continue to practice reciprocal journalism if it subjects them to online abuse. Through in-depth interviews with professional journalists, the study finds journalists experience cognitive dissonance after experiencing harassment during reciprocal journalism, but they are not likely to stop practicing interacting with audiences due primarily to organizational and individual benefits that are perceived as greater than the negatives in audience interactions. Additionally, the study finds journalists feel personally responsible for resolving feelings of dissonance and often use unhealthy dissonance resolution techniques like avoidance, victim blaming, or perspective-taking to deal with online abuse. The end result could mean dangerous consequences for individuals and the industry long-term. Results suggest a cultural shift in the industry would be necessary to significantly ease dissonant cognitions among individual journalists. Through the examination of harassment’s effect on journalists’ willingness to interact with audiences on social media, this study expands current understandings of the normative practice of reciprocal journalism.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Struggling to stay alive: Russia’s provincial journalism adapts to the COVID-19 pandemic • Elina Erzikova, Central Michigan University; Wilson Lowrey • This study adopts an ecological approach in examining Russian regional journalists’ adaptations to COVID-19. Interviews with journalists showed that a worsened economic situation has led to increased dependence on government subsidies. Generally, journalists avoided questioning authorities’ response to COVID, with some publishing government press releases and others focusing on practical tips for readers. There was also some minor deviance via social media. Overall, the crisis aggravated ongoing problems that have already been crippling these newspapers.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • “I Didn’t Know How We Were Going to Survive”: COVID-19’s Disruption of U.S. Community Newspapers • Teri Finneman, University of Kansas; Will Mari, Louisiana State University; Ryan Thomas • As journalists dealt with a nonstop news cycle in the early months of the pandemic, many of their newspapers also faced financial distress. Unable to rely on their centuries-old, ad-centric business model, U.S. community newspapers had to turn to other resources to survive. This study features oral histories with 24 journalists and state newspaper association directors in six states for a deeper understanding of how community newspapers survived the industry’s economic crisis in early 2020.
Research Paper • Professional • Open Competition • Elephant in the room: A study of the impact of emotional experiences on burnout among Chinese reporters • Lei Guo • Drawing on Grandey’s model of emotional regulation at work, this study is conceived to examine emotional experience of Chinese frontline reporters and its effects on their job burnout. The survey with 276 Chinese reporters reveals the effect of the demand on emotions at work and reporters’ experience of engaging in emotional labor magnify their levels of job burnout. Meanwhile, the use of problem-focused coping strategies can help reporters reduce their job burnout caused by emotional labor engagement. Findings in this study fill the gap in understanding the mechanism of reporters’ emotional labor engagement and its impacts on their job burnout. The theoretical and empirical implications of these findings are discussed.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • How partisan is partisan? Media framing of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Job Act • Amanda Comfort; Beverly Horvit, University of Missouri; Camille McManus • In 2017, Congress passed huge changes to the tax code. A mixed methods framing analysis of Fox News and CNN online news and Associated Press coverage shows they reported the same issues – the wealthy and corporations would benefit, and deficits would rise. All three relied most on Republican sources, but Fox News turned more frequently to conservatives than did CNN, and CNN cited more liberal sources than Fox. AP coverage fell between the two.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Predicting News Sharing in Social Media from an Integrated Approach • Su Jung Kim, University of Southern California; Jacob Nelson, Arizona State University • News sharing on social media has become one of the central components of news production, consumption, and (re)distribution. Yet studies of social media platforms as a news channel have suffered from three significant limitations: a failure to consider the interplay between situational and individual factors, a dependence on U.S.-based data, and a lack of distinction between types of sharing behavior. The result is a portrait of social media news sharing that exaggerates the role of news content and downplays the characteristics of social media platforms as well as people’s own preferences and perceptions when it comes to news and social media more generally. This study addresses these gaps by drawing on survey data collected from a representative sample (N=1,008) of the South Korean population by Nielsen Company Korea (Nielsen, hereafter) to examine how individual and situational factors within the social media environment influence different types of social media news. Our results offer a clearer portrait of how and why people share news via social media, one where the individual characteristics of both news stories and news audiences are just one piece of the puzzle that determines news sharing.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • Open Competition • A Reckoning for the Media Industry: Examining the implementation of CSR communication on diversity • Allie Kosterich, Fordham University Gabelli School of Business; Ziek Paul • In this paper, we aim to understand if and how corporate social responsibility communication related to diversity from news organizations deemed to have more successful diversity practices differs from that of those with less successful diversity practices. Understanding the relationship between successful, institutionalized diversity practices and CSR communication is important, especially as news organizations attempt to integrate and institutionalize their diversity commitments within the context of other CSR priorities and the news media landscape at large.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Media and Good Governance: Examining Role of Valenced Framing in Perceptions of Good Governance • Juan Liu, Columbus State University • Media play a vital role in strengthening and promoting good governance. This study explores how valenced frames affect perceptions of good governance by examining two governance issues (Flint water crisis and Syrian refugee crisis). The study reveals that participants exposed to good governance framing of issues yield higher approval of government performance than participants exposed to bad governance news stories. An analysis of moderating influence of political knowledge reveals that participants with higher levels of political knowledge are more susceptible to valence framing effect, but this pattern is only found in the case of Syrian refugees. These findings contribute to a growing body of research and literature around valence framing effect. The study then addresses these results in the context of on-going critical governance issues.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Getting News from Social Media Influencers and from Legacy News Media in Seven Countries: The ‘More-and-more’ Phenomenon and the New Opinion Leadership • Justin Martin; Krishna Sharma • This study examined media use and media-related attitudes as predictors of getting news from social media influencers (SMIs) in seven Arab countries (N=5,166). The study hypothesized that getting news from SMIs is not an “alternative” for people who are disenchanted with mainstream news, but rather that SMI news use is, itself, a form of mainstream news consumption. Specifically, we hypothesized that getting news from legacy digital media and even from print media would positively predict SMI news use. This hypothesis was largely supported. In all seven countries, digital legacy news use was a strong, positive predictor of actively acquiring news from SMIs, providing strong evidence of the more-and-more phenomenon first identified by Lazarsfeld et al. (1944). Moreover, in none of the countries was a belief in media credibility negatively associated with acquiring news from SMIs, a relationship we would expect to see if SMIs represented a mainstream news alternative. Implications for research on SMIs, digital news acquisition, and media credibility are discussed.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • Open Competition • Evaluating the effects of solutions and constructive journalism: A systematic review of audience-focused research • Karen McIntyre, Virginia Commonwealth University; Kyser Lough • The practice and study of constructive and solutions journalism has been growing in recent years, led by claims of positive audience effects. However, the results sometimes conflict with one another. At this stage, we find it necessary to systematically review the existing literature on the effects of solutions and constructive journalism in order to 1) better understand the bigger picture of potential effects and 2) provide guidance for future research.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • Open Competition • The Role of Self-Categorization and Perceptual Media Effects in Selective Exposure to Election Fact-Checking • Dylan McLemore, University of Central Arkansas; Christopher Roland, University of Central Arkansas • As newsrooms devote more resources to fact-checking, this study considers the social psychological factors that influence whether people will actually read them, and if they do, what perceptions they’ll take away. Third-person perception and hostile media perception predicted avoidance of fact-checking election content. The degree to which a supporter self-categorized with a candidate, however, did not significantly affect selective exposure to or perceptions of fact-checking. A summary of the study is presented within the confines of a 1,500-word extended abstract.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • The numbers game: How local newspapers used statistics to frame the coronavirus pandemic • Newly Paul, University of North Texas; Gwendelyn Nisbett, University of North Texas • Data and visualizations are an important part of local health news. Systematic data sourced from credible sources provide context to stories and educate audiences. Data visualizations help simplify complex statistical information and increase audience interactivity. Journalists associate statistics with objectivity, and use them to quantify risk in crisis situations. This study explores how local news used data to cover the coronavirus pandemic. We examined 170 data-driven articles published in the Dallas Morning News and the Houston Chronicle to examine the predominant data sources, data-driven narratives, and use of interactive elements. Results indicate reliance on government sources, prevalence of hard news stories, localization of statistics, contextual presentation of data, and abundant use of visualizations. However, the coverage lacked human-interest stories, interactivity in infographics, and failed to adequately reflect the diversity of the communities covered by the two newspapers. Data-driven stories did not always provide access to the underlying databases; nor did they always explain the methodology used to gather and analyze the data. While the readable format of the articles and the updates on infection rates can inform audiences, we argue that coverage that ignores broader data trends can cause readers to feel negative, which can push them toward news avoidance.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • How Journalists Think About the First Amendment Vis-à-Vis Their Coverage of Hate Groups • Gregory Perreault; Jon Peters; Brett Johnson; Leslie Klein • This study, based on in-depth interviews with U.S.-based journalists (n=18), explores the increasingly fraught circumstances in journalistic reporting on white supremacists. We examine how journalists think about the First Amendment vis-à-vis their coverage of hate groups. Through the lens of media ecology, and First Amendment principles and theories, we argue ultimately that journalists who cover hate groups use the First Amendment to identify their place in the journalistic environment.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • #BREAKING in L.A.: Twitter Use in a Regional News Market • Frank Russell, California State University Fullerton; Miguel Hernandez; Korryn Sanchez • This quantitative content analysis, based on gatekeeping theory, examines Twitter use by Los Angeles news media. Network broadcasters, nonprofit news media, and the Los Angeles Times demonstrated skillful use of Twitter affordances: quote tweets, retweets, hashtags, mentions, and video. However, commercial broadcasters used these functions mainly for branding. Broadcasters were more likely to post or share tweets about weather, crime, and traffic, while two resource-constrained newspapers were more likely to post about sports.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Seeing Red: Reading Uncivil News Comments Guided by Personality Characteristics • Arthur Santana; Toby Hopp • Whether on a news or a social networking site, comments following news stories are often beset with incivility. This article uses a Uses & Gratifications framework to understand why certain people are more drawn to uncivil comments than civil ones. Using eye-tracking technology, this research compares the attention a reader gives to uncivil comments and compares it against certain personality characteristics. Findings suggest that certain readers spend more time reading uncivil comments than civil ones.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Who, What, and How: Analyzing Judicial Constructions of Journalism in Twenty-First Century Cases • Jared Schroeder, Southern Methodist University • Emerging technologies have increasingly challenged the role of journalism in the information ecosystem, leaving journalists and journalism scholars to reexamine the role and mission of journalism in democratic society. At the same time, state and federal judges have constructed a discourse regarding how they define journalism in the twenty-first century. They have done so while facing a variety of cases in which bloggers, message board posters, website publishers, and others have claimed protections that have historically been primarily associated with traditional journalists. Ultimately, judges have constructed a discourse about journalism that combined concerns regarding how closely the process and practices the publishers used to gather and communicate the information aligned with traditional journalistic work, the public-service value of the information, and the journalistic credentials of the publisher. Though concern for how the work was created and who communicated it, jurists consistently conveyed the public-service role was most instrumental in their evaluations, often rationalizing broad expansions of what legally constitutes journalism.
Research Paper • Student • Open Competition • Intermedia Agenda Setting during the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Computational Analysis of China’s Online News • Hanxiao Wang; Jian Shi, Syracuse University • Based on intermedia agenda setting, the current study examines how official media and semi-privatized commercial media on Weibo platform covered the COVID-19 pandemic. Both supervised machine learning and time series analysis were employed to analyze 350,059 Weibo posts released by 3,883 news sources between December 2019 and April 2020. Our results indicated that China’s official media did not necessarily set the agenda for semi-privatized commercial media in this highly controlled media environment. Implications were discussed.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Flooding the Gates: Conservative Media, Hunter Biden’s Laptop Conspiracy and Gatekeeping in the Social Media Era • Burton Speakman, Kennesaw State University; Aaron Atkins; Marcus Funk • Social media have eroded gatekeeping abilities of traditional, mainstream journalists and publications, allowing coordinated campaigns to force popular social media topics into mainstream news coverage. Analysis of a coordinated conservative campaign to promote a baseless conspiracy about Hunter Biden’s laptop in the waning weeks of the 2020 general election indicates that far right actors can overwhelm gatekeeping functions at conservative media by flooding social media with constant conversation on a favored topic. Similar efforts to flood mainstream news media with the same topic were partially successful but failed to overwhelm or manipulate mainstream gatekeeping. Findings suggest a new concept of “gateflooding” to describe manipulative and repetitive social media activity.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • An Evolutionary Approach to Why People Seek and Avoid More Information About Negative News Stories • ESTHER THORSON, Michigan State University; Carin Tunney, Michigan State University; Kevin Kryston, Michigan State University • Americans are awash in negative news. This study examines how people respond to reading negative stories. The amount of fear induced, story importance, efficacy feelings, and individuals’ attributes of optimism and perceived utility of news are all significant predictors of the degree to which people report intending to seek and avoid more information about the stories. The evolutionary psychology of human approach and avoidance is the guide to the design and interpretation of the study.
Research Paper • Professional • Open Competition • Redemption vs. #MeToo: How Journalists Addressed Kobe Bryant’s Rape Case in Crafting His Memory • Patrick Walters, Kutztown University • This study examines how journalists addressed Kobe Bryant’s 2003 rape case in coverage of his death. The qualitative textual analysis examines 488 stories, produced by 18 news organizations across the U.S. between Jan. 26 and Oct. 31, 2020. It finds most omitted the case, and that stories referencing it often included a sanitized version as part of a redemption narrative, a speed bump on Bryant’s road to greatness.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Auditing whiteness: Structural barriers to antiracist newsrooms • Andrea Wenzel, Temple University • Newsrooms across the U.S. are struggling to address the effect of structural racism on stories they tell and who gets to tell them. This study explores the efforts of one news organization to pursue greater equity and inclusion. Using a combination of participant observation and interviews, it follows a metro newspaper through the process of conducting a diversity and inclusion audit of its content and newsroom practices. Drawing on Gidden’s structuration theory, it examines how whiteness is supported by layered and invisible structures including journalism norms, traditions, and practices that overrepresent white sources and center white audiences, structural racism that limits workplace opportunities, and limited local journalism funding. It then explores how journalistic agents either reproduce these norms and traditions or seek to transform the institution and its practices. Finally, taking a normative stance that more inclusive and antiracist journalistic practices are a goal that can and should be pursued, the paper reflects on how transformation may be aided by efforts that attempt to make visible and challenge structures of whiteness.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • Open Competition • Passive News Consumption, Social Media Use, and Public Perceptions of Journalistic Roles • Lars Willnat, Syracuse University; Yu Tian, Syracuse University • This study explores the relationship between passive news consumption (“News Finds Me”) and public support for traditional journalistic roles. Based on data from an online survey conducted in March 2021 with a national sample of 1,200 U.S. adults, we investigate how the individual components of the “News Finds Me” concept are associated with perceptions of journalists, trust in media, and four traditional journalistic roles (interpreter, disseminator, adversarial, and populist-mobilizer).
Research Paper • Student • Open Competition • Discerning Whether It’s ‘Fake’ News: The Relationship Between Social Media Use, Political Knowledge, Epistemic Political Efficacy, and Fake News Literacy • Avery Holton, University of Utah; Homero Gil de Zúñiga, University of Salamanca/Penn State University • This study contributes to unpacking mechanisms that help people identify fake news, seeking to theoretically connect people’s general social media use, political knowledge, and political epistemic efficacy with individuals’ fake news literacy. Results from a two-wave panel US survey data suggested that the more people used social media, were politically knowledgeable, and were able to find the truth in politics (epistemic political efficacy), the better the chances they could discern whether the news is ‘fake.’
Research Paper • Student • Open Competition • What You See and What You Think: Exploring News-ness Perceptions and News Media Repertoires in Singapore • Jingwei Zheng, Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information, Nanyang Technological University; Edson Tandoc Jr • This research explored how audiences in Singapore define news (i.e., news-ness) and how such understanding is shaped by the ways they access news (i.e., news media repertoires). Through a national survey, this study found five types of news repertoires as well as five types of news-ness perceptions. We also found that news-ness perceptions are related to how users access news. For example, news-ness perceptions of news omnivores differ from those of other types of users.
Research Paper • Student • Student Papers • A profession in flux: How Covid-19 coverage is pushing the boundaries of traditional journalism • Kathleen Alaimo • This study argues that Covid-19 is a “critical incident” leading journalists to reconsider how and why they conduct newswork. A textual analysis of metajournalistic discourse in webinars and newspaper op-eds examines how journalists are evaluating news practice in response to Covid-19. Findings indicate that to protect standards of accuracy journalistic role conceptions, norms, and practices are in a state of renegotiation as journalists push the boundaries of “normal” journalism toward an emerging “post-normal” journalism.
Research Paper • Student • Student Papers • It’s all rhetoric: Dominant climate change discourses in a UK and US newspaper • Kathleen Alaimo • This study argues that media discourse is influential in the formation of national climate legislation. Using the dominant climate discourses identified by Leichenko and O’Brien (2019), critical discourse analysis was employed to investigate the language of The Guardian and the New York Times. Findings indicate that UK elite press coverage is more integrative and critical than US reportage. Regarding the UK’s policy success US media might consider incorporating integrative and critical discourse in climate coverage.
Research Paper • Student • Student Papers • How Newspapers’ Social Media Editors in Bangladesh Use Official Social Media Accounts • Ahmed Shatil Alam, University of Oklahoma; Wahida Alam, New Age • For the last several years, the newspaper industry in Bangladesh has been using social media for disseminating news and connecting with readers. This exploratory study sheds light on both issues through the lens of the Gatekeeping theory. Following interviews with 17 social media editors who worked for 14 national newspapers in Bangladesh, the study found that the overall traditional gatekeeping roles of these journalists had undergone substantial changes as they were heavily concerned about audience demands and reactions. Social media editors also feel pressured from their bosses, advertisers, and the audience to maintain their gatekeeping roles. These journalists even considered their jobs as “marketing” or “selling” of news and experienced volatile treatments from their colleagues in the newsrooms. Although they are in charge of multiple most of them had no prior training of any sort in social media management.
Research Paper • Student • Student Papers • Journalists as Platypuses? — Understanding the Hysteresis and Habitus of media startups • Matthew Chew, Nanyang Technological University • “Media startups tend to stretch the boundaries of journalism, but are still influenced by values and ideas from legacy journalists. Guided by Bourdieu’s field theory, this study will utilize in-depth interviews to examine the disconnect between these new entrants and legacy newsrooms. This study proposes that there is a hysteresis in the field, which set the stage for media startups to flourish. These new agents don a media startup habitus, a blend of the traditional journalistic habitus and the startup habitus that is developed out of circumstance and as a response to the changing requirements of media and journalistic work.
Keywords: Field Theory, Startups, Habitus, Hysteresis, Journalistic Identity, Qualitative, Innovation, Mismatch”
Research Paper • Student • Student Papers • For People, For Policy: Journalists’ Perceptions of Peace Journalism • Meagan Doll, University of Washington • Compared to studies on peace-journalism content, little research examines journalists’ perceptions of peace journalism despite theoretical suggestions that individuals influence content production. To address this relative disparity, this study examines the social conditions shaping journalists’ perceptions of peace journalism using a hierarchy-of-influences perspective and data from 20 interviews with East African journalists. Findings suggest that journalists understand peace journalism as either more people-oriented or policy-oriented and these perceptions correspond to varying degrees of professional precarity.
Research Paper • Student • Student Papers • The Public’s Frame: News outlets, YouTube comments and the 2018 Teacher Strike in West Virginia • Laura Harbert, Ohio University • This paper summarizes a study of comments (N=1,961) posted on YouTube videos about the 2018 teacher strike in West Virginia. Analytics software and a hand-coded qualitative analysis of the text showed that themes of teachers, education, and people were prevalent, along with the nature of work in education, and fairness in teacher pay. Interdisciplinary and inter-methodological approaches in social analytics were discussed as a way to deepen understanding of media and journalism texts.
Research Paper • Student • Student Papers • Post-Ghosting: The depletion of local government coverage after a county’s newspapers became ‘ghosts’ • Andrea Lorenz Nenque, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill • This case study documents the decline over time of news about a rural county’s local government entities through quantitative and qualitative content analysis as the community lost its newspapers, finding that despite multiple online startups that sought to fill the gap, local government coverage suffered significant declines in both the quantity and quality of news stories once the newspapers disappeared. The community’s critical information need for local government news was left unfilled in the years following the closures.
Extended Abstract • Student • Student Papers • Extended Abstract: The State of Online News Advertising • Margaret McAlexander, University of Memphis • This research explores the prevalence of display and native advertising in online print news media. To achieve this goal, this research uses a content analysis of three newspapers ranking highly in circulation among major U.S. outlets over a full calendar year. This research provides an analysis of the state of online news advertising in 2020 through the collection of data regarding the presence or absence of advertisements and the qualities of such advertisements.
Extended Abstract • Student • Student Papers • Busking the News: Metajournalistic Discourse and Author-Audience Relationships on Substack • Rowan McMullen Cheng, University of Minnesota: Twin Cities – Hubbard School of Journalism and Mass Communication • This study examines author-audience relationships through Substack newsletters. Using the metajournalistic discourse framework, newsletter discourse is analyzed around two primary trends: (1) author-audience relationship maintenance, (2) boundaries between legacy media and newsletter authors. A qualitative textual analysis of 57 texts across 25 newsletters identifies that authors construct boundaries between themselves and legacy media as well as encourage audience participation. This study furthers research on journalistic labor, news audiences, metajournalistic discourse, and emerging digital formats.
Research Paper • Student • Student Papers • An “assumption of bad faith”: Using fake news rhetoric to create journalistic teaching moments • Kelsey Mesmer, Wayne State University • Using the Communication Theory of Resilience, this project explores how journalists negotiate, adapt, and work to transform a social climate of hostility toward news media. Interviews with 38 journalists who frequently encounter anti-media rhetoric revealed strategies for mitigating this rhetoric, most commonly by turning conversations into teaching moments. By doing this, journalists educate the public about the purpose of the press and journalists’ routines, illuminating a critical, overlooked aspect of media and news literacy interventions.
Extended Abstract • Student • Student Papers • “Without a fixer, it is just an idea, but with a fixer, it will be a story.”: Bangladeshi local news producers’ perspectives on their work and extant challenges • Sohana Nasrin, University of Maryland; Bobbie Foster, University of Maryland Phillip Merrill College of Journalism; Md Mahfuzul Haque • Local news producers (referred to as LNP hereafter), sometimes known as “news fixers” or “fixers,” are an integral part of foreign news production. These local media workers serve as the eyes and ears of foreign correspondents in an unknown land and ensure the safety of foreign correspondents, especially in conflict zones. But perhaps the most important contribution of their labor is rendered through their interpretation of the events and occurrences so that the rest of the world can make sense of it all through the lens of journalistic storytelling. In this study, we present Bangladeshi local news producers’ case to understand their perspectives on their job. Through semi-structured in-depth interviews, we try to understand who they are and what impact they seek to have on the global journalism industry through their work. All of our interview participants identified cultural differences as a challenge. Our most important finding perhaps is that the local news producers still operate within a colonial framework. By focusing on Bangladeshi local news producers, we inform the existing literature in three significant ways: 1)We introduce local news producers labor in a developing country (i.e., Bangladesh) that usually gets international media attention while grappling with frequent natural disasters, poverty, migration, and other social anomalies, 2) We add the non-western perspective by focusing on the Global South, and 3)We contribute to understanding of the local news producers’ perspectives on their job instead of focusing on the foreign correspondents’ views on the local producers’ jobs.
Research Paper • Student • Student Papers • How different market oriented news organizations portrayed news coverage about the CARES Act? • Michelle Rossi • Drawing from the CARES Act’s news coverage, this study investigated how different funding models in news organizations modulated the debate on the most expansive stimulus bill in modern American history. Market theory, news sources, and journalistic role performance in news content were the frameworks applied to this qualitative study. Some of the findings consist of differences in the assessment of objectivity as a journalistic norm, and similarities as the indirect use of government-official sources.
Research Paper • Student • Student Papers • The Role of Anonymity and Race in Online News Story Comment Sections • William Singleton, University of Alabama • This study expands upon previous research examining incivility and negativity of online comments. Guided by deindividuation theory and its connection to anonymity, this study explores whether online comment forums associated with crime stories involving Black suspects yield more racially charged language than comment forums associated with crime stories involving white perpetrators. A quantitative content analysis of the comment sections in Advance Local’s news websites examined racial comments about crime stories involving Black and White criminal perpetrators and suspects. Findings revealed a significant association between crime stories and racial comments based on the race of the suspect. In addition, the study’s prediction that comment sections connected to Black crime stories would feature multiple comments with racial language also was supported.
Research Paper • Student • Student Papers • Public Perceptions and Attitudes towards the Application of Artificial Intelligence in Journalism: From a China-based Survey • Wencai Hu; Mengru Sun, Zhejiang University; WEI HUANG • “In the face of the pervasive influence of artificial intelligence (AI) on journalism and media, the current research probe deeply into the public perceptions and attitudes towards the application of AI in Chinese journalism. The current study aims to answer several highly concerning questions by academics, the AI industry, and the journalism industry. A large online survey was conducted to examine the public’s existing knowledge, emotions, concerns, preferences, and expectations of AI in the Chinese journalism industry. It was found that the public is in general familiar with the application of AI technology in the field of journalism and media, among which the most acquainted aspect was describing some news products that apply the AI. The public’s emotions towards the news broadcast by AI simulated anchors were mainly positive. Compared with the news content, the public believed that the form of news report benefits most from the application of AI. The public prefers the types differently in terms of different media content and news production processes.
Finally, the majority of the public believed that AI and traditional modes should be complementary to each other in future news production. Practical suggestions were proposed to the AI industry, journalism, government, and the public.”
Research Paper • Student • Student Papers • “Timely, Accurately, Avoid Unnecessary Panic”: How Vietnamese Newspapers Framed the COVID-19 Pandemic during the Initial Stage • Huu Dat Tran, Kansas State University; PHAM PHUONG UYEN DIEP, Kansas State University • Via content analysis of COVID-related articles (N = 1127) published in three prominent Vietnamese newspapers between January 23 and March 6, 2020, this study investigates how Vietnamese newspapers framed COVID-19 when it was first recognised in Vietnam, as well as their attempts to shape the public’s perception and behaviours towards the pandemic. Two frames, namely health severity and attribution of responsibility, were found to be predominantly used by VnExpress, Thanh Nien, and Tuoi Tre, thus highlighting the media’s role in Vietnam in disseminating information and calling for collective participation in pandemic precautions. Other elements, including the messages’ tone and sources, were also examined. Findings were then compared to previous studies concerning COVID-19 framing to illustrate the different approaches the media of various countries adopted. It should be noted that during the period, newspapers in Vietnam had to follow governmental orders, which required the media to provide punctual, accurate information while also avoid causing unnecessary panic. The argument that Vietnamese newspapers were a bridge connecting the Vietnamese government and their citizens and that they contributed to Vietnam’s initial victory against COVID-19 was supported.
Research Paper • Student • Student Papers • Source Diversity in Nonprofit News: A Comparative Analysis of The 19th* and The New York Times • Carolina Velloso • This paper compares source diversity in The 19th*, a woman-focused nonprofit newsroom, and The New York Times. It also asks whether reporter gender influences sourcing patterns. Through a quantitative content analysis of 236 articles and 857 sources, this study interrogates whether The 19th* – which has the centering and elevating of women’s issues as its core objective – carries out that mission through greater inclusion of women as sources, both expert and non-expert, in its articles.
Extended Abstract • Student • Student Papers • Local Newspapers During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Understanding Journalists and Communities in Los Angeles • Courtney Weider, California State University, Northridge • This study examines how local newspapers have adapted during the COVID-19 pandemic, including how routines of journalists have been impacted and how they are engaging their communities. In-depth interviews were conducted with 25 journalists throughout Los Angeles, focusing on those serving Black and Latino neighborhoods that have been disproportionately impacted by the pandemic. Findings will advise newspapers, educators, and funders on how to support the local newspaper ecosystem to ensure communities stay informed and engaged.
Research Paper • Student • Student Papers • “The Chinese Virus” and Conditional Partisan Framing? An analysis of the cross-platform partisan framing in American news coverage of China’s role in the COVID-19 pandemic • Yiyan Zhang; Briana Trifiro, Boston University • The COVID-19 pandemic – a global public health crisis – has given rise to US new coverage about China, where the first cases were identified. However, the framing strategies used among different news outlets remain understudied. By conducting a structural topic modeling (STM) analysis on both website news and tweets published by 27 major US news outlets regarding China’s role in the COVID-19 pandemic, this paper examines how framing varied across left and right media and whether the publishing platform moderates the partisan framing. The results show support for both cross-partisan and cross-platform differences. Right media tend to adopt more sensational and attitudinal frames compared to left media. The gap between the two partisans was in general wider on Twitter than on news websites. Implications on media effects studies and activism against hate crimes are discussed.
Minorities and Communication Division
2022 Abstracts
Extended Abstract • Student • Faculty Research Competition • Race/Ethnicity, Online Information & COVID-19 Vaccination: Study of Minority Immigrants’ Internet Use for Health-related Information • Annalise Baines; Hyunjin Seo, University of Kansas; Muhammad Ittefaq, University of Kansas; Ursula Kamanga; Fatemeh Shayesteh, University of Kansas; Yuchen Liu • The COVID-19 pandemic aggravated existing challenges for racial/ethnic minority immigrants in the United States in obtaining health information and seeking health care. Based on in-depth interviews with 52 racial/ethnic minority immigrants in the U.S. Midwest, this study analyzes how they navigated online information related to COVID-19, how their race/ethnicity played a role in online health information seeking during the pandemic, and their perspectives on getting vaccinated against the virus.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • Faculty Research Competition • Extended Abstract: Chronicling History: A Comparative Analysis of Newspaper Coverage Chronicling Hillary Clinton’s and Kamala Harris’s History-Making Moments • Shaniece Bickham, Nicholls State University; Rockia Harris, LSU; Jinx Broussard, Manship School, LSU • This study conducts a qualitative textual analysis of the discourse surrounding former U. S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Vice President Kamala Harris as they achieved major political milestones. Articles from two respected Black and two premiere mainstream newspapers are analyzed, and intersectionality is employed to ascertain the extent to which racial and gender stereotypes were prevalent. Preliminary findings show Clinton received more coverage than Harris, but Harris’s coverage included more race and gender mentions.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • Faculty Research Competition • The language of diversity in ACEJMC site-visit reports: Some inclusion but with a lack of equity and belonging • Robin Blom, Ball State University; Gabriel B, Tait, Ball State University; Curtis Matthews, Ball State University; Elena Lazoff • Diversity is an intricate subject in educational settings and an important aspect of ACEJMC accreditation. That body has recently announced changes in the wording of the Diversity and Inclusiveness standard after ongoing complaints that the old standard did not facilitate the changes needed. This study focused on the vocabulary of ACEJMC site-visit reports to explore what concepts are (not) discussed in affirming diversity. For instance, terms as belonging and antiracism are absent from the reports.
Research Paper • Faculty • Faculty Research Competition • When Beauty Meets Racism: A Comparative Content Analysis of #Foxeye Beauty and Asian Activism Videos on TikTok • Grace Choi, Columbia College Chicago • #Foxeye is a beauty trend that has been under scrutiny on social media, especially on TikTok. Initially created to elongate the look of a person’s eyes, it has been criticized as a racist representation of Asians, mainly because of the signature pose where beauty creators pull back the corners of their eyes to showcase the look. In order to understand how #foxeye has been interpreted by various TikTok video creators, a comparative content analysis of 507 TikTok videos was conducted. Applying framing theory, this exploratory study identified video information, video creators’ identities, video production components and messages. Results indicated that although there were more beauty videos than Asian activism videos, Asian activism videos had more social media engagements that created conversations about racism. Moreover, beauty video creators were mostly White while Asian activism video creators were East Asian. The results highlight the dominant discourse in the beauty industry and complex understanding of self-identity through deconstructing this beauty trend.
Research Paper • Faculty • Faculty Research Competition • Fifty Years Researching and Raising Awareness About Minorities and Communication: The Story of MAC’s Scholarship • George Daniels, The University of Alabama; Lillie Fears, Arkansas State University • Using archival materials available to capture research efforts in the early years of the Minorities and Communication Division, this study takes a historical approach in cataloging the scholarship on journalism and mass communication issues for those in racial minority groups presented between 1972 and 2020. Of 661 papers analyzed for this study, 358 or 54% were authored by a female or had research teams with a woman as first author.
Research Paper • Faculty • Faculty Research Competition • “It’s Just As Whitewashed as Ever”: Social Media Sourcing as a Diversification Tool for Journalists • Danielle Deavours, University of Montevallo; Will Heath; Ryan Broussard • Modern American journalism practices rely heavily on the use of expert sources. Traditionally, white, male officials are the primary sources journalists use in traditional media (Humprecht & Esser, 2017). This silences underrepresented voices, leading to symbolic annihilation of minority communities in media coverage. Journalists often cite their inability to reach communities outside of their own perspective as a primary reason for this symbolic annihilation, but what happens when reporters’ networks of power are widened through digital connections? Previous research has explored the role of social media as a tool for newsgathering (Agbo & Okechukwu, 2016), and some studies suggest social media can provide the opportunity for journalists to reach previously inaccessible communities (Van Leuven et al., 2015). Yet, the network theory of power (Castells, 2011) suggests some nodes of these digital networks can create elite sources like officials or influencers that may uphold traditional sourcing practices and hegemonic power structures (Van Leuven & Deprez, 2017). Utilizing qualitative interviews with professional journalists in traditional media outlets, this study seeks to understand whether tapping into broader networks of power through social media helps journalists combat symbolic annihilation of sources or whether hegemonic structures continue despite widened access to multiperspectival resources.
Research Paper • Faculty • Faculty Research Competition • Journalism and mass communications resources and open access perceptions at Historically Black Colleges and Universities • Jerry Crawford; Joseph Erba, University of Kansas; Amalia Monroe-Gulick, University of Kansas; Pamela Peters, University of Kansas • The financial pressures experienced by many Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) have worsen during the pandemic. The use of open access resources as a substitute to subscription models may assist HBCUs navigate dire budget forecasts. This study investigates access to research resources at HBCUs with a journalism and mass communications program, as well as perceptions of open access among librarians and instructors. Results reveal access disparities among HBCUs and favorable perceptions towards open access.
Research Paper • Faculty • Faculty Research Competition • #BlackoutTuesday: News Media’s Change Agents and the Degrees of Separation between Journalism and Activism • Summer Harlow, University of Houston • Based on interviews with 28 journalists following George Floyd’s murder, this study uses #BlackoutTuesday and posts of black squares on social media in support of Black Lives Matter to explore to what extent journalists are redrawing the boundary between journalism and activism when it comes to taking stances for racial justice. Findings reveal journalists of color and young journalists are change agents, pushing traditional journalistic doxa like objectivity from an orthodox to a heterodox status.
Research Paper • Faculty • Faculty Research Competition • ‘I can’t be neutral or centrist in a debate over my own humanity’: Are traditional news norms universal? • Magda Konieczna; Ellen Santa Maria, Temple University • Journalistic objectivity has long been in flux. This paper examines what we term “journalistic edge cases”: situations in which journalists aim to subvert norms, and managers push back, reprimanding the journalists and removing them from coverage or firing them. We find journalists arguing that objectivity works differently when reporting on minority groups; managers counter that objectivity is universal. This examination offers insight into how journalism is evolving, in particular in this moment of racial reckoning.
Research Paper • Faculty • Faculty Research Competition • Understanding the Motivations of Asian American Publics’ Collective Actions Against Racism During the COVID-19 Pandemic • Yeunjae Lee, University of Miami; Weiting Tao; Jo-Yun Li • Grounded in the situational theory of problem solving (STOPS) and social identity model of collective action (SIMCA), this study aims to examine the motivations of minority publics—Asian Americans—in the U.S. engaging in activism against racism and xenophobia during the COVID-19 pandemic. Results of an online survey with Asian Americans in the U.S. suggested that the Asian American publics’ identity enhanced their perceived injustice, efficacy, and situational motivation to counter racism and xenophobia, which in turn facilitated their online activism on social media. Online activism, then, drove their offline activism. Theoretical and practical implications on collective actions from the minority public are discussed.
Extended Abstract • Student • Faculty Research Competition • First-generation students’ college experiences: The role of familial and mentorship support • Victoria Orrego Dunleavy, University of Miami; Ekaterina Malova, University of Miiami; Diane Millette, University of Miiami • In this study, we examined supportive memorable messages received by Black and Hispanic first-generation students from family members and mentors and explored how issues of demographic similarity affect protégé’s perceptions of mentor support and mentor satisfaction. First, results indicate that students may benefit from activating both mentoring and family connections to succeed in college. Second, students find the same-gender mentoring relationships more satisfying. Thus, students, mentors, and families should be educated on the benefits of supportive communication.
Research Paper • Faculty • Faculty Research Competition • 600 & Rising’s Quest to Improve Diversity in the Advertising Profession • Teresa Mastin, Michigan State University; Alina Freeman, Michigan State University; Susan Reilly • “This paper explores advertising trade publications’ coverage of the 600 & Rising social movement, which was launched to dismantle systemic racism in the advertising industry. The visibility of the Black Lives Matters movement and the murder of George Floyd served as catalysts for two Black advertising professionals to lead an effort to address how the advertising industry perpetuates systemic racism through its portrayals of African Americans and Blacks.
Keywords: 600 & Rising social movement; systemic racism in advertising”
Research Paper • Student • Faculty Research Competition • Music of Generations: Expressions of the Black Experience From Civil Rights to Black Lives Matter • Christina Myers; Linwan Wu, University of South Carolina • “This study investigates expressions of the African American experience by examining song lyrics published by Black musicians during two critical time periods in civil rights – 1960-1969 and 2010-2020. To determine the predominate narratives that arise from their songs (N=3,302), LDA-based topic modeling as well as a comparative analysis was employed. Findings indicated the presence of seven topic categories – ‘Love/Relationships,’ ‘God/Religion/Spirituality,’ ‘Social/Activities,’ ‘Wealth/Status,’ ‘Sex/Sexual Desire,’ ‘Social/Political Issues’ and ‘Alcohol/Drugs/Substance Use.’
Keywords: Ideology, music, topic modeling, critical race theory”
Research Paper • Faculty • Faculty Research Competition • Latinas in journalism: Examining their biggest challenges and opportunities • Jessica Retis, University of Arizona; Amara Aguilar; Laura Castaneda, USC • Preliminary findings of a larger project examine the experiences of Latinas in journalism. Drawing on Latino/a Critical Communication theory, the new Latina Critical Journalism Studies approach places Latina journalists at the center of the analysis and focuses on intersectionality (gender, race, class, age, language, migration status); diversity, equity and inclusion; news media practices; and structural challenges. A recent survey shows Latina journalists face distinct challenges in the workplace ranging from sexism to racism.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • Faculty Research Competition • Extended Abstract – Selena: A Latinx Cultural Anchor for Pop Culture Pedagogy • Nathian Shae Rodriguez, San Diego State University • This study evidences how the pop culture pedagogical practice of using Selena as a cultural anchor for a media and communication course can be employed as practice that reflects on, and incorporates, methods that critique and respond to hierarchies of power and identity. Students critically analyzed Latinx mediated representations though pop culture media and highlighted connections with politics and cultural identity, particularly in border regions. Students were empowered to combat racism, homophobia, and other oppressions.
Research Paper • Faculty • Faculty Research Competition • Constructing and Negotiating Panethnic Professional Identity: The Case of the Asian American Journalists Association • Yong VOLZ, University of Missouri; Indah Setiawati, University of Missouri • This study explores how Asian American journalists define and negotiate their collective identities both in panethnic and professional terms. Focusing on the case of the Asian American Journalists Association (AAJA), our analysis finds that, instead of problematizing the blanketing panethnic identity, AAJA members tactically and collectively present themselves as a more homogenous racial group in order to maximize their presence and amplify their voices in both newsrooms and the public sphere. They also publicly vocalize their solidarity with other minority groups, especially with their African American colleagues during the “Black Lives Matter” movement, as a way to insert themselves into the broader social justice project. In addition, they capitalize on their ethnic identity to enhance their journalistic authority when covering identity issues. Our findings add to the thin literature on Asian American journalists as they try to position themselves in the social and professional arenas. This study also highlights the impact of the highly racialized moments of 2020, which was compounded by the COVID-19 pandemic and the Black Lives Matters, on the Asian American journalists.
Extended Abstract • Student • Faculty Research Competition • A New Conceptual Model for Understanding Interracial Communication Apprehension: How Does Racial Representation in Television-Entertainment Media Impact Interracial Conversation? • Farrah Youn-Heil, University of Georgia; Yan Jin, University of Georgia • This study proposes a new conceptual model for understanding interracial communication apprehension (IRCA), delineating how people of color use various communication practices (Orbe, 1998) and coping strategies (Lazarus, 1991) to cope with communication apprehension (McCroskey, 1970) triggered by or associated with racial representation in television-entertainment media and public discourse on race-related topics. In-depth interviews are conducted to provide initial examination of the new IRCA model. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.
Extended Abstract • Student • Student Paper • How coverage of deportation at the U.S./Mexico border constructs common knowledge • Tania Ganguli, University of Minnesota • Stories about deportation, like all pieces of journalism, include background information – that which isn’t explicitly tied to sourcing – which helps identify and reify common knowledge. This study examines that unattributed text to understand how those words construct the reality of deportation of Latinx migrants. By analyzing text from 2014 and 2018 at three newspapers on the U.S./Mexico border, this study illuminates how the construction of Latinx migrants changed as the American political climate shifted.
Research Paper • Student • Student Paper • Barbaric Arabs: Hollywood Portrayals, A Content Analysis • Farah Harb, Wayne State University • The Arab ethnicity encompasses many countries — from North African nations like Egypt and Tunisia, to Gulf countries like Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates, to Mid-East countries like Lebanon and Syria. Although the general language in these countries is Arabic, natives to each country speak different dialects and follow different traditions. For example, although Kuwait and Saudi Arabia (both Gulf countries in the Mid-East) are neighboring countries, their dialects and traditional attire are so different that one can tell them apart just by the way they speak or dress. The same goes for other Arabic-speaking countries. Due to historic influences, some of these Arab countries speak French as their second language (e.g., Lebanon, Syria, Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia), whereas the rest speak English. There are significant differences in the Arabic spoken by a Moroccan person, compared to Arabic spoken by a Lebanese person. While there are similarities between Arabs who come from these different countries, major differences include variations in cultural dialects, religions, traditions, dress codes, liberalism, and so on. Although Arabs come from different backgrounds, Hollywood has long portrayed them as different shades of barbaric (Shaheen, 2003). The term “barbaric” here refers to attributes that have been falsely associated with the Arab image and constantly perpetuated through TV shows, movies, books, paintings, and other forms of art and media.
Extended Abstract • Student • Student Paper • Mass Media Coverage of the Unprecedented Events of 2020 Took a Toll on Black People’s Mental Health Conditions • Jaquela Chalise Macklin, The University of Alabama • Many scholars have done research on mental health care, but there are few studies on mental health care in the Black community, particularly how the mass media impacts the stability of Black people’s mental health. This paper focuses on using cultivation theory and conducting qualitative research by way of interviews with the intent to gain first-hand accounts from Black people about the state of their mental health and how mass media possibly impacts it.
Extended Abstract • Student • Student Paper • Black death virality: Exploring motivations of sharing Black death online • Ajia Meux, University of Oklahoma; Britney Gilmore, Texas Christian University • This study seeks to explore the relationship between locus of control, online and offline activism and sharing and forwarding behavior of videos of unarmed Black people being murdered by the police. This research is important because it attempts to define the particular sharing and forwarding behavior at the granular level of online activism based on the idea of control for a population who is often marginalized and underrepresented in more formal areas of political power.
Research Paper • Student • Student Paper • Combating the Angry Black Woman Stereotype at Work Through Demeanor and Praise • Erin Perry, Wayne State University • This visual rhetorical analysis of a viral image from a 2019 interview between CBS journalist Gayle King and singer R. Kelly uses co-cultural theory to make three arguments. First, presumptions are widely held about Black women’s demeanor in the workplace. Second, Black women are members of a co-cultural group that uses various communicative strategies to constantly resist the Angry Black Woman stereotype. Third, Black women and their allies appropriate stereotypes into opportunities for their praise.
Research Paper • Student • Student Paper • “We Just Can’t Afford Not To Be Informed”: How Women of Color are Pushing Against The Theory Of Information Poverty In The Digital Age • Chelsea Peterson-Salahuddin, Northwestern University • In line with the theory of information poverty, one could argue that women of color may face high barriers to news information seeking. However, social and political trends point to the ways women of color are highly informed. Motivated by this tension, this study engaged focus group interviews to examine women of color’s news information seeking habits. Findings suggest holding a woman of color identity does not deter, but motivates news information seeking processes.
Extended Abstract • Student • Student Paper • Shared Identity Endorsement Narratives in Political Campaigns: A framework for studying celebrity endorsements of minority politicians • Madhavi Reddi, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill • This paper introduces the concept of shared identity endorsement narratives in political campaigns of minority candidates to provide a framework for researchers to examine celebrity endorsements along the lines of shared racial/ethnic/cultural identity. Using examples of endorsements of Kamala Harris by North American celebrities of Indian descent, I outline four elements of shared identity endorsement narratives in political campaigns – 1) entertainment value, 2) engagement with identity politics, 3) timelessness, 4) solidarity and validation.
Research Paper • Student • Student Paper • The Hair Dilemma of Black Female Newscasters: Personal Preferences Versus Professional Pressures in Picking Styles • Robert Richardson, University of Texas at Austin • A growing number of Black female newscasters are embracing natural hair on television, breaking a long-established requirement for anchors and reporters of all races to have straight hair. This study asks questions about industry pressures to conform to White normative standards and individual issues of identity and expression. Interviews with 25 Black women who work as on-air talent reveal newsrooms are becoming more accepting of natural styles but there is still progress to be made.
Research Paper • Faculty • Student Paper • Perceptions of COVID-19 and BLM Protesting on Twitter • Tanya Gardner; Wei Sun, Howard University; Carolyn Stroman • “On May 25, 2020, in the midst of the pandemic crisis, an innocent Black man, George Floyd, died as a result of police brutality. This event sparked nationwide protests against racial inequality, led by the Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement. While the number of COVID-19 cases continued to increase in many states, and as businesses began to re-open, there were fears that the BLM movement protests contributed to the resurgence of COVID-19 spread (Meyer, June 1, 2020). In a time of political and racial division, people expressed their support for, or opposition to, the claim that there was a connection between the protests and the rising number of cases.
This study aims to investigate how social media users make sense of the relationship between COVID-19 and BLM, and how health disparities of COVID-19 and race have been discussed in Twitter posts. The findings of the research will increase our understanding of how social media impacts knowledge regarding public health crises.”
Extended Abstract • Student • Student Paper • Reviving the Yellow Peril Digitally: Anti-Asian Hate during The COVID-19 Pandemic on Twitter • Xue Gong, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Shanshan Jiang; Fangjing Tu, University of Wisconsin-Madison • Since the COVID-19 pandemic, Chinese and the broader Asian communities have become the target of resurgent racism both online and offline. Combining Twitter data, governmental data and COVID case data, this study uses both interrupted time series analysis and traditional time series analysis to investigate how anti-Asian sentiments in social media are systematically enhanced by a series of socioeconomic factors and discursive opportunities provided by demagogue attacks on the Asian communities. The results shed implications on building racial justice during a pandemic like COVID-19.
Research Paper • Student • Student Paper • Prescription for Change: The Erasure of Filipino Nurses from American Medical Shows • Kris Vera-Phillips, Arizona State University • This research paper explores the erasure of Filipino nurses from American medical television shows in order to highlight biases in media that lead to a scripted reality that ignores an essential community of workers who are responsible for the daily care of patients. This paper examines the relationship between Filipinos and American power structures. It will also investigate the issue of erasure in television shows through the lens of postcolonial and critical race theories.
Research Paper • Student • Student Paper • How Ethnic News Helps Shape Presidential Evaluations among Chinese Americans During the Covid-19 Pandemic • Jiehua Zhang • Ethnic media play important roles in constructing or reconstructing ethnic identity, facilitating the acculturation process, and encouraging political participation among ethnic groups. The current study looked at the moderation effects of ethnic news use in the relationships between political ideology and presidential evaluations among Chinese Americans during the Covid-19 pandemic when the virus was called “Chinese virus” by some news media and the former president. Relying on a survey of Chinese Americans conducted between October and December 2020, the study showed that while conservative Chinese Americans were more likely than liberals to approve of the former president Trump, the effects of political ideology on the presidential evaluations were diminishing for people who used ethnic media more frequently to get news.
Media Management, Economics, and Entrepreneurship Division
2022 Abstracts
Research Paper • Faculty • Configuring the usage of audience analytics on journalism practices inside Egyptian Newsrooms • Rasha Allam, The American University in Cairo • The usage of audience analytics tools has redefined the whole process of news production. This study, which focuses on six major Egyptian news organizations, examines the use and role of audience analytics on the news production practices within the different types of news organizations understudy. Based on semi-structured interviews with senior and managing editors and using the sociology of news production theory, the study found that the type of ownership is quite decisive in defining the scope of usage for the analytics tools and their roles, in addition to the political context that plays a substantial role in this matter. Results show that although the private news organizations seem more open towards audience metrics, maintaining an authoritative tone of journalism is a priority to protect the organization’s brand. Finally, reaching transnational audiences and creating a pan-Arab news hub are seen by the private news organizations as potential benefits of the analytic tools.
Research Paper • Student • What is Fair? How journalists’ dual identity, resource conservation, and power dynamics shape pay secrecy culture • Fitria Andayani, University of Missouri • A textual analysis of 49 articles from the U.S. journalism trade publications finds that pay secrecy culture is responsible for journalists’ suffering from low wages and income inequity. Moreover, the research shows how the journalists’ dual identity creates their tendency to engage with loss aversion to protect their valuable resources of job security, self-esteem, and self-efficacy. The power dynamics within the news organization also lower journalists’ bargaining power leaving the company’s pay secrecy policy undisputed.
Research Paper • Faculty • Do Four (or Five, or Six) Firms Control the American Media? Revisiting The Media Monopoly • Jon Bekken, Albright College • Exaggerated versions of Bagdikian’s Media Monopoly are ubiquitous. This paper reviews the current state of media ownership concentration. After reviewing economic concentration in the book publishing, broadband and multichannel, motion picture, newspaper, radio and television industries, I demonstrate that the dominant U.S. media firms control more than 60 percent of mass media revenue. These firms’ relentless expansion and profit-seeking, I conclude, poses an existential crisis for journalism, and for the media more generally.
Research Paper • Student • Does social capital matter to the Millennials? Social capital and user engagements in online video platforms • Jaewon Royce Choi; Sooyeon Hong, University of Texas at Austin; Junghwan Kim, Pukyong National University • User engagements in video platforms are considered critical for businesses in measuring attention. This study investigates various factors influencing online video platform user engagements in the forms of showing empathy (e.g., “like”), commenting, and sharing. A theoretical model positing mediating role of social capital and moderating role of generational difference is suggested and tested against three types of engagement. Results indicate intriguing generational effect on social capital’s role in online video platform engagement.
Research Paper • Faculty • Video Measurement and Analytics: Best Practices and Industry Challenges • Amy Jo Coffey, University of Florida; Ann Hollifield, University of Georgia • This paper explores current approaches to video measurement in the rapidly evolving media environment. In-depth interviews of media analytics executives were employed (N=13), along with secondary analysis of data. Findings indicate that best practices include responsible integration of linear and census measurement, viewer assignment modeling, new metering technologies, and the retirement of older, less accurate data-gathering practices. Remaining challenges include a proven single-source method for cross-platform measurement and the resolution of definition issues.
Research Paper • Student • Digital news business models in the age of Industry 4.0 • Mathias Felipe de-Lima-Santos, University of Navarra; Lucia Mesquita, Dublin City University • The news media industry is a sector that is greatly affected by technology and the rapid speed with which changes are taking place. The Fourth Industrial Revolution is upon us and promising to bring with it novel technologies, such as data, automation, and artificial intelligence. However, fostering innovation inside the newsroom takes place with as many hindrances and bureaucratic obstacles as possible. To address how news outlets are adopting new approaches to sustain their business, we conducted thirteen (n = 13) in-depth interviews with leading actors of news organizations in Brazil, a leading country within the Global South with a complex national reality. Our study systematically analyzes qualitative data to present technology-driven, innovative business models and technologies that will be major players in the news industry’s future. Results indicated that organizations do not rely on a unique income source but combine different sustainable models of funding. By deploying technological assets in the news business, these outlets are capable of meeting the needs of audiences and better identifying customer segments, which brings a competitive advantage to these organizations. In summary, this research resulted in responsive knowledge sharing about digital journalism’s business model that is being implemented for the next revolution.
Research Paper • Student • The Financialization of ABC: Wall Street Legitimation & the Financialized Commodity Audience, 1943–1970 • Peter Johnson, Boston University • Leveraging literature from media history and political economy, I consider how the discursive transactions between U.S. television executives and Wall Street stakeholders in the post-war period represented an overlooked “commodity audience” construction. I chart the rise of publicly-traded broadcasting stocks in the 1950s and how the encroachment of institutional investors led to broadcasting’s financialization and concentration. Specifically, I examine ABC between 1953 and 1970, when it became vulnerable to financial extraction and financialized strategies.
Research Paper • Student • Nothing routine: Television news management’s response to COVID-19, organizational uncertainty, and changes in news work. • Asma Khanom; Peter J. Gade • COVID-19 impacted broadcast news work (routine and organization level) which influenced on content. This study, guided by media sociology, explores the impact of COVID-19 on broadcast news routines and management’s organizational responses. The study includes in-depth interviews with broadcast news directors in the southern Midwest of U.S. (n = 10). The pandemic is a macro-level influence, yet the data in this study suggest its influence on news is fluid, flowing up and down among organizational, routine, and individual levels.
Research Paper • Faculty • Predicting Twitter Engagement with the Oscar-Winning Parasite: Through the Theoretical Lens of Country-of-Origin • Dam Hee Kim; Kyung Jung Han; Sungchul Lee • This study examines how 96,131 tweets in Korean and English discussed the Oscar-winning Korean film, Parasite, through the theoretical lens of Country-of-Origin (COO) and electronic Word-of-Mouth. Korean tweets used more affective COO frames (e.g., history-making) whereas English tweets used more cognitive (e.g., film quality) and normative COO frames (e.g., social norms). The number of Twitter engagement was positively predicted by cognitive and affective frames overall, but was negatively predicted by normative frames in English tweets.
Research Paper • Faculty • Teaching Media Management in International Perspective: A Comparative Content Analysis of Curricula in the US and Germany • Castulus Kolo, Macromedia University; Bozena Mierzejewska, Fordham University; Florain Haumer, Macromedia University; Axel Roepnack; Christopher Schmidt, Macromedia University; Anran Luo, Fordham University • “This study was designed to learn more about how media management education varies within national contexts of the US and Germany as well as between both countries via a content analysis of undergraduate and graduate curricula. Information about the specific course content of 34 US programs and nine programs from German universities was captured on the basis of a codebook developed for this purpose. Data shows that media management education focuses on conventional content.
Keywords: media management, education, curricula, media industry”
Research Paper • Faculty • Transboundary Cultural Economy: Spatial and Market Configurations of Cascadia’s News • Derek Moscato, Western Washington University • This study examines the news media environment of the U.S./Canada cross-border region known as Cascadia, which includes parts of British Columbia, Washington state, and Oregon. It analyzes the journalistic production processes that drive media coverage in this cross-border region. To better understand the unique dynamics of reporting about this area, the author developed case studies drawn from in-depth interviews with media practitioners from multiple news publications and outlets. Such interviews-driven cases not only inform how Cascadia is understood thematically and contextually, but also how the concept of Cascadia drives media business models and audience interest. This research explores how news media–as an outgrowth of regional communication and culture–navigate the spatial, logistical, and market dimensions of Cascadia reporting, especially as the Cascadia concept grapples with concurrent themes of politics, economy, social responsibility, and climate change. The results show that while regional media enterprises and practitioners on the whole embrace the concept and promise of Cascadia, they are increasingly constrained by logistical or economic challenges. However, emergent models of cross-border media production and dissemination provide insight into the future for Cascadia’s news enterprises.
Research Paper • Faculty • Educating effective practice of communication for sustainable development in Thailand • Ray Wang, Thammasat University • Scholarship has indicated that communication about sustainable development can have many different definitions and objectives. However, little research has discussed how higher education has prepared young professionals who aspire to work in this media management sector. Results from this study indicate that higher education may not be sufficiently preparing young professionals of these roles, and more research on the key competencies and development of young professionals should be conducted in Thailand and around the world.
Research Paper • Student • Analysis on financing efficiency of listed media companies in China from 2014 to 2018 • Changcheng Zhou • “This paper selected 118 media listed companies in mainland China as samples and analyzed their financing efficiency from 2014 to 2018, applying Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) model. On the basis of calculating the financing efficiency of all sample companies, the authors compared the financing efficiency of five sub-areas of news publishing, animation games, film and television media, marketing media and radio and television, and analyzed the changing trend of these indicators in the past three years.
Findings from the study suggest that, the overall financing efficiency of media listed companies in mainland China is low. Among the current sample, companies with pure technical efficiency account for the largest proportion. More than half media listed companies are in the increasing stage of scale returns. Based on the findings, the study also provides suggestions on how to improve the financing efficiency of media listed companies.”
Mass Communication and Society Division
2022 Abstracts
Research Paper • Student • Moeller Student Paper Competition • Purpose vs. Mission vs. Vision: Persuasive Appeals and Components in Corporate Statements • Alexis Fitzsimmons, University of Florida; Yufan “Sunny” Qin, University of Florida; Eve Heffron, University of Florida • Purpose statements persuade stakeholders of companies’ reasons for being. However, there is a lack of distinction among purpose, mission, and vision statements. This quantitative content analysis explored the differences among Fortune Global companies’ purpose, mission, and vision statements, adding to a much-needed body of literature on corporate purpose. Results provide implications for communicators who write these statements as well as theoretical implications related to rhetorical and social identification theories and organizational identification.
Research Paper • Student • Moeller Student Paper Competition • The New Media Normal: Survey-based study of COVID-19 Effects on Motivations to Consume Non-News Media • Kate Stewart, University of South Carolina • This large-scale, self-administered Qualtrics survey, based on a representative sample from 2020 United States Census Data, study specifically investigates the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, in a mediating role, on motivations to consume non-news media by having an impact on social escapism, social presence, and coping mechanisms. The scope of this analysis has relevance as a current on-going global pandemic and could be replicated to study how disasters or other pandemics affect non-news media consumption.
Research Paper • • Open Competition • News in the Time of Corona: Institutional trust, collective narcissism, and the role of individual experiences in perceptions of COVID-19 coverage • Ivy Ashe; Ryan Wallace, The University of Texas at Austin; Ivan Lacasa-Mas, Universitat Internacional de Catalunya; Q. Elyse Huang, The University of Texas at Austin • All public health crises have an element of uncertainty to them; however, even in this context, COVID-19 stands out. Trust heuristics such as institutional trust, and trust in media in particular, become more important for people seeking information. In this study, we use a cross-sectional nationally representative study of the American online population to better understand factors impacting overall perceptions of and trust in COVID-19 news. We focus on a subset of people exhibiting traits of collective narcissism, the emotional investment in an in-group such as the nation-state. We show that for core values like institutional trust and perceptions of news media in general, indices for collective narcissism may prove valuable in understanding relationships between audience perceptions and core ideological beliefs. However, in the case of individual news events where uncertainty may be high, individual components of collective narcissism (i.e. anti-elitism, general conspiracy belief, and xenophobia) remain better perception indicators.”
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • News literacy, conspiratorial thinking, and political orientation in the 2020 U.S. election • Seth Ashley, Boise State University; Stephanie Craft, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign; Adam Maksl, Indiana University Southeast; Melissa Tully, University of Iowa; Emily Vraga, University of Minnesota • The rapid spread of misinformation in the digital age has increased calls for news literacy to help mitigate endorsement of conspiracy theories and other falsehoods. This study conducted in the week before the 2020 U.S. presidential election shows that individuals with higher levels of news literacy were more likely to reject conspiratorial thinking, but also that news literacy is unevenly distributed across the population and matters more for individuals with liberal views than conservative views.
Research Paper • Student • Open Competition • Change is the only constant: Young adults as platform architects and the consequences for news • Kjerstin Thorson, Michigan State University; Ava Francesca Battocchio, Michigan State University • We examine digital platform repertoires for news among young adults. Through the lens of “digital labor,” we explore the work that young adults’ undertake to design and maintain their personal media systems, and the consequences of those practices for news use. Drawing on 30 in-depth interviews with 18-34-year-olds, including a shared reading of participants’ newsfeeds in their top three social media platforms, we develop the theoretical concept of personal platform architecture. Our findings suggest that young adults architect and maintain platform repertoires for sociality, personal interests, and emotional well-being rather than for information—but with substantial consequences for news.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • The interplay of narrative versus statistics messages and misperceptions on COVID-19 vaccine intention • Porismita Borah; Xizhu Xiao; Yan Su • Drawing on exemplification theory, we used a moderated moderated mediation model to test the relationships among message manipulation, perceived expectancies, perceived susceptibility, COVID-19 misperceptions and intention to vaccinate. Findings show that perceived expectancies mediate the relationship between message manipulation and vaccine intention. Findings indicate that among individuals with high misperceptions about COVID-19, statistical messages are more persuasive for individuals with high perceived susceptibility, while narrative messages are more influential for individuals with low perceived susceptibility.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • New Cuban-American narratives about the homeland: Moving away from traditional storylines shared by “hardliners” via Twitter • Maria DeMoya, DePaul University; Vanessa Bravo, Elon University • This study analyzed Twitter conversations about Cuba, posted between June 1, 2017, and July 31, 2020, to discover the main themes that “hardliners” and the “new Cuban diaspora” communicated about in relation to Cuba and its future. This is a relevant and timely topic because, without a Castro as the head of the Cuban government for the first time in over six decades, the international community is getting to know a different image of Cuba. In this context, the Cuban diaspora in Florida has also changed and divided into two contrasting groups: the “hardliners,” who completely oppose the Cuban government and do not want any softening in the U.S.-Cuba relationship; and a newer generation whose members do not support the government on the island but prioritize their support for the Cuban people and are in favor of building new relationships on the island. The younger community approves the travel to the island, supporting their relatives at home through remittances, and potentially ending the U.S. embargo imposed on Cuba since 1960. As the analysis of their Tweets showed, this second group is a “new Cuban diaspora” that is changing the way in which the Cuban diaspora performs its public diplomacy roles in the United States.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Misinformation and News Verification: Why Users Fact Check Suspect Content • Erik Bucy, Texas Tech University; Duncan Prettyman, Colorado Technical University • The rise of misinformation has led to a corresponding call for more investigation into the antecedents of news verification, and for improved understanding about who verifies and why. In this study we conduct a thematic analysis of participants’ open-ended responses (N = 2,938 individual thoughts, volunteered by N = 715 participants) to an online questionnaire to explore the factors that may influence individuals’ decisions to verify or not verify information they have reason to believe might be false when they are given the opportunity to do so. We investigate what themes are associated with information verification broadly, then examine the prevalence of themes when associated with several individual difference variables that previous research suggests may be impactful. Specifically, we examine the association of themes with news knowledge (high vs low), news skepticism (high vs low), and individuals’ motivations for media use (surveillance vs entertainment). Descriptive results show significant differences in the characteristics of searchers compared to non-searchers. In addition, news knowledge is a particularly potent individual difference: individuals with high news knowledge had more thoughts about the need to verify information, concerns about manipulative intent, and were far less entertained by the idea of fake news than those with low news knowledge.
Research Paper • Postdoc • Open Competition • Media Mistrust and the Meta-Frame: Collective Framing of Police Brutality Evidence Reporting on YouTube • Richard Canevez, University of Hawaii at Manoa; Moshe Karabelnik, University of Hawaii at Manoa; Jenifer Sunrise Winter, University of Hawaii at Manoa • Social media impacts the news media’s role in police accountability. This convergence produces collective framings of police violence-related evidence that requires further attention. Using a frame analysis of news outlets and content analysis of comments on YouTube, we identify frames, responses, and the collective framing that results from this converging environment. Our findings suggest a triumvirate of competing frames around police brutality, with mistrust of media complicating the role news media plays in accountability.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Who Conducts Fact Checking and Does It Matter?: Examining the Antecedents and Consequences of Fact-checking Behavior in Hong Kong. • Stella Chia, City University of Hong Kong; Fangcao Lu; Al Gunther • This study utilizes a representative survey to examine multiple ways in which people engage in fact checking in a highly divided Hong Kong. The findings showed that stronger partisans who had greater news consumption were more likely to engage in fact-checking behavior. However, frequent fact-checking behavior enhanced, rather than reduced, their beliefs in pro-attitudinal misinformation. A warning of the backfire effects of fact-checking on exacerbating opinion polarization and social division is issued.
Extended Abstract • Research Fellow • Open Competition • Extended Abstract: Exploring the Information Authentication Acts of Experts, Environmentalists, and the Public in Southeast Asia • Agnes Chuah; Shirley Ho; Edson Tandoc Jr; Peihan Yu • Drawing on the Audiences’ Acts of Authentication framework, this study explores how the public, energy experts, and environmentalists in Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore authenticate energy related information in a period of energy-related misinformation. The findings showed that the authentication behaviors across the three countries were consistent with the two-step process proposed by the framework. Individuals would turn to external forms of authentication when they were internally unconvinced of the authentication of the information.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • What Remains? The Relationship between Counterfactual Thinking, Story Outcome, Enjoyment, and Emotion in Narratives • Di Cui • Counterfactual thinking is a psychological concept. It explains the phenomenon that occurs when individuals reflectively imagine different outcomes for events that have already happened. This paper examines the application of counterfactual thinking in the field of media psychology. It examines if readers can generate counterfactual thinking in a fictional context. It also looks at the relationship between counterfactual thinking, enjoyment, and negative emotions. By conducting two experiments, the author finds readers can generate counterfactual thinking toward narrative pieces. Different story outcomes play an essential role in influencing the generation of counterfactuals. These findings indicate that counterfactual thinking can be a critical factor that impacts audiences’ understanding and reimaging stories in the long-term.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Fit Bodies that Inspire? A Qualitative study exploring perceptions of and motivations for interacting with Fitspiration content on social media • Roxanne Vos, Radboud University Nijmegen; Serena Daalmans, Radboud University, Behavioural Science Institute • The purpose of this qualitative study (N = 34 interviews) was to gain insight into the motives that underlie the interaction with Fitspiration content on social media and the personal meaning making processes surrounding this interactions. Based on the data four motives to post ‘fitspirational’ content and eight to follow the trend on social media were constructed. These give insight into the positive and negative ways participants believe Fitspiration affects them and others.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Political news personalization and the third-person effect: Examining support for restrictions on audience data collection • Lisa Farman, Ithaca College • An online survey (N=561) tested perceptions of the personalization of online political news. A third-person effect emerged: respondents believed others would be more affected by personalized political news than themselves. Those who thought others would be more affected by news personalization were also more likely to support restrictions on websites’ use of audience data to personalize news. Narcissism was a significant moderator of the relationship between perceived effect on self and support for regulation.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • The Labeling Experiment: Examining the Differential Effects of Equivalent Labels on Individuals’ Associations toward Immigrants • Juliana Fernandes, University of Florida; Moritz Cleve, University of Florida • Using a mix-methods approach, this study examines the differential effects of equivalent labels (i.e., authorized, documented, legal vs. unauthorized, undocumented, illegal) and the impact of these labels on individuals’ associations toward immigrants. Results of three studies show that those exposed to positive valenced labels produce more favorably associations of immigrants than those exposed to negative valenced labels (Study 1a), that associations tend to be quicker for labels such as illegal and slower for labels such as authorized (Study 1b), and that the interaction of association type (warmth/morality vs. competence) with association valence accounts for more variance in evaluations than labels, especially for negatively valenced associations (Study 2). Overall, the series of studies suggests a stronger influence of associations about warmth and morality compared to associations about an immigrant’s competence.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Pornography Addiction and Social Media: An exploratory study on the impact of social media on the road to porn abstinence. • Débora Martini, University of Colorado Boulder; Harsha Gangadharbatla, University of Colorado Boulder • Pornography addiction is on the rise in our society and excessive use often leads to negative life consequences. Just as other addictions, porn addiction can also be triggered by a number of factors. Of these factors, the role of social media has not been fully studied or understood. The current exploratory study uses a survey method to investigate the role of social media in porn addiction among Brazilian porn addicts. Results suggest that social media content is seen as a trigger by self-identified porn addicts and the factors that influence such perception include age of the addict, gender, and the number of times they have relapsed. And changes in behavior on social media are influenced by individuals’ perceptions of social media as a trigger.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • The Growing Influence of Political Ideology in Shaping Health Behavior in the United States • Mugur Geana, University of Kansas; Nathaniel Rabb, The Policy Lab, Brown University; Steven Sloman, The Policy Lab, Brown University • Political polarization is a growing concern in many parts of the world and is particularly acute in the US. This study reinforces previous research on long-term health consequences driven by partisanship by showing that these ideologically-driven differences manifest even more acutely in situations where the possibility of severe illness or death is immediate, and the potential societal impact is significant. The substantial implications for public health research and practice are both methodological and conceptual.
Research Paper • Student • Open Competition • Public buying behaviors during the COVID-19 pandemic: Presumed media influence and the spillover effects of SARS • Tong Jee Goh, Nanyang Technological University; Shirley Ho • Testing for a historical spillover effect, this study examined how the influence of presumed media influence (IPMI) processes differed between people with low and high perceived severity of the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), when it comes to predicting Singaporeans’ purchasing intention during the COVID-19 pandemic. Results showed that people’s presumptions of media influence on others predicted their intention to buy more. The study also found a historical spillover effect of pre-existing attitude towards SARS.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Unprecedented Times: How Journalists Coped with the Emotional Impact of Covering the COVID-19 Pandemic • Gretchen Hoak • This study explored the stress of covering the COVID-19 pandemic on journalists in the United States. A survey of 222 journalists revealed covering the story was both stressful and emotionally difficult. Females and those who were younger and less experienced perceived higher levels of stress and felt the story was more emotionally difficult than their counterparts. The repetitive nature of the coverage, interacting with victims, and public backlash for their reporting were among the top stressors. Supervisor support was associated with higher levels of work commitment and lower levels of stress. Nearly 60% of participants indicated they received no stress management or coping resources from their news organizations. Of those that did receive support options, most did not take advantage noting the resources were either not feasible or not helpful. Implications for organizational support and its impact on journalist stress are discussed.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Social Media Use Intensity and Privacy Concerns: The Implications for Social Capital • Iveta Imre, U Mississippi; Jason Cain • This study examines how SNS use intensity, specifically social routine integration and social integration and emotional routine, correlate with social capital, as well as how privacy concerns impact the relationship between SNS use intensity and social capital. Findings support that social capital correlates with both factors on the use intensity scale. Only the accuracy factor was a significant predictor of bridging capital while both accuracy and control, and collection proved significant for bonding capital.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Determination of the Factors Influencing the Third-Person Effects in Health and Environmental Concerns • Jessica Shaw, Louisiana State University; Soojin Kim, Louisiana State University; Yongick Jeong, Louisiana State University • This study examines how three personal factors (issue involvement, behavior change intention, and consumption amount) influences the third-person effect in different public issues of health and environment. By employing two measures of the third-person effect (perceived threat of public issues and perceived likelihood of participating in risky behavior), this study found that the influence of the three personal factors vary across issues and measures. Practical implications and suggestions are also discussed.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Science Podcasters and Centering Fairness in Content Creation • Shaheen Kanthawala, University of Alabama; Shupei Yuan, Northern Illinois University; Tanya Ott-Fulmore • “The podcast industry has steadily grown over the last decade and keeps showing promise for further growth. Science and science-related podcasts are a popular genre of podcasts that seem to play a role in science communication. Fundamentally, information provided through science communication is a resource, and there is often disparity in the allocation of most resources. As creators of content that could not only help, but also possibly add to this disparity, science podcasters need to be aware of their audience when developing podcasts.
Therefore, we use the fairness and justice literature to explore how science podcasters think about their audiences when creating content. We further explore how science podcasters view themselves and the role of their podcasts within the science communication space. To do this, we conducted a survey with 147 of the top science podcasters (identified from Apple Podcasts’ top rankings). Our results indicated podcasters view themselves in a connecting role between scientific information lay audiences. They hold ethical values and are mindful of principles of fairness. These findings indicate that they view themselves in the role of science communicators – a role of vital importance today. Their resources should, therefore, be harness in the future to spread science and scientific information to the general public.”
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Media Consumption, Attitudes, and #BlackLivesMatter on the Ground, Court and Field • Danielle Kilgo, University of Minnesota; Rachel Mourao, Michigan State University; Tania Ganguli, University of Minnesota • This work utilizes a nationally representative survey to explore how news media consumption of mainstream, partisan and sports news organizations and the attitudes held by audiences affect recall, negative attitudes towards protest utility, and support for Black Lives Matter. We include considerations for celebrity advocacy efforts in the NBA and NFL. We found ideological and political barriers to support for BLM, indicating conservatism has a stronger impact on protest attitudes, regardless of the tactics employed.
Research Paper • Student • Open Competition • When does the Past Colonial Memory Plug into Nationalism? Information and Media’s Priming of Anti-Japan Nationalism in South Korea and China • Jisoo Kim, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Gaofei Li, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Xining Liao, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Hernando Rojas • Underlining the importance of the respective context of nationalism, this study focuses on anti-Japan nationalism in South Korea and China, which share a similar history of being colonized by Japan. Anti-Japan nationalism has always been alive but explicitly appears in people’s attitudes and behaviors only at certain times. Our study is centered on how information regarding a painful memory of the colonial past may prime individuals to express stronger anti-Japan attitudes and behaviors. Our results suggest that our prime contextually interacts with different types of media in unique ways: in South Korea, those that use social media more often are primed to express increased anti-Japanese nationalism, while in China it is those that consume more mainstream media. Implications of our findings are discussed.
Research Paper • Student • Open Competition • Politically Contested Beliefs: Why Do Conservatives Tend to Have More Inaccurate Beliefs About COVID-19? • Tom Johnson; Taeyoung Lee; Chenyan Jia, The University of Texas at Austin • A fair amount of research showed that politically conservative people are susceptible to false claims about COVID-19. Based on the belief gap hypothesis, this study examines why conservatives have more false beliefs about COVID-19. A representative survey showed that institutional trust was associated with people’s beliefs around COVID-19. Meanwhile, conservative identity indirectly influenced having false beliefs through institutional trust. Also, support for Trump, education, and the use of conservative media predicted having false beliefs.
Research Paper • Student • Open Competition • The new yellow peril: Priming news context on attitudes towards Asian models, and brands • Lincoln Lu, University of Florida; T. Franklin Waddell, College of Journalism and Communications, University of Florida • Recent increase in incidents of violence towards Asian Americans are indicative of underlying animosity often overlooked in discussions of race. Within a news story advertising context, an online experiment (N = 372) found some evidence that consumer ethnocentrism may moderate perceptions of attractiveness for male Asian models, consumer attitudes towards the ad, brand, and purchase intention. These results provide insight into race-based stereotyping at a time of flux surrounding race in America.
Research Paper • Student • Open Competition • Informational, Infrastructural and Emotional Labor: The Extra Work in a News and Broadband Desert • Nick Mathews, University of Minnesota; Christopher Ali • This study offers a systematic qualitative investigation inside a combined news and broadband desert. Despite popular attention to both news and broadband deserts, most recently and acutely during the coronavirus pandemic, there has been no scholarly research into communities where these two deserts intersect. This article confronts this knowledge gap. Built on 19 in-depth interviews with residents of Surry County, Va., we argue that life in a news and broadband desert requires a substantial amount of labor to obtain the information and connectivity so many Americans take for granted. Our findings demonstrate three areas of increased labor for residents: (1) informational, (2) infrastructural and (3) emotional. We conclude with a discussion of life and labor in this desert, specifically, and how it may apply to similar communities across the United States.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Jessica Jones: Exploring Marvel’s Dark Anti-Hero and the Portrayal of Complex Women Characters • Newly Paul, University of North Texas; Gwendelyn Nisbett, University of North Texas • This project uses social construction of gender theory to explore transmedia narratives of Jessica Jones in the graphic novel Alias, and the Netflix television shows Jessica Jones and The Defenders. Transmedia narratives often ascribe new dimensions to characters and narratives, and we aim to compare and contrast the narratives that emerge in these spaces. Using thematic analysis, we find that Jones breaks the sexist tropes often associated with female superheroes, and exemplifies the qualities of a strong, independent woman.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Why and How People Avoid News during the Coronavirus Pandemic: An Analysis of News Repertoire • Chang Sup Park; Barbara Kaye • This study explored how the coronavirus pandemic as a large-scale news event functioned as a catalyst for news avoidance. In-depth interviews with 50 adults in South Korea in May and June 2020 revealed three reasons reconfiguring their media repertoire to ‘coronablock’ news about the pandemic: to tune out, to control information flow, and to seek positive news. The findings contribute to the understanding of news avoidance during a time of global crisis.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • The media affect them, but not me: Veteran and civilian perceptions of news coverage about U.S. military veterans • Scott Parrott; David L. Albright; Nicholas Eckhart; Kirsten Laha-Walsh • Informed by theory of the third-person effect, the present study examined civilian and veteran perceptions of news content concerning veterans of the U.S. Armed Forces, including the perceived quality and effects of news content. A national survey of adults in the United States, including veterans and civilians, documented the presence of a third-person effect in which individuals estimate that media exposure affects others more so than themselves. The effect occurred among both civilians and veterans. In addition, when asked to recall news stories about veterans, respondents often recalled stereotypical stories related to victimization/harm, heroism, charity/social support, mental illness, and violence. The results are important for veterans because the third-person effect may lead veterans to assume media content affects public perceptions of veterans, which could in turn affect veterans’ perceptions of interactions with civilians in social, employment, educational, and other settings. Put simply, veterans could act differently when they assume others are thinking they are traumatized heroes, the predominant image conveyed by U.S. news outlets.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Swapping Insults, Neglecting Policy: How U.S. Presidential Candidates Communicate About Mental Health • Scott Parrott; Hailey Grace Allen • Background. Candidates for high office in the United States of America play an important role in determining the political agenda and shaping public and mass media understanding of which issues should receive attention. Critics contend politicians rarely address mental health, despite the importance of the federal government in ensuring Americans access to quality care. Aims. Two studies sought to understand how candidates for the highest office in the U.S. — the presidency — communicated about mental health using formal (mental, depress, anxiety) and informal (crazy, insane) terminology in social media posts and debates. Methods. Two coders examined 1,807 tweets from 41 politicians who competed in the 2016 and 2020 races, plus transcripts from 47 debates during the primaries and General Elections. Results. Politicians often stigmatized mental illness, using mental health-related slang terms to insult opponents. They afforded less attention to policy and calls for action related to mental health. Conclusions. The authors offer recommendations for mental health professionals and advocates to encourage politicians to address mental health policy while avoiding stigmatizing language.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • My Pandemic News is Better Than Yours: Audience Perceptions of Early News Coverage About Covid-19 • Mallory Perryman, Virginia Commonwealth • This study focuses on how American audiences perceived news coverage during the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic in the United States. Through a survey-experiment of American news consumers (N=767) over a three-day period in mid-March 2020, we show that news consumers had positive attitudes toward their own Covid-19 news sources, but were critical about the news sources others were using to get information about the virus. Our data reveal evidence of presumed media influence, where audiences’ evaluations of pandemic news were linked to their perceptions of how news content was impacting others’ health behaviors.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • When In Doubt, Blame China: A Qualitative Analysis of Conservative Coronavirus Content on Reddit • Jeffrey Riley, Georgia Southern University • This is a qualitative content analysis examining the top content posted to the conservative, /r/The_Donald-affiliated subreddit /r/Wuhan_Flu from February 2020 until August 2020. The expectations of health misinformation and widespread downplaying of the virus were not met. Instead, /r/Wuhan_Flu deviated from Donald Trump’s public statements about the pandemic and tended to be far more alarmist than calming. Instead of health misinformation, the subreddit tended to encourage masks and social distancing. However, the results also indicate that geopolitical issues with China were the primary topic, with 217 posts containing negative language or visual images directed at China. Based on literature about radicalized digital spaces, /r/Wuhan_Flu represents the potential for dangerous real-world consequences, especially considering the increase in hate crimes against Asians and Pacific Islanders in the United States since the beginning of the pandemic.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Identity for Sale: Authenticity, Commodification, and Agency in YouTube Influencers • Aysha Vear, University of Maine; Judith Rosenbaum, University of Maine • Focusing on YouTube influencers, this study extends structuration theory into the realm of social media. Interviews, observations, and content analysis were used to explore the relationship between agency, commodification, and authenticity in influencers’ performances. Results show a need to reconceptualize structures as emergent and embodied; that authenticity and agency are inexorably linked and constrained by the commodification inherent in influencers’ performances; and that influencers face a hierarchy of choices that enable and constrain their agency.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Influencing the agenda: The role of conservative figures in melding media agendas for social media communities • Burton Speakman, Kennesaw State University; Marcus Funk • Historically, mainstream news media held significant agenda setting authority. As news and social media evolve, individual actors and digital communities have to meld and filter diverse media agendas into one curated, personal space for their followers. This article examines attempts at far right agendamelding by fringe and conspiracy-affiliated Reps. Lauren Boebert and Majorie Taylor Greene during and after their respective runs for Congress. Results suggest far right politicians can meld agendas from friendly media and their own campaigns, while rejecting mainstream agendas, to influence their Twitter community.
Research Paper • Student • Open Competition • “Infodemic” amid the pandemic: Social media news use, homogeneous discussions, self-perceived media literacy, and misperceptions • Yan Su; Porismita Borah; Xizhu Xiao • Heeding the call to address the “infodemic” in the COVID-19 crisis, this research investigates the associations among social media news use, homogeneous online discussion, self-perceived media literacy, and misinformation perceptions about the COVID-19. We use an online survey and a moderated mediation model. Results show that social media news use is positively associated with misinformation perceptions. Moreover, homogeneous online discussion was a significant mediator, such that social media news use is positively associated with homogeneous discussion, and the latter, in turn, is associated with increased misinformation perceptions. Further, self-perceived media literacy is a significant moderator for both the main and the indirect effects, such that the associations became weaker among those with higher self-perceived media literacy. Findings provide insights into the significance of information sources, discussion network heterogeneity, and media literacy education.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Attention Convergence and Narrative Coalescence: The Impact of the US Presidential Election on the Generational Gap in Online News Use • Chris Chao Su, Boston University • This study revisits the contentious role of the 2016 US presidential election in shaping news and disinformation use by contrasting usage networks of millennials and boomers, two groups with disparate preferences. Theoretically, through bringing the literature on selective exposure thesis into media events, this study advances an analytical framework to approach increased divergence and intensified polarization in the election through a sociological perspective. Empirically, this study compares the generational gap in online news usage in a typical month (Apirl-2015) and the month just before Elections (October-2016), by conducting relational analyses of shared usage for each cohort comprising all major news outlets. The analyses reveal that during the election boomers moved toward a collection of digital-native outlets that produce and disseminate political disinformation – the fake fringe – as well as more toward conservative partisan side of the news landscape. Investigating audience convergence during Donald Trump’s election, this study demonstrates that although the public tends to converge their attention in the event, the systematic divergence in consuming various narratives of the event forcefully steers to audience divergence compared to uneventful periods.
Research Paper • Student • Open Competition • Getting Inspired by Fitspiration Posts: Effects of Picture Type, Numbers of Likes and Inspiration Emotions on Workout Intentions • Yuan Sun; Nicholas Eng, Penn State University; Jessica Myrick, Penn State University • The study investigated the potential positive effects of fitspiration posts for inspiring physical exercises through a 2 (Numbers of likes: High vs. Low) x 2 (Picture type: Body transformation vs. After-only) between-subject experiment. Numbers of likes cued subjective norm, while body transformation posts elicited inspirational emotion, which mediated the effects of picture type on workout intention. Picture type and numbers of likes jointly affected descriptive norm and inspiration emotion, which led to workout intention.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Avoiding real news, believing in fake news? Investigating pathways from fake news exposure to misbelief • Edson Tandoc Jr; Hye Kyung Kim, Nanyang Technological U • This study sought to examine the potential role of news avoidance in the link between exposure to and belief in misinformation. Using two-wave panel survey data in Singapore, we found that exposure to misinformation contributes to information overload, which is subsequently associated with news fatigue as well as with difficulty in analyzing information. News fatigue and analysis paralysis also subsequently led to news avoidance, which made individuals more likely to believe in misinformation.
Extended Abstract • Student • Open Competition • Effective Health Risk Communications: Lessons Learned about COVID-19 Pandemic through the Lens of Practitioners • Taylor Voges, UGA; LaShonda Eaddy, Southern Methodist University; Shelley Spector, Museum of Public Relations; Yan Jin, University of Georgia • The study utilizes semi-structured interviews of health risk communication practitioners in the backdrop of the COVID-19 pandemic. The contingency theory of strategic conflict management is the guide to understanding the challenges and nuances. Insights gained from interviewing practitioners (projected, n=40) from different sectors with diverse professional backgrounds will help advance the contingency theory’s application in understanding the dynamics observed in times of health risks and crises threatening societal wellbeing.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Fake News in the Family: How Family Communication Patterns and Conflict History Affect the Intent to Correct Misinformation among Family Members • T. Franklin Waddell, College of Journalism and Communications, University of Florida; Chelsea Moss • Do family communication patterns or family conflict history affect the intention to correct fake news shared by family members? A pre-registered online survey (N = 595) was conducted to answer this question. Results revealed that conversation orientation and conformity orientation positively predicted the intention to correct family members, while family history was negatively related with corrective action intention. Presumed influence, by comparison, was not significantly related to corrective action. Theoretical implications are discussed.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • How do NPOs effectively engage with publics on social media? Examining the effects of interactivity and emotion on Twitter • Chuqing Dong, Michigan State University; Yuan (Daniel) Cheng, University of Minnesota – Twin Cities • “Nonprofit organizations (NPOs) are increasingly using social media to engage with publics. However, communication factors associated with effective social media use remain unclear in the nonprofit literature. Drawing from literature on public engagement, interactivity, and emotions, this study employs a computational approach to examine the effects of communication strategies on NPOs’ public engagement on Twitter (i.e., likes and retweets). By analyzing functional interactivity, contingency interactivity, and emotion elements of tweets from the 100 largest U.S. NPOs (n= 301,559), this study finds negative effects of functional interactivity on likes, negative effects of contingency interactivity on likes and retweets, but a positive effect of functional interactivity on retweets. The findings also show negative effects of emotion valence on likes and retweets but positive effects of emotion strength on likes and retweets. Using NPO type as a moderator suggests that there are varying effects of interactivity and emotion on public engagement for service-oriented and other types of NPOs. Practical implications regarding strategic social media use in the nonprofit sector are discussed.
Research Paper • Student • Open Competition • Do All Types of Warning Labels Work on Flagging Misinformation? The Effects of Warning Labels on Share Intention of COVID-19 Vaccine Misinformation • Alexander Moe, SUNY Brockport • Using a survey experiment (N = 403), this study tested the effectiveness of Twitter warning labels flagging misinformation pertaining to COVID-19 vaccines. Results showed that all types of warning labels decreased perceived credibility and share intention compared to no label condition. Moderated mediation analysis showed that vaccine hesitancy moderated the relationship between exposure to warning labels and perceived credibility while perceived credibility served as a mediator on the effects of warning labels on share intention.
Research Paper • Faculty • Open Competition • Linguistic Attribution Framing: A Linguistic Category Approach to Framing Crisis • Xiaochen Zhang, University of Oklahoma; Jonathan Borden • Based on Attribution Theory, this study proposes a linguistic category approach to framing. A 2 (language: concrete/abstract) x 3 (social identity: out-group/in-group/control) experiment in a political crisis context was used to understand linguistic framing’s effects on attribution. Main effects a) of abstract (vs. concrete) language and b) of out-group (vs. in-group) on higher attribution, future crisis occurrence and unethical perceptions of the politician were found. Implications for framing research are discussed.
Research Paper • Student • Student Competition • The Effects of Nudges on Social Media Users in the Context of COVID-19 Fake News • Wen Xuan Hor, Nanyang Technological University; Rui Yan Leo, Nanyang Technological University; Xin Jie Tan, Nanyang Technological University; Agnes Yeong Shuan Chai, Nanyang Technological University • This study examines the applicability of nudging on reducing sharing of fake news. Using a 2 (Nudge Frame – Gain vs. Loss) x 2 (Nudge Frequency – Single vs. Repeated) between-subject experiment (n = 238), results showed gain-frame nudge will lower the likelihood of sharing and confidence of news. We also examined individual-level traits, need for cognition and reactance, but found no evidence to support moderation. Theoretical and practical implications for nudging theory were discussed.
Extended Abstract • Student • Student Competition • Media Parenting Styles: A Typology of Parental Guidance of Electronic Media Use • Sarah Fisher, University of Florida • Parental guidance for children’s electronic media use varies greatly. From parents who carefully limit the content set before their children’s eyes, to parents who allow freedom for their children to explore on electronic devices. This typology provides a useful definition of a range of parental oversight styles of their children’s use of electronic media. The typology categories emerged from in-depth interviews (N=20) with parents regarding their oversight of their children’s use of electronic media.
Research Paper • Student • Student Competition • Porn and Consent: The relationship between college students’ pornography consumption, perception of realism, and sexual consent intentions • Niki Fritz • Despite sexual assault prevention education (SAPE) on college campuses, sexual assault remains a persistent issue on campuses. Student may be learning non-consensual sexual activity scripts from other sources, such as pornography. Additionally, perceived pornography realism may mediate the relationship between pornography consumption and non-consensual behavioral intentions. This national survey of 500 undergraduate students suggests pornography consumption has a strong positive relationship with non-consensual behavioral intentions and perceived pornography realism was found to mediate the relationship.
Research Paper • Student • Student Competition • From “OK Boomer” to “Boomer Remover”: A Critical Examination of Ageist Memes by Meme Factories • Si Yu Lee, Nanyang Technological University Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information (WKWSCI); Jasmon Wan Ting Hoh, National University of Singapore • Memes and meme factories are increasingly the new fronts for ageism online. Guided by the tripartite model of ageism and third and fourth age concepts, this study employed multimodal discourse analysis to analyze 98 memes from five meme factories in Singapore. An ageist portrayal of older adults in memes was found and tropes like fetishization and denigration of the old were identified. The intersectionality of ageism with gender, race, and class was also emphasized.
Research Paper • Student • Student Competition • Predictors of IS Professionals’ Information Security Protective Behaviors in Chinese IT Organizations: The Application of the Organizational Antecedents, Theory of Planned Behavior and Protection Motivation Theory Abstract • Xiaofen Ma, National University of Singapore • “Securing organizational information systems (IS) as pivotal information assets is central to achieving a strategic advantage; this is an organization-wide concern. Recognition by practitioners and researchers of the positive impact of inside work-driven protective behaviors on IS security at the organizational level has led to the establishment of a research stream focused on IS experts’ performance of protective behaviors. To contribute to the research stream, this study employs two theories: protection motivation theory (PMT) and the theory of planned behavior (TPB), and a set of work-related organizational antecedents: organizational commitment and job satisfaction, often cited in information security literature. Therefore, given the varied facets central to work-motivated information security resources, determining the relationships of each distinct PMT, TPB, and organizational aspect with IS experts’ protective behaviors is a significant contribution. Using a survey of 804 representative IS professionals in the Chinese information technology (IT) industry, we find support for several associations: (a) information security attitude and subjective norms as constituents of TPB significantly influenced the information security protective behaviors performed by IS experts; (b) the coping appraisals (self-efficacy and response cost) and threat appraisals (threat susceptibility and threat severity) of PMT were significantly predictive of IS experts’ protective behaviors toward information security; and (c) organizational factors involving organizational commitment positively impacted the protective behaviors. However, job satisfaction, and perceived behavioral control as a construct of the TPB were not associated with information security behaviors. Contributions to theory and implications for practice are discussed.
Research Paper • Student • Student Competition • The Mediated Classroom: A Grounded Theory Analysis of Live Streaming Media Affordance and Teaching Context Remodeling from The Perspective of Actor-Network-Theory • Yefu Qian, School of Media and Communication, Shanghai Jiao Tong University; Chen Li; Ruimin He • The massive and popular application of emerging media technology (such as live streaming, virtual meeting-Zoom & Google Meet) in releasing the tensions of suspended classes during the global pandemic (COVID-19) provides an entry point to visualize the role of mediatization in shaping the traditional human social practice. As the online form of teaching penetrates in college education, it is of practical significance to comprehend the mediated teaching contexts and visualize the optimization of online teaching by exploring the affordance of live streaming media which serving as an “actor” in social networks. In this paper, we apply a qualitative analysis according to the grounded theory, based on detailed interviews with 45 college students in Shanghai, to elaborate on the affordance of live streaming in shaping the online teaching in Actor-Network-Theory. Besides, we target to explore the transformation of the teaching context between media technology and social practice so that we can offer insights for the ongoing or future researches of mediatization.
Extended Abstract • Student • Student Competition • Learning by doing: The potential effect of interactivity on health literacy • Natasha Strydhorst; Sava Kolev; Philippe Chauveau, Texas Tech University; Eric Milman, Texas Tech University • This experimental study investigates the relationship between message interactivity and message comprehension, absorption, and self-reported elaboration of health information as contributors to increased health literacy about COVID-19 and the opioid epidemic. A representative population will be exposed to a stimulus of factsheets, followed by tests measuring perceived comprehension, absorption, elaboration, message processing bias, and political ideology and interest. The authors anticipate a positive correlation between interactivity level and comprehension, absorption, and elaboration scores of participants.
Research Paper • Student • Student Competition • Cancel Culture and Its Underlying Motivations in Singapore • Beverly Tan, Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information, Nanyang Technological University; Gabrielle Lee, Nanyang Technological University; Rachel Angeline Chua, Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information, Nanyang Technological University; Charlyn Ng, Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information, Nanyang Technological University • This mixed-methods study explores Singaporeans’ understanding of cancel culture and motivators of participation. Interviews defined cancel culture as public shaming on a social media platform, carried out or supported by a group of people, which aims to hold people accountable for socially unacceptable behaviour. Our survey found attitude, subjective norms, perceived behavioural control, outcome expectancy, and general Belief in a Just World as significant predictors behaviour through intention, contextualising cancel culture in Singapore’s context.
Research Paper • Student • Student Competition • A content analysis of alcohol posts from adolescents, brands, influencers, and celebrities in Facebook and Instagram’s persistent and ephemeral messages • Sofie Vranken, School for Mass Communication Research, KU Leuven; Sebastian Kurten, Leuven School for Mass Communication Research • “This content analysis examines how peers, celebrities, influencers and brands refer to alcohol in Facebook and Instagram’s persistent and ephemeral messages. The results show that: (1) all agents frequently portray alcohol posts, (2) adolescents are the sole agent to refer to moderate and extreme forms of alcohol use as opposed to celebrities, influencers and brands whom solely display moderate alcohol posts and (3) some agents (celebrities/influencers) may have a commercial motive to share alcohol posts.”
Extended Abstract • Student • Student Competition • Extended Abstract: In AI we trust: The interplay of media attention, trust, and partisanship in shaping emerging attitudes toward artificial intelligence • Shiyu Yang; Nicole Krause; Luye Bao, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Mikhaila Calice, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Todd Newman; Michael Xenos; Dietram A. Scheufele, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Dominique Brossard • Artificial intelligence (AI) has changed the way scientists make genetic edits; it has infiltrated our daily lives through the internet of things; and it is being used by law enforcement agencies to fight crime. Many of the societal questions raised in its wake cannot be answered by science. Who or what will govern this technology? How do we prevent inevitable biases in how the technology is developed and applied? In this extended abstract, we report analysis of nationally representative public opinion data and examine what factors, including attention to mass and social media, shape U.S. publics’ trust in various institutions regulating AI development, as well as how trust and political ideology interact to shape public support for AI technology.
Research Paper • Student • Student Competition • Women on-screen: Exploring the relationship between consumption of female talent shows and sexism, internalization of beauty ideals, and self-objectification in China • Yi Yang, The Chinese University of Hong Kong; Yunyi Hu, The Chinese University of Hong Kong • Will consumption of female talent shows influence Chinese women’s self-body relationship? With the framework of objectification theory, this study provides empirical evidence to this question. Using data collected from a sample of 584 females in China, this study found that female talent shows consumption indirectly promoted body-surveillance through the mediation effects of benevolent sexism, internalization of beauty ideals, and self-objectification. Implications of the findings for the reflection on female talent shows in China are discussed.
History Division
2022 Abstracts
Research Paper • Student • Evangelical Erasure?: Digital Communications Technology and the Memory of Rachel Held Evans • Karlin Andersen, The Pennsylvania State University • Rachel Held Evans was a blogger, author, and speaker who chronicled her “evolution” from a devout evangelical Christian to critic in four books, a popular blog, and multiple social media profiles before her death in 2019. Evans’ work is contextualized within the relationship between evangelicals and online technology and ends with a review of Evans’ community as of 2020. Evans’ story offers valuable insights for historians studying digital media, online communities, or public memory.
Research Paper • Faculty • Acadian Airwaves: A History of Cajun Radio • Noah Arceneaux, San Diego State University • This study explores French-language radio in southern Louisiana, particularly in the region known as “Acadiana.” This region is so named for the Acadian French who settled there in the late 1700s, a group commonly known today as “Cajuns.” Drawing from a variety of sources, this study outlines the history of this form of broadcasting, which has persisted since the beginning of radio in the region.
Research Paper • Faculty • Deadline: A History of Journalists Murdered in America • Elizabeth Atwood, Hood College • Although non-profit organizations issue periodic reports on violence directed against the media, little scholarship exists to explain why these attacks occur. Previous studies have focused primarily on volatile regions of the world, but this work looks at attacks on the news media in the United States. It identified seventy journalists who were murdered from 1829 to 2018 and offers a typology with which to categorize the violence.
Research Paper • Faculty • The effect of early journalism codes and press criticism on the professionalization of public relations • Thomas Bivins, University of Oregon • Following the end of WWI, both journalism and the nascent practice of public relations sought to establish a more professional image. The challenge to professionalize from Walter Lippmann on the one hand and Edward Bernays on the other exacerbated an already tense relationship between the two practices. While journalism reinforced its historical role, public relations attempted to elevate its occupation to a higher plane. The result was a sometimes literal battle of codes of ethics.
Research Paper • • Civil War Generals for President: Press Coverage of Rutherford B. Hayes and James A. Garfield During the Elections of 1876 and 1880 • Jack Breslin • During the 19th Century, four American “military chieftains” – Jackson, Harrison, Taylor and Grant – won the presidency. Besides their political careers, Rutherford B. Hayes and James A. Garfield also served as Union generals. By analyzing news stories and editorials during the Elections of 1876 and 1880 in selected New York City newspapers, this study examines campaign press coverage and electoral impact of the military heroism and political experience of Hayes and Garfield, who defeated General Winfield Scott Hancock.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • Extended Abstract: Targeting the trades, press associations, and J-schools: Tobacco industry mapping and shaping of metajournalistic discourses • Michael Buozis, Muhlenberg College • Drawing on archival sources, this study explores how the tobacco industry targeted journalism trade publications, professional and press associations, and journalism schools in a decades-long effort to map and shape metajournalistic discourses to their advantage. By contributing to media-to-media publications, funding and participating in conferences, and engaging in journalism “education” initiatives the industry sought to influence journalistic practices. These journalism-adjacent actors and sites are particularly vulnerable to infiltration from corporate actors and deserve more scrutiny.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • An Attempted Coup on King Coal: How The Tennessean helped reshape discourse of coal mining • Anthony Cepak, University of Tennessee – Chattanooga • Through extensive archival research, oral history and ethnography, “An Attempted Coup on King Coal” examines the reportage of journalists at The Tennessean at the beginning of the environmental movement. The activism of The Tennessean’s journalists is illustrated through the lens of photojournalist Jack Corn, as the newspaper covered issues related to the waning coal industry in Tennessee’s Clear Fork Valley, and the social, economic and environmental devastation left in the wake of its abandonment.
Research Paper • Faculty • Community Divisions and Fractures in Print: Institutional and Student Media Coverage of a 1927 High School Student Strike • Caitlin Cieslik-Miskimen, University of Idaho • Throughout the 1920s, high school students went on strike across the United States. Yet, despite the number of strikes, their size, and their geographic diversity, they’ve largely been lost in scholarship. This paper examines the longest and largest strike of the decade, and details how it unfolded in institutional media, represented by the community’s daily newspaper, and student media. It argues the strike represented a clash of narratives and revealed a series of community tensions.
Research Paper • Faculty • Where There Was a Will, AEJ Made a Way for Diversity • George Daniels, The University of Alabama • The words “Still Here” were a banner to promote Lee Barrow’s work to recruit and retain students of color in the journalism and mass communication. This paper spotlights Barrow’s work and the others in the leadership of Association for Education in Journalism (AEJ) as they operated the AEJ/New York University Summer Internship Program, created The Journalism Council to raise funds for these efforts and supported a Job/Scholarship Referral Service and career-oriented newsletter Still Here.
Research Paper • Student • The 1980s and the War on Drugs: The Media’s Declaration Against Hollywood? • Andrew Daws, The University of Alabama • What began as a crusade against countries in Latin America turned into a war on the home front – a war against drugs. The federal government was fighting to curb drug use while Hollywood was brandishing images of it. Oftentimes the media sided with the government. Critics from The New York Times were quick to point out these distinctions in films such as Scarface, Drugstore Cowboy, Fast Times at Ridgemont High, and Clean and Sober.
Extended Abstract • Student • Extended Abstract: A Socially Responsible Trade: an Analysis of Ethical Discourse in Editor & Publisher, 1930-1934 • James Fuller, UW-Madison • This paper shows the trade journal Editor & Publisher regularly discussed ethics of journalistic practice. Through an analysis of 265 Editor & Publisher journals published from 1930 to 1934, I show that newsmen were concerned about ethics in the normative practice of journalism. Further, I argue ethical conversations found within Editor & Publisher illustrate elements of the Social Responsibility Theory of the Press over a decade before its adoption by the Hutchins Commission in 1947.
Research Paper • Faculty • The Making Of “The Young Budgeter”: The American Girl Magazine’s Role in a Girl Scout’s Life During the Great Depression • Tamar Gregorian • Juliette Gordon “Daisy” Low founded the Girl Scouts and almost immediately began publishing The American Girl, arguably the most significant publication for adolescent girls at the time. Its content was reflective of societal norms for girls’ behavior. However, were economic effects of the Great Depression reflected in the content? The author, through a close reading of the magazine during that decade found the magazine avoided such content, leaving questions of the publications true influence.
Research Paper • Student • Perceptions of Progressive Era Newsgirls: Framing of Girl Newsies by Reformers, Newspapers, and the Public • Autumn Linford, University of North Carolina • As part of a larger project about news work and gender, this study focuses on the gendered experiences of Progressive era newsgirls. Newsgirls took up a disproportionate amount of public conversation during this time period, but have been mostly ignored by historians. This research suggests the image of the newsgirls was strategically framed and exploited to further reformer’s causes, bolster newspapers’ business, or excuse the public’s apathy.
Research Paper • Student • Cementing Their Heroes: Historical Newspaper Coverage of Confederate Monuments • Alexia Little, University of Georgia • Following continued conflicts about Confederate monuments in American society, this study explores Civil War memory encapsulated in newspaper coverage of four Confederate monument unveilings. Discourse and narrative analyses of 258 articles published in seven U.S. newspapers in the 1890s and 1920s examine how the American public negotiated terms of heroes, victims, and villains, largely in a hegemonic Lost Cause myth that took primacy over fact, thus distorting collective memory of the war.
Extended Abstract • Student • Extended Abstract: “By Far the Best of Our Foreign Representatives:” Vira B. Whitehouse and the Origins of Public Diplomacy • Ayla Oden, Louisiana State University; John M. Hamilton, Louisiana State University • The Committee of Public Information’s efforts during the first World War mark the beginning of American public diplomacy, but its influence has since been overlooked by scholars. The CPI owes a large portion of its overseas success to suffragist Vira Boarman Whitehouse. This paper examines the role Whitehouse played in the CPI’s efforts in Bern, Switzerland. So far, scant research has looked at Whitehouse’s role in shaping public diplomacy, and even then, diminishes the challenges she faced due to her position in a male-dominated field and how her initial efforts were marred by poor mismanagement. This paper analyzes how her role as a leader in the New York suffrage movement gave Whitehouse the skillset to serve as one of the most-accomplished CPI commissioners and trailblazers for modern public diplomacy.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • Dorothy Barclay: Mediating Parenting Advice • Diane Prusank, Westfield State University • Research on the history of the women’s pages has neglected a staple of the women’s pages, namely the information provided regarding family and parenting advice. This study begins to fill this gap by analyzing the work of Dorothy Barclay, editor of the parent and child section of The New York Times between 1949 and 1965.
Research Paper • Student • Race Films and the Black Press: Representation and Resistance • Carolina Velloso • This paper investigates Black press coverage of race films in the early twentieth century. Using archival methods and textual analysis to examine coverage in three Black newspapers, this study argues that through advertisements, film reviews, actor profiles, and production updates, Black newspapers played a crucial role in the advancement of positive screen representations of African Americans. The Black press challenged dominant media representations of African Americans and provided readers with positive examples of Black accomplishment.
Extended Abstract • Student • Title: The Image of Heroines in Advertisements of Shanghai’s Martial Arts Films during1920s-1930’s • HUANG WENLU • This paper argues that Nüxia pian such as Red Heroine displays the females’ bodies in a de-gendered way, challenging the visual culture in which females’ bodies was often seen as objects of desire by male viewers. However, in newspaper advertisements, the image of Nuxia Pian has become sexualized,implying the resurrection of the male’s desire. By discussing the disparity of image representations, the present study attempts to offer an analysis related to issues of women’s liberation in Nüxia pian.
Communication Technology Division
2022 Abstracts
Research Paper • Faculty • Aaron Atkins • The development and exploration of immersive, 360-degree virtual reality video (360VR) and its potential as a viable medium for information dissemination, has been the subject of both speculation and exploration over the last five years. As such, it becomes important to test/examine and investigate the effects the medium itself in different message contexts. This study details an experiment designed to test memory performance, persuasion and counterargument, and mediated influence in a community news context. It will use a political ideology message factor manipulation in a virtual reality, community journalism story and utilize a general public participant pool as the foundation for the study. It will also make use of the limited capacity model for motivated mediated message processing (LC4MP) as its theoretical framework. Findings include differences in memory performance between moderate and liberal participant groups, an increase in spatial presence mediated by sense of community, differences in visual and aural recall, and a ceiling effect in perceptions of journalist and message credibility. Implications and future research directions are discussed.
Research Paper • Faculty • Itai Himelboim, University of Georgia; Porismita Borah; Danielle Ka Lai Lee; Janice Lee; Yan Su; Anastasia Vishnevskaya; Xizhu Xiao • In this paper we examine Tweets related to five leading conspiracies regarding the COVID-19 pandemic. Among the 15 conspiracy elements that were coded, content that believed in the conspiracy theories were the highest; followed by malicious purpose; and content about the conspirators. Our findings from the quantitative patterns as well as from qualitative narrative coding showed the interconnections among all five conspiracy theories. Findings showed that malicious purposes and secretive actions received the highest engagement.
Research Paper • Faculty • Yuhmiin Chang • Recent survey studies have found that media multitasking had a negative effect on mood. This study, however, proposes that media multitasking can have both positive and negative effects on mood depending on the messages in the single medium. The results of the experiment demonstrate that media multitasking lead to greater mood repair through the mediation of perceived entertainment than relevant Website and lesser mood repair through the mediation of flow than Netflix sitcoms on PC.
Research Paper • Student • Ye Chen; Carolyn Lin • This study examined the effects of augmented realness and technology fluidity of (Augmented Reality)AR applications on consumers’ experience. A posttest-only between-subjects experiment was conducted to test a series of hypotheses. Findings demonstrate that both features positively influenced consumer responses through the immersion experience of flow. Specific effects on cognitive and affective response were discussed. The study contributes to theoretical building in AR marketing research and has implications to AR marketing practitioners.
Research Paper • Student • Joshua Cloudy, Texas Tech University; Jamie Banks; Nick Bowman • Artificially intelligent (AI) journalists have the potential to lower hostile media bias by activating the machine heuristic—a mental shortcut assuming machines are more unbiased, systematic, and accurate than are humans. An online experiment targeting abortion partisans found support for the prediction: an AI journalist activates the machine heuristic that, in turn, mitigates hostile media bias. This mediation effect was moderated: perceived bias was more strongly reduced as partisanship towards the issue became more extreme.
Research Paper • Faculty • Juliann Cortese, Florida State University; Mia Liza A. Lustria; Vaibhav Diwanji, Florida State University • A randomized controlled, within-subjects experiment was conducted to compare user preferences for receiving information through a tailored video website compared to a generic website. Findings suggested that participants significantly preferred the interactive video format compared to the standard format on all but two direct-comparison variables. The interactive format outperformed the generic site in terms of behavioral intentions, user engagement, user fulfillment and positive affect, with significant order effects for information evaluation and elaboration of content.
Research Paper • Faculty • KW Fu • This study empirically examines the roles of organizational and crowd activists in social movement’s action repertoires (mobilization, framing, and tactical coordination) by analyzing 4 million Telegram channel messages collected in the Hong Kong’s 2019 Anti-Extradition Law movement. The findings highlight the logic of cross-breeding metaphorically, a hyper-hybrid mode of Bennett & Segerberg’s logics of connective and collective actions, emphasizing a dynamic power-making process of the networked media in shaping contemporary social movement.
Research Paper • Faculty • Homero Gil de Zúñiga, University of Salamanca/Penn State University; Manuel Goyanes, Carlos III University; Christofer Skurka, Pennsylvania State University • Recent scholarship has devoted attention to the spread of fake news in social media, suggesting systematic viable ways to slow down the spread of misinformation. Generally, effective documented interventions rely on fake news identification and social peer corrective actions. Based on a cross-cultural, mixed method sequential design, this study further investigates 1) how citizens develop strategies to identify fake news and generate rational motivations to engage in corrective actions (Study 1, based on fifty-one in-depth adults’ interviews in Spain), and tests 2) whether traditional, social media, and fake news exposure predict taking corrective measures, as well as indirect relationships explained through individual’s news cognitive elaboration (Study 2, with US survey data). Qualitative and quantitative results highlight the distinctive news use effects over fake news corrective actions, placing some individual cognitive processes at the center of fake news counteractive behavior.
Research Paper • Postdoctoral Fellow • Zhang Hao Goh; Edson Tandoc Jr; Bin Ng • Livestreaming has gained traction in recent years, making it a billion-dollar industry. Owing to its success, most social networking sites today have integrated livestreaming functions in their platforms, as an increasing number of users broadcast, and an even bigger number watch, livestreams. What makes people watch livestreams? Studies have acknowledged how social media use (i.e., social networking) can mitigate the effects of loneliness, but due attention has yet to be given to the consumption of livestream content. Using national survey data (N = 1,606), this study demonstrates that livestream viewing has a positive influence on individuals’ well-being. Notably, the frequency of livestream viewing moderates the negative effects of loneliness on the viewers’ psychological, social, and emotional well-being. Implications of the results were discussed.
Extended Abstract • Student • PEI-CHUAN CHANG; Ying-Chia Hsu • Guided by Information Acceptance Model, this study examines information adoption in the context of social shopping by integrating two moderators, content provider motivation and social homophily. Results of structural equation modeling verify information acceptance model: As perceived information quality increases, information usefulness would also increase, boosting the likelihood of information adoption. Meanwhile, when social shoppers perceived higher similarities with the social media groups, they would be more likely to view the provided information as useful.
Research Paper • Faculty • Yu-Huay Hsu, Department of Bio-Industry Communication and Development at National Taiwan University; Shihhsien Hsu, National Taiwan University • Based on the affordance approach, this study used surveys to explore the relationship among the multi-dimensional aspects of SNS affordance (symbolic, functional, interactive), users’ perceived value, and usage loyalty. Findings indicated that site affordances contribute to perceived value and usage loyalty. Moreover, trust is a significant moderator through the mediated model of affordance and usage loyalty via perceived value. Results show that participants care about social media platforms’ offering and form value perceptions; thus, influencing their posterior behavior of commitment toward the corresponding SNSs.
Research Paper • Faculty • Li Zhong; Vincent Huang • This study explores how mobile technologies provide a communication tool to help Filipino domestic workers in Hong Kong cope with social and emotional loneliness. Findings from a survey suggest that mobile phone use was only negatively associated with social loneliness. Both problematic mobile phone use and social support mediated the negative relationship, while only problematic mobile phone use was found to mediate the positive association between mobile phone use and emotional loneliness.
Research Paper • Faculty • Liefu Jiang, Chicago State University • Through an experiment with 199 participants, this paper tested the causal relationships between perceived media reach, perceived media influence, and different levels of corrective actions on social media. Findings show that only perceived media reach can influence participants’ likelihood of taking low-level corrective actions. This paper contributes to corrective action studies by providing evidence of causality between antecedents and different levels of corrective actions, which helps researchers investigate corrective actions more accurately.
Research Paper • Faculty • Shaheen Kanthawala, University of Alabama; Jessica Maddox • “WhatsApp is a highly prevalent form of communication among people in India, with India being the app’s largest market. The app has revolutionized communication within people’s day-to-day lives in the country with discussions including a wide spectrum of topics including health. Health content on these closed platforms can have long-term and dangerous ramifications, especially since WhatsApp has often been under fire for the excessive amount of misinformation spread on the platform. In order to explore the kind of health content prevalent on the platform, we conducted 19 semi-structured, in-depth interviews with Indians over the age of 40.
Our findings highlight how most health discussions on the platform predominately involve natural remedies and alternative medication in order to build people’s immunity. However, this content is rarely verified, but people still engage with it in order to reduce feelings of uncertainty that come along with health issues (especially those in light of the COVID-19 pandemic). These ideas also give insights into the folk theories people have surrounding natural health solutions (as compared to Western medication), especially when tied together with historical and cultural narratives, and the role of the government in encouraging these beliefs.”
Research Paper • Faculty • Wonkyung Kim; Hyun Jung Oh • This study examined the process through which the quality of relationship between fans and a musician influences fans’ experience and engagement of virtual concerts. A structural equation model with the survey data collected from 248 Chinese participants highlights the importance of fan-artist relationship, perceived interactivity, presence, and enjoyment in predicting fans’ eWOM behaviors. Implications are provided on how to utilize virtual platforms and interactivity features to improve audience experience and engagement of the virtual concert.
Extended Abstract • Professional • Alex Kirkpatrick, Washington State University; Amanda Boyd; Jay Hmielowski, University of Florida • We surveyed a sample of US citizens regarding their media habits related to staying informed about artificial intelligence (AI). Results suggest that those dependent on media-systems to stay informed about AI perceive the impacts of AI to be nearer and more likely to affect people similar to them. In turn, this psychological proximity increased the chances that respondents themselves would share AI contents online. Perceived rate of technological change was found to enhance this process. Results are conceptualized in relation to Construal-level of Psychological Distances, and Media-System Dependency Theory.
Research Paper • Student • Heysung Lee, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Yibing Sun; Hernando Rojas • This research investigates relationships between engagement during live streaming, parasocial interactions (PSI), and the role of PSI as social capital promoting offline political participation, using online survey with 504 respondents in South Korea and 510 respondents in the U.S. Results shows that viewer engagement and perceived attitude homophily with the host is positively related to PSI. PSI promote political participation and political efficacy amplifies the positive effects of PSI on political participation in both countries.
Research Paper • Student • Yukyung Lee, University of Connecticut; Carolyn Lin • This study tested the effects of serial positioning of online consumer reviews on review information process and evaluation. Results suggested that consumer reviews published in the order of “lowest” to “highest” ratings alongside more positive prior brand attitude led to more systematic information processing, which was positively related to perceived review helpfulness. While perceived review helpfulness is positively associated with perceived website credibility, the latter is positively linked to intentions to shop on the website.
Research Paper • Student • Wenbo Li, The Ohio State University; Silvia Knobloch-Westerwick, The Ohio State University; Chris Cosma, The Ohio State University • News recommender system and popularity metrics (i.e., bandwagon cues) have changed how users encounter and select information. Hypotheses on resulting information exposure were derived from Sundar et al.’s (2015) TIME and Knobloch-Westerwick’s (2020) UCU frameworks. A computerized lab experiment examined how a self-representation affordance (inducing focus on self vs. others) moderates bandwagon cues’ (low vs. high numbers) impact on exposure to political messages. The results show that creating a private self-representation induced self-focus and led to more exposure to messages with high bandwagon-cues numbers than to messages with low bandwagon-cues numbers. Creating a public self-representation induced other focus and led to more exposure to messages with low bandwagon-cues numbers than to messages with high bandwagon-cues numbers. An online field study followed up and yielded similar, albeit weaker effects on information exposure. The findings underscore how user profiles and recommender systems, as on Twitter or Facebook, interact to affect information exposure.
Research Paper • Student • Fanjue Liu, University of Florida; Mo Chen; Yu-Hao Lee • Computer-generated virtual influencers today have humanlike visual representations and function like human social media influencers. Virtual influencers have been increasingly adopted as brand endorsers in influencer marketing with both successes and failures. However, little is known about how consumers would attribute the success or failure regarding virtual influencers’ endorsements. Through the theoretical lens of mind perception theory and attribution theories, this study examines how people attribute responsibility to virtual influencers when they perceive the influencer as a computer-generated virtual person versus as a human in terms of endorsement failure and success. The results of a 2 x 2 experiment showed that when the endorsement had a positive outcome, people attributed more credit to the human influencers than the virtual influencers. In contrast, when the endorsement had a negative outcome, people attributed similar responsibility levels to the human influencers and the virtual influencers. Mind perception was found to mediate the effect of source identification—virtual human versus human—on the responsibility attribution toward influencers. The findings of this research provides theoretical and practical implications for both influencer marketing and human-robot interaction research.
Research Paper • Faculty • Nancy Muturi, Kansas State University; Raluca Cozma, Kansas State University; Alec Tefertiller, Baylor University; Jacob Groshek, Kansas State University • A nationally representative online survey conducted in the United States during the initial surge of the COVID-19 pandemic examined the moderating role of civic engagement, social capital, and misinformation concerns in the relationship between media use and self-protective health behaviors. Building on the Social Exchange Theory, analyses found that while social media as a whole negatively impacts compliance with recommended health practices, certain affordances and awareness of its potential shortcomings reverse that association. Implications for theory, risk communication via traditional and social media, and public health are discussed.
Research Paper • Faculty • Mustafa Oz, The University of Tennessee Knoxville • “This study is an attempt to further understand uncivil discourse on social media platforms. Instead of solely focusing on incivility, this study distinguishes incivility from intolerance and examines these two concepts in the context of public comments on two social media platforms. More specifically, the study examines whether uncivil and intolerant comments vary based on platforms and topic sensitivity, as well as the relationship between uncivil/intolerant discourse and deliberative attributes.
According to the results, while incivility occurs in both platforms, there is a meaningful difference between Facebook and Twitter in terms of intolerant comments. Also, there is a positive relationship between topic sensitivity and intolerance. Finally, Facebook discussion 46% more likely to contain deliberative comments than Twitter discussion.”
Research Paper • Faculty • Mustafa Oz, The University of Tennessee Knoxville; Akan Yanik • Many surveillance studies used the panopticon analogy to understand the impact of government surveillance practices on political participation. In the light of Foucault’s thoughts, this study examined how the perception of government surveillance impacts Turkish social media users’ willingness to express an opinion on social media. Also, we examined whether online privacy skills and perceived majority variables moderate the relationship between perceived surveillance and willingness to speak out on social media. The results suggested that perceived surveillance is negatively related to one’s willingness to speak out. On the other hand, online privacy skills moderate the relationship between perceived surveillance and one’s willingness to speak out.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • Judith Rosenbaum, University of Maine; Benjamin Johnson, University of Florida; Jonathan Hinds • With social media seen as central to marketing, understanding how the source of a brand-related social media post impacts attitudes is critical. Building on research into electronic word-of-mouth and warranting theory, an experiment was used to compare the impact of content posted and reshared by peers, influencers, and brands on Facebook and Instagram. Results pointed to the value of third-party claims, but also revealed the interaction between the nature of the source and the platform.
Research Paper • Student • Olga Shabalina; Xiaohan Hu; Kevin Wise • Layout congruency and user experience are central predictors of visual search on social media feeds. However, our understanding of their effect on users’ online behavior and attitude towards social media platforms is underdeveloped. The present research fills this gap and explores what Pinterest users think about visual search in one-column (congruent) versus two-column (incongruent) conditions of Pinterest board layout, and how their experience primes perceived processing fluency and attitude towards visual search.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • Inyoung Shin; Hyunsook Youn • This study explores the roles of mass and social media use and personal networks in the judgment of COVID-related perceived risk among college students. Extending the impersonal hypothesis, we examine how mass media, social media, and personal networks related to college students’ risk perception at two different levels: personal and societal. Our study shows that mass media use can increase societal risk perception, whereas social media and network-related characteristics have the potential to increase both personal and societal risk perceptions.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • Brian Smith, Brigham Young University; Staci Smith; Danielle Hallows; Lauren Silva; Kateryna Kravchenko • The COVID-19 pandemic’s effects include extended use of communication technology. This study examines communication technology effects through the lens of missionaries, who faced an unprecedented new normal – the replacement of in-person proselyting with digitally-facilitated interaction. In-depth interviews with 17 participants who served as missionaries during the pandemic reveal both effects and effectiveness of communication technology, including effects on resilience mediated by uncertainty acceptance and integration of personal interest.
Research Paper • Faculty • Xu Song; Cindy T. Christen, Colorado State University • A post-test only 2x2x2 factorial between-subjects experiment was conducted to investigate the effects of gender and instant messaging experience on the organization-customer live chat communication in both schema-resonance and non-schema-resonance conditions. A convenience sample (N=261) was used. Compared to males, females used less live-chat time, demonstrated greater usage intent, and were more satisfied with live chat service, communication approach, and information provided. IM experience had a significant effect on customer intention in schema-resonance live chat.
Research Paper • Faculty • Edson Tandoc Jr; James Lee, Nanyang Technological University; Xin Ping Lee, Nanyang Technological U; Yu Xuan Joycelyn Teo, Nanyang Technological U; Chei Sian Lee, Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information, Nanyang Technlogical University, Singapore • This experimental study investigated the effectiveness of correction message sent by different group members (in-group vs out-group) and through different modes of delivery (group vs interpersonal chat) in reducing participants’ perceived credibility of online fake news. Guided by the social identity theory, this study found that correction messages sent via interpersonal channels were more effective at lowering participants’ perceived credibility of online fake news, but we found no main effect for type of sender.
Research Paper • Faculty • Jingyuan Shi; Liang Chen; Stephanie Jean Tsang • We extended the influence of presumed media influence model by taking interpersonal communication into account. Our survey (N = 642) results revealed that individuals’ attention to COVID-19 information on social media and their engagement in interpersonal communication about the disease independently and jointly affected presumed others’ attention. The more that individuals engaged in interpersonal communication, the less that their attention to mediated content factored into how they perceived others’ attention to such content. Presumed others’ attention, in turn, was positively associated with presuming that others were influenced by COVID-19 misinformation and the intention to correct, but not censor, misinformation.
Research Paper • Student • Yunwen Wang, University of Southern California; Yusi Aveva Xu; Jiaxi Wu, Boston University; Hye Min Kim, University of Southern California; Traci J. Hong, Boston University; Margaret L. McLaughlin, University of Southern California • A recent surge of e-cigarette use raised serious public concern. Drawing on Moral Foundations Theory, this study integrated computational and human strategies to disentangle vaping controversies. We conducted time-series analysis, topic modeling, classification, and chi-square tests on 2,669 public Facebook posts. Results revealed pro-vapers cited more Fairness/Cheating and Authority/Subversion than anti-vapers, while anti-vapers cited more Sanctity/Degradation. Referencing to Care/Harm as well as Loyalty/Betrayal in similar sheer volumes, the two opposing communities sometimes contextualized them differently.
Research Paper • Faculty • Yuan Wang, City University of Hong Kong; Yang Cheng, North Carolina State University • This study examines the patterns and trends of social media-related public relations (SMPR) research published in 14 journals from 2006 to 2018. It analyzes the theoretical trends (i.e., research topics, theories and theoretical models, hypotheses, and research questions), methodological trends (i.e., sample types, sampling methods, and research methods), and social media platforms used in 357 published journal articles. The results reveal the trends of SMPR articles across journal areas and stages of social media development.
Research Paper • Student • Luxuan Wang, Rutgers University; Inyoung Shin; Yi-Ta Lu • Our study examined how the unique social endorsement systems on Twitter indicating who retweets a post and how many like that post, affected perceived credibility of misinformation and sharing intention. By conducting a 2 by 2 survey experiment among 267 Twitter users, we found the relative effects of an acquaintance as a retweeter over a celebrity on misinformation credibility and retweeting intention and the presence of bandwagon cues increases information credibility and retweeting intentions.
Research Paper • Student • Yi-Ning Katherine Chen, National Chengchi University; CHIA-HO RYAN WEN, Newhouse School of Public Communications, Syracuse University • Enhancing public confidence in revolutionary technology is possibly the most consequential job of government when developing novel science, and one of the greatest obstacles is to figure out why the masses hold highly discrepant views on any specific technology. Based on previous literature, this study hypothesizes that the discordant perceptions of science arise from individuals’ intrinsic divergent world views built upon political orientations, content knowledge, perceived knowledge, and habitual consumption of scientific news. Analysing 502 survey participants, our research concludes first that the dichotomous political ideology (liberalism versus conservativism) is a feeble predictor in Taiwan’s social context and not as indicative as it is for the U.S. society. Second, content knowledge of AI predicts positive attitudes towards AI and its regulation, whereas perceived knowledge of AI predicts risk perceptions of AI. Third and finally, in accordance with content knowledge, scientific news consumption has a direct bearing on both the benefit perceptions of AI as well as its regulation support.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • David Wolfgang, Colorado State University; Manu Bhandari • Negative online reader comments on news sites can hurt journalists’ credibility but much could depend on how the comments are constructed and presented. This study considers how differences in the argument strength of negative comments and the individual’s level of media trust could influence journalist’s credibility ratings. An experimental study with 122 U.S. participants showed comment argument strength can affect a journalist’s credibility and, more importantly, media trust can influence perceived argument strength effects.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • Yuehua Wu; Jie Hu; Wu Li • Using online survey, this study examines a sample of Chinese college students to assess the relationship between online gaming intensity and real-life unethical decision-making. Results show that gaming intensity has no direct effect on unethical decision-making yet has indirect effect on it via game cheating and serial indirect effect via game cheating and moral disengagement. The relationship between these two variables is positive at low levels of peer cheating and negative at high levels.
Research Paper • Faculty • Linwan Wu, University of South Carolina; Taylor Wen, University of South Carolina • In this study, we explored the practitioner perspective of AI advertising by analyzing the articles that mention AI and its related terms from an important advertising trade publication. A computational analysis of natural language processing discovered five salient topics from these articles, including “platform/companies leverage AI in business,” “AI powers content creation,” “AI battles against human wrongdoing,” “using AI for consumer marketing,” and “exhibiting AI-involved work/cases.” We compared these topics with the existing scholarly research of AI advertising and identified the gap between academic and practitioner perspectives. Implications of this study to both researchers and professionals are discussed.
Extended Abstract • Faculty • YOWEI KANG, NTOU; KENNETH C.C. YANG, UTEP • “The convergence of mobile technologies and location-aware AR applications in museums has presented an interesting phenomenon for both researchers and practitioners to develop best practices and theoretical exploration. Particularly, the pervasive nature of mobile technologies and the heavy reliance on consumers’ locational information are two major technological advantages that make digital reality applications possible. An important question to explore is how users’ privacy concerns would affect the emerging AR applications in museums that rely on consumers’ locational information to generate location-relevant cultural contents. To better understand these relationships between consumers’ privacy concerns, consumer autonomy, and their privacy management strategies, this employed a questionnaire survey to collect empirical data from conveniently recruited 263 participants. Findings from this study did not support the role of consumer autonomy on concerns over location privacy. However, museum-goers’ own privacy concerns do predict 2 out of 3 privacy management strategies to better protect their location privacy. Theoretical and practical implications will be discussed.
Keywords: Augmented Reality (AR), Communication Privacy Management (CPM) Theory, Consumer Autonomy, Location Privacy Concerns, Privacy Management Strategies, Self-Determination Theory, Questionnaire Survey”
Extended Abstract • Faculty • Xinzhi Zhang, Hong Kong Baptist University; Dion Deng • By analyzing users’ real-time comments on the video streaming platforms—known as Danmaku comments—the present study advances research on co-commenting and distinguishes co-commenting based on the same time (two users sending comments at the same time) versus co-commenting based on the same timeline point (two users sending comments at the same points of the video’s timeline). Two co-commenting networks based on users’ danmaku commenting on Bilibili are constructed and analyzed.
Research Paper • Student • Ying Zhu; David Silva, kent State University; Michael Beam, kent State University • Internet censorship and VPN restrictions prevail in mainland China. This study investigates factors influencing overseas Chinese VPN users’ attitudes toward censorship and VPN use guided by theories of the third-person effects and social norms. Results show that third-person effects, injunctive norms, and censorship attitudes influence people’s VPN use. Both injunctive and descriptive norms influence censorship attitudes. Chinese social media use impacts people’s injunctive norms while U.S. social media use influences both injunctive and descriptive norms.
Research Paper • Student • Annalise Baines; Muhammad Ittefaq, University of Kansas; Mauryne Abwao • Using echo chambers as a framework, we analyzed 400 Parler posts using the hashtag #COVID19Vaccine and #NoCovidVaccine to understand users’ discussions through text analytics approach. Findings reveal five themes: reasons to refuse the COVID-19 vaccine, side effects of the COVID-19 vaccine, population control through the COVID-19 vaccine, children getting vaccinated without parental consent, and comparison of other health issues with COVID-19. Findings suggest users adopted various terms to express their beliefs regarding the COVID-19 vaccine.
Extended Abstract • Student • Jaewon Royce Choi; Sharon Strover, University of Texas at Austin; Soyoung Park, University of Texas at Austin; Mackenzie Schnell, University of Texas at Austin • This study examines relatively understudied aspect in disinformation research: affective nature of contents. We investigate the visual elements of images used in the Facebook ads purchased by Russian Internet Research Agency (IRA). Following systemic functional visual semiotic theory, visual elements of gaze, social distance, and efficacy statement were coded for images in IRA Facebook ads. Multiple regression analysis reveals significant joint effects of these visual elements and political leaning of ads on IRA ad engagements.
Extended Abstract • Student • Lingbo Gan; Peng Xu • This study examines the types and motivations of Chinese elderly adults using social media to share health information through in-depth interviews. Chinese elderly adults tend to share health information about healthcare and specific diseases through group and private chats with their strong relationships. This study concludes five motives for Chinese elderly to share information, and categorizes them according to relationships and information appeal. The cultural traits and local psychology behind the behaviors are also discussed.
Research Paper • Student • Ashley Hedrick • This paper uses interviews with 15 One Direction fanfiction writers on Wattpad.com to learn more about the interactions between Wattpad’s technological affordances and fans’ erotic writing about “bad boy” characters. Fanfiction bad boys often mistreat women, sometimes escalating to sexual coercion. While the popularity of erotic writing decreased teen girl writers’ internalized stigma regarding sex, some young writers learned to seek out bad boys in real life romantic relationships.
Research Paper • Student • Mengru Sun, Zhejiang University; WEI HUANG; Wencai Hu • The proposed perception-behavior linkage effect in present study bridges the gap between perceptions of social media affordances and behaviors, shedding new light on how disclosure perceptions may trigger communication behavior in CMC. Based on Hyperpersonal communication model, it was found that asynchronicity indirectly influence the self-disclosure processes through the affordance of editability, whereby the intensified perception of asynchronicity (or anonymity) could lead to stronger perception of editability as well as more amount of disclosure and depth of disclosure. Meanwhile, the relationship between perception of asynchronicity (or anonymity) and perception of editability was contingency depend on the frequency of social media use. More specifically, suggested by cognitive load theory, the working memory would decay the self-disclosure amount as the increase use of social media. The results are critical to understanding the dynamics and opportunities of self-disclosure in social media services that vary levels of identification and types of audience.
Research Paper • Student • Muhammad Fahad Humayun, U of Colorado-Boulder • Previous research has concluded that online social network sites (SNS) may be benefiting their users by connecting and communicating with others (Donath & Boyd, 2004; Subrahmanyam & Greenfield, 2008) while there is also a growing body of research focusing on social media and privacy concerns (Bode, 2012). In this study, we aim to demonstrate that privacy concerns might limit political participation online using a convenience based sample. Through previous literature review, we hypothesized that a) Individual privacy concerns will predict lower levels of online political participation, b) Individuals’ privacy concerns will predict lower levels of the political use of Facebook, c) Individuals’ privacy concerns will predict higher levels of the political use of Instagram d) Individuals’ privacy concerns will predict lower levels of the political use of Twitter. Results show that the privacy concerns of citizens predict lower political participation on the Internet in general along with Facebook and Twitter but predict higher participation on Instagram.
Extended Abstract • Student • Fanjue Liu, University of Florida; Mo Chen • COVID-19 is fundamentally changing the way people connect, collaborate and socialize. With the ongoing pandemic amplifying people’s feeling of loneliness, technology has been integrated into peoples’ lives and used to solve challenges induced by social distancing and quarantines. Specifically, voice assistants are growing as a pandemic-era staple. Combining the uses and gratification approach and three-factor theory of anthropomorphism, this study investigates the psychological factors underlying the interaction between users and voice assistants that motivate users to anthropomorphize voice assistants, and tests whether the lack of sociality during COVID-19 pandemic motivates people to regain the feeling of connectedness through anthropomorphizing voice assistants.
Research Paper • Student • Muira McCammon • This study examines how government agencies negotiate and navigate what is appropriate for users acting on behalf of the U.S. administrative state to say. It traces the digital labor of government employees tasked with intervening when official government social media accounts amplify inappropriate content. The analytical framework proposed—government content moderation—is meant to extend understandings of how digital workers at government institutions negotiate the continued importance of information technology in promoting organizational identity.
Research Paper • Faculty • Emily McCaul, Virginia Tech; Jocelyn Hotter, Virginia Tech; Jess King, Virginia Tech; Jenna Davis • Brands increasingly utilize Instagram influencers as a digital marketing tool, because influencers have shown to be effective in engaging customers by offering them relatability and trustworthiness online via digital communication, as suggested by source credibility theory. This study seeks to explore the questions: How do Instagram users identify an Instagram influence, and what factors communicate to the consumer that a user carries “influence?” In this experiment, a 2×2 factorial design is used to present participants with two visual cues: follower counts and verification badges. Then, participants’ attitudes towards the product, attitudes towards the influencer and purchasing intentions are measured via a questionnaire. The results of this study found no significant interactions between the independent variables (i.e., follower count and verification badge) and the attitude towards the product, attitude towards the influencer’s credibility, or purchasing intention. These results carry implications for source credibility of influencers, as this study suggests, that perhaps follower count and verification badges do not play as big of a role in determining an audience’s trust and relatability to an influencer.
Research Paper • Student • Anneleen Meeus, KULeuven • This cross-sectional study examined how preadolescents’ different (i.e.,real and false) online self-presentation strategies are associated with their appearance-related perceptions. Results (n=638;52.4% girls,Mage=10.94,SDage=0.85) showed that when preadolescents engaged in more truthful self-presentations, they also felt more positive about their appearance. A significant moderation effect was found for social feedback, with the association becoming stronger as online popularity (e.g., likes) increased. Conversely, false self-presentation was negatively related to appearance-related perceptions, while no significant interaction effect was found.
Research Paper • Student • Jessica Wyers, Louisiana State University; Ayla Oden, Louisiana State University • Although the divide in terms of technological access has largely been flattened, there remain large disparities in digital and online privacy literacy. Individuals with lower rates of digital literacy are often more vulnerable to online surveillance and privacy invasion threats. Using 2019 data collected by the Pew Research Center, this study investigates how digital literacy can play a mediating role in the perceived understanding of online institutional threats by the government and private companies.
Extended Abstract • Student • Giang V. Pham, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign • This study examines the process through which flow absorbs media users’ attentional resources and results in a cost of time and effort for goals outside of the flow-inducing activity. An eye-tracking experiment is conducted to observe how video game players– who were assigned a single goal or multiple goals– allocate their attention to the game vs. to external cues. The findings will enhance the understanding of flow’s negative aspects and technology that alleviates flow costs for users.
Research Paper • Student • Caleb Porter, Brigham Young University; Camilla Owens; Ljubica Ivanović • Clubhouse is a new anonymous, audio-only, invitation-only communication technology. In the year since its inception it has amassed an enormous following. The current study seeks to build foundational knowledge on Clubhouse user’s motivations for use, in accordance with the Uses and Gratifications theory. A big data, computational content analysis was performed using text mining to evaluate the conversation surrounding Clubhouse on Twitter. Results showed “communication utility” and “exclusivity,” among others, as key motivators for use.
Research Paper • Student • Mingzhen Megan Tan; Bing Ming Woo; Dilys Ting Ying Woon • This study investigates the role of multimodal disinformation and fact-checks on message credibility and the intention to share disinformation online. Using the Heuristic Systematic Model (HSM) to control for variables that could impact credibility perceptions, this study features a 2 x 2 factorial design conducted on a Singapore sample (N = 205). The results show that multimodal fact-checks are more effective than monomodal fact-checks in debunking disinformation, with its impact mediated by message credibility.
Research Paper • Student • RYAN TAN, Pennsylvania State University; Cheng Chen • Discord is a videogame-related social platform allowing gamers to join or host and customize chat servers. Customization allows each server to have a unique interface design. With the thousands of servers currently run by players and various corporations, why are some Discord servers more popular than others? We explored these questions through an online experiment (N = 130) coupled with a content analysis of Discord servers’ interface elements at varying levels of popularity. We discovered that players perceived lower community-building opportunities in the presence of automated role assignment and role restricted channels but these perceptions were elevated in the presence of hierarchical roles in the member-list and voice channels. These perceptions of community-building further influenced users’ attitudes and behavioral intention towards the server. These findings have theoretical implications for building an integrated model of new technology adoption as well as practical implications for building better platforms for game communities.
Research Paper • Student • Dongya Wang; Yang Liu • The prevalence of masculinity on gay dating apps has negative impacts on gay men’s mental health. When cruising on gay dating apps, gay men often encountered the representation of masculinity from other users, which in turn provoked their own masculinity consciousness. Given masculinity consciousness’ association with internalized homophobia, gay dating apps use may further deteriorate gay men’s mental health. However, few studies have been conducted in the Chinese context. The current study utilized an online survey to examine how gay dating apps use influenced gay men’s depressive symptoms in the Chinese gay community in the neoliberal era. Eventually, 236 eligible participants were recruited via snowball sampling. The results demonstrated the positive relationship between gay dating apps use and users’ depressive symptoms. Moreover, the mediation effect that masculinity consciousness and internalized homophobia respectively had on gay dating apps use and depressive symptoms were demonstrated. Those findings called for attention to the negative impact of heave gay dating apps use, the prevalence of masculinity consciousness and internalized homophobia had on users’ mental health.
Research Paper • Student • Wenting Yu • The actions that news audiences take to verify news bear great theoretical and practical relevance to journalism and communication studies. In existing literature, there is no standardized scale for measuring news verification behavior. The purpose of this study is to develop and to validate a multidimensional scale of news verification. The model is developed based on U.S participants, and then validated with Sweden samples. The results show that news verification can be considered a hierarchical factor (of second-order), which consists of three lower-order factors: message elements, social cues, and third-party sources. This model is the first news verification behaviour measurement scale developed with validation in communication research.
Research Paper • Student • Ali Zain, University of South Carolina • This study uses the theory of planned behavior to predict individuals’ intentions to quit social media. Attitude, subjective norms and perceived behavioral control significantly predicted intentions to quit social media, accounting for 68 percent of variance among participants (N = 525) representing the US census data. Political partisanship and belief in misinformation were also slightly increasing predictability of the TPB, indicating that they can be used as moderators or antecedents of subjective norms in future.
Research Paper • Faculty • Yulou Jiang, Beijing Normal University; Wanci Li, Beijing Normal University; Jing Lu, Beijing Normal University; Yicheng Zhu, Beijing Normal University; Anan Wan, Kansas State University • Combining gamified interfaces with popular online influencers, Social Livestream Shopping (SLS) has emerged recently as a powerful format of online marketing in East Asian societies and the West. This paper explores the effect of gamification and influencer perception on Chinese college students’ competitive arousal and impulsive buying tendency. Building on S-O-R model and Competitive Arousal Model, our path analysis found gamification and influencer perception influences competitive arousal through the mediation of immersion.
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