Tips from the AEJMC Teaching Committee

Drones: Just Another Tool

By Mary T. Rogus
AEJMC Standing Committee on Teaching
Associate Professor
E.W. Scripps School of Journalism
Ohio University

(Article courtesy of AEJMC News, July 2017 issue)

“Drone journalism? I didn’t know they could write.” Sometimes it takes someone completely unattached to journalism to cut right to the heart of an issue. Suddenly the thousand or so words already written to make a point seemed superfluous, but since they’re written, here they are.

Two summers ago, a television station in my local market, Columbus, OH, received one of the FCC waivers to operate a drone for commercial purposes (before the licensing rules were adopted). With great promotional fanfare, the drone was named and launched. Every night on the evening news there was at least one story with drone video and multiple live aerial shots for weather, traffic or beauty bumper shots. Only about one in four of the stories effectively used or needed the drone video, and the weather and traffic shots were no better than those the station already had from tower and traffic cameras.

I was immediately transported back to my years as a television news producer when some shiny new piece of technology came into our newsroom, and we were tasked with finding ways to use it. I vividly remember the frustration, shared by many, of having to kill legitimate stories so we could go to one more “Sky-7” chopper shot for breaking news, that often wasn’t news at all.

That same “finding ways to use our new technological toy” attitude seemed to be the focus of drone classes presented at a recent academic conference for educators in broadcast and digital media. We heard all about what equipment to buy, and teaching students to operate drones and pass the certification test. One class even received a grant to buy kits for each student to build his or her own drone. But it wasn’t until we got to ask questions that there was any mention of ethics, or when and why to use drone video.

There is no question that drones already are enhancing video journalism in the same way that helicopters did in the 1970’s and 80’s. It’s difficult to remember the days when we covered floods, tornado and hurricane damage, wild fires, crop damage from droughts, etc. without helicopter cameras. And that view from above provides an important perspective to coverage of marches and protests, while also being safer for journalists on the ground. More important, drones make aerial photography and videography accessible to a much wider range of journalism outlets because they are less expensive to own and operate.

Getting certified to fly a drone and having the skills to shoot video or pictures with it would be a valuable extra for a journalism student entering the job market. But the essential skill is knowing when drone video or pictures are the best way to visualize a story and when they are simply a distraction. You do not need to be a certified Apple trainer to edit a compelling video story. You do not need to know how to take apart and put together a Sony XDCAM to shoot good video stories.

University of Nebraska’s Drone Journalism Lab and University of Missouri’s Drone Journalism Program have the right idea in training students and professionals to use drones as one tool for visual storytelling. Both run regular workshops (although Missouri also is now teaching a full class) and have a professional staff, with certified and experienced pilots to operate and maintain the drone equipment. They have developed drone operation manuals, with safety and ethics prominently discussed. They also do what journalism schools should do with new technology — experiment and research the ways it can help journalists tell better stories. In addition, Poynter partnered with UN’s Drone Journalism Lab, Google News Lab and the National Press Photographers Association to provide intensive three-day workshops on using drones for journalism.

The Professional Society of Drone Journalists (yes, there is one!) developed what it calls a layered approach to drone ethics, layered on top of existing ethics codes from organizations such as SPJ, RTNDA and NPPA. There are five layers creating a pyramid — the foundation of the pyramid is Newsworthiness and the top of the pyramid is Traditional Journalism Ethics:

• Traditional ethics. “As outlined by professional codes of conduct for journalists.”
• Privacy. “The drone must be operated in a fashion that does not needlessly compromise the privacy of non-public figures…”
• Sanctity of law and public spaces. “A drone operator must abide by the regulations that apply to the airspace where the drone is operated whenever possible…”
• Safety. “A drone operator must first be adequately trained in the operation of his or her equipment. The equipment itself must be in a condition suitable for safe and controlled flight….”
• Newsworthiness. “The investigation must be of sufficient journalistic importance to risk using a potentially harmful aerial vehicle. Do not use a drone if the information can be gathered by other, safer means.”

As journalism educators, we struggle with the journalistic value and ethical considerations, not to mention the skills learning, of constant technological innovation. A digital editor for the New York Times provided very helpful advice during a Poynter seminar on the Future of Journalism. As we eagerly asked which software and hardware we should be teaching our students, he said, “None! Any technology they use in college will be obsolete by the time they enter the job market.” Instead he urged us to always emphasize the story. Then get them so adaptable to changing technology, that when they have an idea for a story element, it’s second nature to google search for the freeware tool they need and find the YouTube video that teaches them how to use it. The first thing I did when I got back to my office was delete every step-by-step cheat sheet I had painstakingly created for the tools my students use.

Sources:
PSDJ Code of Ethics for Drone Journalists, http://www.dronejournalism.org/code-of-ethics/
Poynter, https://www.poynter.org/
The Drone Journalism Lab, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, http://www.dronejournalismlab.org/

Teaching Corner

Mass Communication and Society 2015 Abstracts

Open Competition
Building Social Capital. The Role of News and Political Discussion Tie Strength in Fostering Reciprocity • Alberto Ardèvol-Abreu, University of Vienna; Trevor Diehl, University of Vienna; Homero Gil de Zúñiga, University of Vienna • This study explores the role of news and discussion network tie strength in developing the social and civic norm of reciprocity. It argues that interactions of mutual benefit and exchange are an outcome of media use and political discussion, which in turn, directly leads to an increase in community connectedness and social capital. Informational uses of media directly predicted attitudes of reciprocity and social capital, though only conversation with weak ties led to reciprocity.

News Media Literacy and Political Engagement: What’s the Connection? • Seth Ashley, Boise State University; Adam Maksl, Indiana University Southeast; Stephanie Craft, University of Illinois • Scholars and educators have long hoped and assumed that media education is positively related to pro-social goals such as political and civic engagement. Others worry about the possibility of alienation and disengagement. With a focus on news, this study surveyed 537 college students and found positive relationships between news media literacy and current events knowledge, political activity and internal political efficacy. News media education should be deployed widely to mitigate a news media literacy gap that limits democratic citizenship.

Reducing stigmatization associated with alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency • Michelle Baker, Juniata College • Differences in response to three written narratives designed to reduce stigmatization associated with the genetic condition alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency (AATD) were examined. Three protagonists were depicted: positive, transitional, and transformational. Positive protagonists, who did not stigmatize a person diagnosed with AATD, showed greater stigmatization reduction than transitional and transformational protagonists. Positive protagonists showed reduced advocacy for individuals to maintain secrecy about their diagnosis or withdraw from others and increased advocacy to educate others about AATD.

Beyond Empathy: The Role of Positive Character Appraisal in Narrative Messages Designed to Reduce Stigmatization • Michelle Baker, Juniata College • The psychological processes guiding the effect that protagonists in narrative health messages have on genetic stigmatization reduction has not been fully explored. This study (N = 170) empirically tests these processes in relation to positive, transitional, and transformational protagonists in messages designed to reduce stigmatization associated with alpha-1 antitrypsin deficiency. Findings reveal that positive character appraisal rather than empathy with the protagonist led to greater self-efficacy, transportation, and decreased desire for social distance.

Let Go of My iPad: Testing the Effectiveness of New Media Technologies to Measure Children’s Food Intake and Health Behaviors • Kim Bissell, University of Alabama; Lindsey Conlin, The University of Southern Mississippi; Bijie Bie; Xueying Zhang; Scott Parrott • This field experiment with just under 100 children at a school in the Southeast examined children’s use of an iPad app as a means of improving the measurement of their food consumption. Secondarily, external factors related to children’s food preferences and food consumption were also examined to determine how the iPad app could be further developed to help them become more aware of the foods they ate and also how they could become more proactive in their health and well-being. Results indicate that the app has enabled children to have more precision in recording the foods they ate, and children, across the board, expressed great appeal for the app. The foods reported in the app were compared to attitudes toward eating and nutritional knowledge; in both cases, more positive attitudes toward eating and stronger nutritional knowledge meant that a child was more likely to report eating healthy foods. Findings from this exploratory study contribute to knowledge in several areas because the findings represent the first of its kind in the discipline. No study, to our knowledge, has examined the usefulness of iPad app in recording children’s food intake, and no study, to our knowledge, has compared the recording of food consumption using traditional measures and the newer measures found on the app. Additionally, we learned a good bit about external factors that could be related to low-income children’s consumption of healthy or unhealthy foods.

Looking for the Truth in the Noise: Epistemic Political Efficacy, Cynicism and Support for Super PACs • Justin Blankenship, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; Daniel Riffe; Martin Kifer, High Point University • Using a statewide cell and landline telephone survey (N=594) this study examines relationships among political efficacy, epistemic political efficacy (EPE), cynicism and North Carolina voter attitudes toward super PACS that have emerged as key players in political campaigns since the Citizens United decision. While older, higher-income, conservative voters support allowing super PACs to play a role in political campaigning, results also indicate that cynicism and EPE are related to support for super PACs.

Sensation Seeking, Motives, and Media Multitasking Behaviors • Yuhmiin Chang • This study examines the motives behind media multitasking, along with the relationships among sensation seeking, motives, onset timing behaviors, and frequency of media multitasking. An online survey recruited a total of 938 valid respondents across three regions and four universities. The results showed that the motives for media multitasking are different from other types of multitasking. The motives either perfectly or partially mediate the effect of sensation seeking on two types of media multitasking behaviors.

The effects of race cue and emotional content on processing news • Heesook Choi; Sungkyoung Lee, University of Missouri; Frank Michael Russell, University of Missouri School of Journalism • This experimental study with 2 (race cue) x 2 (emotional content) mixed design examined the effects of race and emotional content in news stories on discrete emotions, transportation, intention to share the story, and policy support. The results showed that stories with race cues elicited greater anger compared to those with no cues, and presence of emotional content led to greater anger and fear, and greater intention to share than those with no emotional content.

Underestimated Effect on Self but Overestimated Effect on Other: The Actual and Perceived Effects of Election Poll Coverage on Candidate Evaluations • Sungeun Chung, Sungkyunkwan University; Yu-Jin Heo, Sungkyunkwan University; Jung-Hyun Moon, Sungkyunkwan University • The present study investigated biases in the perceived effect of election polls by comparing it with the actual effect of election polls for those who experienced a bandwagon effect and those who experienced an underdog effect respectively. An online survey with a manipulated poll result (N = 308) showed that voters tended to underestimate the level of change in their evaluation and voters tended to overestimate the level of change in others’ evaluation.

The Effects of News Exposure, Amount of Knowledge, and Perceived Power of Large Corporations on Citizens’ Self-Censorship in SNS • Sangho Byeon, Dankook University; Sungeun Chung, Sungkyunkwan University • The present study investigated whether self-censorship regarding large corporations in SNS is affected by media exposure, the amount of knowledge, and perceived power of large corporations. A nationwide survey was conducted in South Korea (N = 455). As exposure to the news about large corporations increased, self-censorship regarding large corporations increased. The effect of media exposure was mediated by the amount of knowledge about large corporations and perceived power about large corporations.

There Goes the Weekend: Binge-Watching, Fear of Missing Out, Transportation, and Enjoyment of Television Content • Lindsey Conlin, The University of Southern Mississippi; Andrew Billings, University of Alabama • Binge-watching—the act of consuming multiple episodes of a TV show in a single sitting—has become increasingly popular among TV audiences. The current study sought to define and investigate binge-watching in terms of transportation theory and the outcomes associated with entertainment consumption (transportation and enjoyment). Additionally, the personality traits of transportability and fear-of-missing-out (FoMO) were analyzed. Results indicated that personality traits were strong predictors of the pace at which a person would choose to watch a TV show, while transportability and FoMO both predicted that a person would choose to binge-watch existing episodes of a TV show in order to catch up to live episodes. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Romance and Sex on TV: A Content Analysis of Sexual and Romantic Cues on Television • Elise Stevens, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; Lu Wu, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; NATALEE SEELY, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; Francesca Dillman Dillman Carpentier, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill • Content analyses of sexualized content have been done with television shows, movies, and music videos. However, little research has analyzed content in ways that specifically differentiate between sex and romance. Therefore, using a content analysis with popular television programs, we examine sexual and romantic depictions, as well as whether or how sexual risk and responsibility depictions appear alongside other depictions of sex and romance. Twelve programs were analyzed by a total of three coders. The most prevalent sexual or romantic talk dealt with harming/ending a romantic relationships and liking/loving a person romantically. The most prevalent sexual or romantic behavior was light romantic kissing or touching. The dominant category in risk and responsibility was a show of an unwanted pregnancy; mentions of STIs or contraceptives were notably absent. Interesting, most scenes depicting risk and responsibility involved sexual talk or behavior, whereas risk/responsibility was hardly mentioned within the context of romance.

Seeking out & avoiding the news media: Young adults’ strategies for finding current events information • Stephanie Edgerly • This study uses in-depth interview data from 21 young adults to identify their strategies for locating current events information in the high-choice media age. During the interviews, participants responded to six hypothetical vignettes by articulating the steps they would take to find current events information. The data revealed two strategy patterns—one set of strategies that directly involved the news media, and another set that avoided the news media in favor of functional information alternatives.

NGOs, hybrid connective action, and the People’s Climate March • Suzannah Evans; Daniel Riffe; Joe Bob Hester • Studies of civic engagement through social media have often focused on horizontal, leaderless, and spontaneous demonstrations. Formal NGOs, however, have also moved into this space and combined their knowledge of classic collective action with the affordances of digital media to create a hybrid approach to civic engagement. Using Twitter data from the 2014 People’s Climate March, this study examines how successful NGOs were in penetrating the digital public sphere with their chosen messages.

Are You Connected? Evaluating Information Cascades in Online Discussion about the #RaceTogether Campaign • Yang Feng, The University of Virginia’s College at Wise • In the context of online discussion about the recent Starbucks’ Race Together cup campaign, this study aims to explore the central users in the online discussion network on Twitter and the factors contributing to a user’s central status in the network. A social network analysis of 18,000 unique tweets comprising 26,539 edges and 14,343 Twitter users indicated five types of central users: conversation starter, influencer, active engager, network builder, and information bridge. Moreover, path analysis revealed that the number of people a Twitter user follows, the number of followers a user has, and the number of tweets a user generates within a time period helped a user increase his/her in-degree connections in the network, which, together with one’s out-degree connections in the network, propelled a user to become a central figure in the network.

Expanding the RISP Model to Politics: Skepticism, Information Sufficiency, and News Use • Jay Hmielowski, Washington State University; Michael Beam, Kent State University; Myiah Hutchens, Washington State University • This study extends the research on skepticism and information insufficiency in several ways. First, this study tests the assumption that skepticism correlates with needing additional information about an issue. Second, it examines the relationship between insufficiency and news use by looking at the relationships between insufficiency and use of four media variables. Third, it examines whether the relationship between information sufficiency and use of these four outlets varies by political ideology. Lastly, this study puts these variables into a mediated-moderated model to understand whether there is an indirect effect of skepticism through information sufficiency, and whether this indirect effect varies by political ideology. We test these models using survey data from a quota sample collected during the 2014 US midterm elections.

Ambivalence and Information Processing: Potential Ambivalence, Felt Ambivalence, and Information Sufficiency • Jay Hmielowski, Washington State University; Myiah Hutchens, Washington State University; Michael Beam, Kent State University • Using cross-sectional data from the 2014-midterm elections in the US, this paper proposes a serial mediation model looking at the relationship between ambivalence and information processing. Results show that ambivalence is associated with higher levels of systematic processing of information and lower levels of heuristic processing of information. However, the benefits of ambivalence only occur when people feel the psychological discomfort associated with ambivalence (i.e., felt ambivalence) and people perceiving that they do not have enough information to competently participate in the election. In essence, there is a positive relationship between potential ambivalence and systematic processing of information through felt ambivalence and information sufficiency. We found a negative relationship for potential ambivalence on heuristic processing through the same two intervening variables.

The Effect of Partisanship on Changes in Newspaper Consumption: A Longitudinal Study (2008 – 2012) • Toby Hopp; Chris Vargo, University of Alabama • This study used three waves of General Social Survey panel data and a latent change score modeling approach to explore the relationship between partisanship and newspaper consumption across time. The results suggested that prior levels of partisanship were negatively and significantly related to newspaper consumption. Further analyses failed to identify a relationship between changes in partisanship and changes in newspaper consumption.

Narratives and Exemplars: A Comparison of Their Effects in Health Promotions • Zhiyao Ye; Fuyuan Shen; Yan Huang, The Pennsylvania State University • The study aims to compare the effects of narrative and exemplars in health promotions. A between-subjects online experiment (N =253) showed that although narratives were perceived as more convincing than exemplars, both message types had significant effects on issue attitude and behavioral intentions. However, the mechanisms underlying their persuasive effects were distinct. While identification and transportation mediated narrative effects, they did not mediate the influence of the exemplar message.

Diverting media attention at a time of national crisis: Examining the zero-sum issue competition in the emerging media environment • S. Mo Jang, University of South Carolina; Yong Jin Park, Howard University • Although scholars theorized that news topics compete against one another and are subject to the zero-sum dynamics in the traditional media, little research tested this with social media content. Analyzing datasets of Twitter, blogs, and online news, we found that media attention to the government related negatively to attention to another target for blame. This zero-sum principle prevailed in mainstream and social media. Time-series analyses hinted at the intermedia influence from mainstream to social media.

Erasing the scarlet letter: How media messages about sex can lead to better sexual health • Erika Johnson, University of Missouri; Heather Shoenberger, University of Oregon School of Journalism and Communication • This study explores how positive media messages about sex could lead to better sexual health in young adults. Participants were students at a large university (N = 228). The research found that young women have higher stigma, lower sensation seeking, and higher condom embarrassment than young men and media exposure could lessen negative sexual behavior. The conclusion is that positive mediated messages could lead to better sexual health for young women in particular.

Life Satisfaction and Political Participation • Chang Won Jung; Hernando Rojas • This study examines people’s happiness and satisfaction both as an individual assessment of one’s own life and relates them to communication antecedents and political outcomes. Relying on a national representative sample of Colombia (N= 1031), our results suggest life satisfaction and quality of life are positively related to civic participation, but not to protest activities. Furthermore, only quality of life predicts voting and material satisfaction is negatively related to civic engagement.

Sexualizing Pop Music Videos, Self-Objectification, and Selective Exposure: A Moderated Mediation Model • Kathrin Karsay, University of Vienna, Department of Communication; Joerg Matthes, U of Vienna • This article presents an experimental study in which young women were either exposed to pop music videos high in sexualization or to pop music videos low in sexualization. Women’s self-objectification and their subsequent media selection behavior was measured. The results indicate that exposure to sexually objectifying media content increased self-objectification, which in turn increased the preference for sexually objectifying media content. Self-esteem, the internalization of appearance ideals, and BMI did not influence these relationships.

The State of Sustainability Communication Research: Analysis of Published Studies in the Mass Communication Disciplines • Eyun-Jung Ki, The University of Alabama; Sumin Shin, University of Alabama; Jeyoung Oh • This study examined the state of organization sustainability communication research in the mass communication disciplines between 1975 and 2014. Several main findings evolve from this analysis: (1) exponential growth of sustainability studies in recent years (2) contributions of a wide range of scholars and institutions (3) prevalence of environmental issues as a topic of research (4) under-development of definitions, conceptualization, and theoretical foundations (5) the growth of the methodological and statistical rigors.

A Reliable and Valid Measure of Strategic Decision • Eyun-Jung Ki, The University of Alabama; Hanna Park; Jwa Kim, Middle Tennessee State University • The goal of this investigation was to construct a comprehensive instrument for measuring strategic decision. Based on a literature review, eight dimensions—decision quality, decision routines, procedural rationality, understanding, decision commitment, procedural justice, affective conflict, and cognitive conflict—were developed to measure strategic decision by applying the development of multiple-item measurement procedures suggested by Churchill (1979) and Spector (1992) as a guideline and philosophy. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) validated the constructed measures.

Predicting Time Spent With News Via Legacy and Digital Media • Esther Thorson, Missouri School of Journalism; Eunjin (Anna) Kim, University of Missouri; Roger Fidler, University of Missouri • A model of is proposed to help explain how much time people will spend with legacy and digital media for news, and mobile media for non-news use. The model is tested with a national U.S. telephone sample of more than 1000 adults. News Affinity predicts news use across the media. Incumbent Media Habit Strength, instead of influencing digital media negatively, increases it. The more digital devices people own, the more they use smartphones and tablets for news, but not Web news. A new variable, Professional Journalist Importance is correlated with news use, but when demographics are controlled, its effect disappears.

The Impact of Political Identity Salience on the Third-Person Perception and Political Participation Intention • Hyunjung Kim, Sungkyunkwan University • This study investigates the influence of political identity salience on the third-person perception of polling reports and political participation intention. Results of two studies demonstrate that partisans in the political identity salience condition show greater third-person perception differentials between the in- and out-groups than those in the control group. Findings also show that political identity salience is indirectly linked to voting intention through the third-person perception particularly for the supporters of a losing candidate.

Factors and Consequences of Perceived Impacts of Polling News • Hyunjung Kim, Sungkyunkwan University • This study investigates how third-person perception of polling news is linked to behavioral intention change directly and indirectly through emotions by employing a survey experiment. Findings demonstrate that the third-person perception of polling news is associated with behavioral intention in two opposite directions depending on participants’ predisposition, and the association may be partially mediated by pride particularly for those who support the majority opinion. Implications of the findings are discussed.

Investigating Individuals’ Perceptions of Anti-Binge Drinking Message Effects on Self versus on Others: The Theoretical Implications for the Third-Person Perceptions • Nam Young Kim, Sam Houston State University (SHSU); Masudul Biswas, Loyola University Maryland; Kiwon Seo, SHSU • What makes people undervalue the impact of health campaign messages that promote positive behavioral changes? In the context of anti-binge drinking Public Service Announcement (PSAs), this study explores what happens if people’s prior alcohol consumption control beliefs and message attributes interactively cause dissonance, which make them feel uncomfortable and cognitively disagree with the PSAs. A 2 (Fear Appeal: High vs. Low) X 2 (Controlled-Drinking Belief: High vs. Low) experiment revealed that participants who experienced dissonance tended to estimate a greater PSA effect on others than on themselves (i.e., third-person effects) because of psychological defensiveness. The findings have partial and theoretical implications for future studies on third-person perceptions and persuasion.

Beauty or Business Queen– How Young Women Select Media to Reinforce Possible Future Selves • Silvia Knobloch-Westerwick, The Ohio State University; Melissa Kaminski, Ohio State University; Laura E. Willis; Kate T. Luong, The Ohio State University • Young women (N = 181, 18-25 years) completed a baseline session, four sessions with selective magazine browsing (beauty, parenting, business, and current affairs magazines), and three days later a follow-up online. Their possible future selves as romantic partner, parent, and professional at baseline affected the extent to which beauty, parenting, and business pages were viewed. In turn, possible future selves as romantic partner and professional were reinforced through selective exposure to beauty and business magazines.

Memory Mobilization and Communication Effects on Collective Memory About Tiananmen in Hong Kong • Francis L. F. Lee, Chinese University of Hong Kong; Joseph Chan • People in a society share collective memories about numerous historical events simultaneously, but not every historical event is equally salient in the minds of individuals, and social processes may influence the salience of specific historical events over time. This study examines the implications of memory mobilization, defined as the organized efforts to bring the collective memory about the past or specific past events to the fore for the purposes of social mobilization, on recall of historical events. Memory mobilization is treated as a process involving communication activities via a wide range of platforms, creating an atmosphere of remembering for the historical event. Focusing on the case of Hong Kong people’s memory of the 1989 Tiananmen incident in Beijing, this study finds that more people indeed recall Tiananmen as an important historical event during the period of memory mobilization. Recall of Tiananmen is related to age cohorts and political attitudes. But during memory mobilization, communication activities, especially those involving interpersonal interactions, also significantly lead to recall of the event.

Predicting Tablet Use: A Study of Gratifications-sought, Leisure Boredom and Multitasking • Louis Leung, The Chinese University of Hong Kong; Renwen Zhang, The Chinese University of Hong Kong • Using a probability sample of 348 tablet users, this study found that relaxation, information seeking, fashion/status, and work management were instrumental reasons for tablet use, while social connection anytime/anywhere, large screen, and ease-of-use were intrinsic motives. Contrary to what was hypothesized, leisure boredom was not significantly linked to tablet use. Relaxation was the strongest motivation to predict multitasking with the tablet; however, people tend not to engage in cognitively unproductive multitasking.

What’s in a Name? A Reexamination of Personalized Communication Effects • Cong Li, Univ. of Miami; Jiangmeng Liu, Univ. of Miami • Personalized information has become ubiquitous on the Internet. However, the conclusion on whether such information is more effective than standardized information looks somewhat confusing in the literature. Some prior studies showed that a personalized message could generate more favorable outcomes than a standardized one, but others did not (sometimes with an almost identical study design). To provide a possible explanation why there existed such conflicting findings and conclusions in the personalized communication literature, the current study tested the moderating effect of involvement on personalization in an advertising context. Through a 2 × 2 × 2 between-subjects experiment, it was found that the superiority of a personalized message over a standardized message was much more salient when the message recipient was highly involved with the focal subject of the message than lowly involved.

The Link Between Affect and Behavioral Intention: How Emotions Elicited by Social Marketing Messages of Anti-drunk Driving on Social media Influence Cognition and Conation • Chen Lou, Michigan State University; Saleem Alhabash, Michigan State University • This study used a 3 (emotional tone: positive vs. negative vs. coactive) x 3 (message repetition) within-subject experimental design to investigate how affect elicited from persuasive messages may influence cognitive processing and behavioral intention. This study explicated the mechanism underneath the affect-attitude-behavioral intention relationship, and identified the process of how and in what circumstance emotional responses to persuasive messages could affect behavioral intentions via its effect on people’s attitude. Specifically, this study showed that people’s emotional responses elicited by negative emotional anti-drunk driving social marketing messages was effective in persuading them to refrain from driving while tipsy or drunk via affecting their attitude toward drunk driving.

The information exchangers: Social media motivations and news • Timothy Macafee • Individuals visit social media for a variety of reasons, and one motivation involves information exchange. The current study explores the relationship between individuals’ demographics, their information exchange motivations on social media and the extent to which they attend to different news media. Using a United States representative survey sample, the results suggest a strong, positive relationship between information exchange motivations and attention to news.

Media and Policy Agenda Building in Investigative Reporting • Gerry Lanosga, Indiana University Media School; Jason Martin, DePaul University • This examination of American investigative journalism from 1979 to 2012 analyzes a random sample (N=757) of 22,163 questionnaires completed by journalists for annual investigative reporting contest entries. This novel data source uncovers aspects of journalistic process rather than static product, resulting in methodological and empirical advances that better explain journalist/source relationships, policy outcomes, and agenda-building interdependence. A model for predicting policy agenda-building results based on attributes of investigative reporting is proposed and tested.

News framing and moral panics: Blaming media for school shootings • Michael McCluskey, University of Tennessee-Chattanooga; Hayden Seay • School shootings have triggered moral panics responses that blame popular media for real-world violence. Analysis of news coverage following 11 school shootings identified five frames, of which four reflect a moral panics perspective identifying popular media as a threat to society. Frames of media affect society, media help us understand the shooter, media are full of odd material and media behaved irresponsibly fit a moral panics approach, while media behaved responsibly provided an alternative perspective.

Closing of the Journalism Mind: Anti-Intellectualism in the Professional Development of College Students • Michael McDevitt; Jesse Benn • This paper represents the first attempt to measure anti-intellectualism in journalistic attitudes, and the first to document developmental influences on student anti-intellectualism. We propose reflexivity as a conceptual foundation to anticipate how students evaluate intellect and intellectuals in relation to an imagined public. While transparency in public reflexivity appears to sanction anti-intellectualism, craft reflexivity offers a resistant orientation conducive to critical thinking.

Identifying with a Stereotype: The Divergent Effects of Exposure to Homosexual Television Characters • Bryan McLaughlin, Texas Tech University; Nathian Rodriguez, Texas Tech University • Scholars examining homosexual television characters have typically come to one of two conclusions, either exposure to homosexual characters leads to increased acceptance, or homosexual characters serve to reaffirm negative stereotypes. We resolve these differences by introducing the concept of stereotyped identification – the idea that cognitively identifying with fictional characters can increase acceptance of minorities, while reinforcing stereotypes about how they look, act, and talk. Results from our national survey provide support for this hypothesis.

Processing Entertainment vs. Hard News: Cognitive and Emotional Responses to Different News Formats • Sara Magee, Loyola University-Maryland; Jensen Moore, Manship School of Mass Communication, LSU • How millennials process news is crucial to determining the growth of future news audiences. This 2 (message content: entertainment news/hard news) X 12 (message replication) experimental study found millennials not only encode and store entertainment news better, it is also more arousing, credible, and positive than hard news. Results are interpreted using Lang’s Limited Capacity Model of Mediated Motivated Message Processing. Our results suggest new ways of thinking about the Hardwired for News Hypothesis.

Effects of Embedding Social Causes in Programming • Pamela Nevar, Central Washington University; Jacqueline Hitchon, University of Illinois-Urbana Champaign • Cause placement is a recent extension of the advertising strategy, product placement. This research examined the roles of cause involvement and message sidedness on the persuasiveness of cause placement in primetime entertainment programming. Two experiments found that high cause involvement (vs. low) tended to produce more favorable attitudinal responses and behavioral intentions. When cause involvement was high, one-sided messages triumphed over multi-sided messages; when cause involvement was low, multi-sided messages tended to be more persuasive.

The They in Cyberbullying: Examining Empathy and Third Person Effects in Cyberbullying of Young Adults • Cynthia Nichols, Oklahoma State University; Bobbi Kay Lewis, Oklahoma State University • The 21st century has seen rapid technological advances. Although these advances bring a multitude of benefits, there are also drawbacks from the technology that has become an integral part of daily life—such as cyberbullying. Although online bullying has becoming as common as in-person bullying, cyberbullying is not understood nearly as much as its counterpart. Due to its characteristics, it can be hard to recognize, prevent, or stop online bullying. Certain characteristics have emerged in cyberbullying research as indicators of bullies—lack of empathy toward cyberbullying, lack of parental mediation, high social media use, and third person effects toward the impact of media. The following paper looks to explore the relationships between these variables. Data (N=436) indicated that young adults believe other people are more susceptible to bullying than themselves, empathy influences attitudes toward cyberbullying, and athletes are more empathetic toward others being cyberbullied.

Commercialization of Medicine: An Analysis of Cosmetic Surgeons’ Websites • Sung-Yeon Park, School of Media and Communication, Bowling Green State University; SangHee Park, Bowling Green State University • This study examined the homepages of 250 cosmetic surgeons’ websites. Common elements on the webpages were pre-identified as indicators of medicalization or commercialization and their presence and salience were examined by focusing on the service provider, service recipients, and the practice. Overall, the providers were highly medicalized and moderately commercialized. The recipients were moderately medicalized and commercialized. The practice was moderately medicalized and highly commercialized. Implications for doctors, regulators, and consumer advocates were discussed.

Women with disability: Sex object and Supercrip stereotyping on reality television’s Push Girls • Krystan Lenhard; Donnalyn Pompper, Temple University • We respond to critical neglect of disability representation across mass media by evaluating characterizations of women who use wheelchairs on the U.S.-based reality show, Push Girls. Content analysis and a hermeneutic phenomenological theme analysis revealed findings which suggest that Sex object and Supercrip stereotypes enable producers to create programming for audiences otherwise repelled by images of women using wheelchairs. Implications of stereotype use for audiences and the disabilities community are offered.

Disclosure or Deception?: Social Media Literacy, Use, and Identification of Native Advertising • Lance Porter; Kasey Windels, Louisiana State University; Jun Heo, Louisiana State University; Rui Wang, Louisiana State University; YONGICK JEONG, Louisiana State University; A-Reum Jung • The rise of native advertising presents a number of ethical issues for today’s audiences. Do social media audiences recognize native advertising as paid messaging? Does media literacy make a difference in this ability to distinguish editorial and user generated from paid advertisements? An eye-tracking experiment found that while most can identify native advertising, certain types of native advertising are more difficult than others to identify and that Facebook is not fully disclosing paid content.

Impact of Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood and active mediation on preschoolers’ social and emotional development • Eric Rasmussen, Texas Tech University; Autumn Shafer, Texas Tech University; Malinda Colwell, Texas Tech University; Narissra Punyanunt-Carter, Texas Tech University; Shawna White, Texas Tech University; Rebecca Densley, Texas Tech University; Holly Wright, Texas Tech University • 127 children ages 2-6 either watched or did not watch 10 episodes of Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood over a two-week period. Those in the viewing condition exhibited higher levels of empathy, self-efficacy, and emotion recognition, under certain conditions. Without exception, children benefitted from watching the show only when their viewing experiences were frequently accompanied by active mediation. Preschoolers’ age, income, and home media environment also influenced children’s reactions to exposure to the show.

Probing the role of exemplars in third-person perceptions: Further evidence of a novel hypothesis • Mike Schmierbach, Pennsylvania State University; Michael Boyle • Despite strong evidence of its existence, the third-person perception remains incompletely understood. This paper expands previous research that added an important variable to models explaining perceived influence: availability of exemplars. Employing a 2 x 2 experiment and a diverse U.S. sample (N = 523), the study confirms that this variable is a robust predictor regardless of thought-listing procedures or primes shown to reduce the heuristic reliance on media examples.

Portable Social Networks: Interactive Mobile Facebook Use Explaining Perceived Social Support and Loneliness Using Crawled and Self-Reported Data • mihye seo; Jinhee Kim, Pohang University of Science and Technology; Hyeseung Yang • The present study examines if Facebooking using mobile devices could generate gratifying social relationships and contribute psychological well-being. Matching crawling data with self-reported data from mobile Facebook users, this study found that more social interactions mobile Facebook users had with their friends and faster friends’ reactions to users’ postings increased mobile Facebook users’ perceived social support and ultimately alleviate their loneliness. Implications of living in always on and connected mobile society are discussed.

Keeping up with the audiences: Journalistic role expectations in Singapore • Edson Tandoc, Nanyang Technological University; Andrew Duffy, Nanyang Technological University • Scholarly work on journalistic role conceptions is growing, but the assumption that what journalists conceive of as their roles depend in part on what they believe audiences expect from them remains underexplored. Through a nationally representative survey (N=1,200), this study sought to understand journalistic role expectations in Singapore. The study found that Singaporeans, in general, expect their journalists to serve the public, the nation, and the government—and in that order.

What did you expect? What roles audiences expect from their journalists in Singapore • Edson Tandoc, Nanyang Technological University; Zse Yin How • This study seeks to understand the role expectations Singaporeans have for their journalists. Ten categories of role expectations emerged from the analysis of open-ended responses from a nationally representative survey of Singaporeans (N= 1,200). Some role expectations, such as the disseminator and interpreter, were conceptually similar to earlier typologies of journalists’ own role conceptions. But two new roles emerged: protector of the people, and being a good citizen. The role of cultural context is discussed.

And they lived happily ever after: Associations between watching Disney movies and Romantic beliefs of children • Merel van Ommen; Madelon Willems; Nikki Duijkers; Serena Daalmans, Radboud University; Rebecca de leeuw • Disney movies are popular among children and depict a world that is very romantic. The question is what role popular Disney movies play, as a cultivating resource. This survey study (N=315) aimed to explore if Disney’s depictions of romance are related to children’s romantic beliefs, as assessed by the Romantic Beliefs Scale. Findings fromregression analyses are the first to show that the more children watched Disney movies the stronger they endorsed the ideology of romanticism.

Issue publics, need for orientation, and obtrusiveness: A model on contingent conditions in agenda-setting • Ramona Vonbun, University of Vienna; Katharina Kleinen-von Königslöw, University of Zurich; Hajo Boomgaarden, University of Vienna • This study investigates the role of contingent conditions in the agenda-setting process introducing issue public membership as a mediating factor in opinion formation. The model is tested on five issues, based on a content analysis of 28 media outlets and a panel study in the context of a national election. The findings hint to a stable public agenda, NFO as an important antecedent in the agenda-setting process, and a mediating role of issue public membership.

Turned off by Media Violence: The Effect of Sanitized Violence Portrayals on Selective Exposure to Violent Media • T. Franklin Waddell, Penn State University; Erica Bailey; James D. Ivory, Virginia Tech University; Morgan Tear; Kevin Lee; Winston Wu; Sarah Franis; Bradi Heaberlin • The current study examined whether prior exposure to non-sanitized media violence affects viewers’ subsequent preference for violent media. Exposure to traditional, sanitized media violence increased the likelihood of selecting a clip that featured the prevention of violence and decreased the likelihood of selecting a clip that featured retributive violence. Our study thus offers the novel finding that exposure to some forms of media violence can actually inhibit, rather than foster, additional exposure to violent media.

Minnie Mouse, Modern Women: Anthropomorphism and Gender in Children’s Animated Television • Stephen Warren, Syracuse University; YUXI ZHOU, YUXI ZHOU; Dan Brown; Casby Bias, Syracuse University • This study examines the extent to which anthropomorphism influences gender representation of characters in children’s television programs. Results revealed that anthropomorphic characters were presented more physically gender-neutral than humans, and observed female characters were underrepresented. No significant differences were found between anthropomorphic and human characters in terms of personalities and behavior. The researchers propose that because physical appearance is more ambiguous, anthropomorphic characters’ personalities and behaviors may be overcompensated to make their gender clearer.

Social Media, Social Integration and Subjective Well-being among Urban Migrants in China • Lu Wei; Fangfang Gao, Zhejiang Univesity • As Chinese urban migrants are increasingly dependent on new media, particularly social media for news, entertainment, and social interaction, it is important to know how social media use contributes to their social integration and subjective well-being. Based on an online survey, this study revealed that social media use can indeed contribute to urban migrants’ social integration, particularly their perceived social identity and weak social ties, but helps little with strong social support and real-world social participation. While social media use can indeed influence urban migrants’ subjective well-being, different types of use may have different effects. Finally, urban migrants’ social integration, particularly their level of social identity, is significantly associated with their subjective well-being.

Blogging the brand: Meaning transfer and the case of Weight Watchers • Erin Willis, University of Memphis; Ye Wang, University of Missouri – Kansas City • Brand communities are becoming increasingly more popular online. The current study examined the Weight Watchers online brand community to understand the role consumer engagement plays in shaping brand meaning and how brand meaning is transferred through consumer-generated content. Social and cultural meanings are discussed. Practical implications for online brand strategy are included and also how to engage consumers with content delivered through brand communities.

Exemplification in Online Slideshows: The Role of Visual Attention on Availability Effects • Bartosz Wojdynski, University of Georgia; Camila Espina, University of Georgia; Temple Northup, University of Houston; Hyejin Bang, University of Georgia; YEN-I LEE, University of Georgia; Nandita Sridhar, University of Georgia • Although research has shown that human examples in news stories wield a high level of influence on the way users perceive story content, the role of attention in these effects has not been tested. Furthermore, it is not clear if exemplification effects identified in traditional linear story forms extend to newer news formats that are more list-based. An eye-tracking experiment (N=87) examined the effects of content type (human exemplar/ no exemplar) and exemplar distribution (early / late / evenly distributed) in online health news slideshow stories on visual attention, exemplar availability, issue perceptions, and behavioral intent. Results showed that the presence of exemplars early in a slideshow significantly increased visual attention throughout the slideshow. Furthermore, availability of slide topic was highly significantly correlated with perceived persuasiveness of slide topic. Implications of the findings for the extension of exemplification theory and the production of list-based informational content are discussed.

Credibility Judgments of Health Social Q&A: Effects of Reputation, External Source, and Social Rating • Qian Xu, Elon university • Social Q&A websites have gained increasing popularity for health information seeking and sharing. This study employs a 2×2×2 between-participants experiment to explore the effects of three interface cues in health social Q&A – reputation, external source, and social rating – on credibility judgments of the answerer and the answer. The study discovered that different cues contributed to different dimensions of perceived answerer credibility. The three cues also complemented each other in influencing perceived answer credibility.

A Multilevel Analysis of Individual- and Community-Level Sources of Local Newspaper Credibility in the United States • Masahiro Yamamoto, University of Wisconsin-La crosse; Seungahn Nah • Existing research has identified salient individual- and community-level factors that systematically account for variations in audience credibility of news media, including an audience’s political orientation, media use, social and political trust, community structural pluralism, and political heterogeneity. The purpose of this study is to test whether audiences’ perceptions of local newspaper credibility are explained by these theoretical variables, using a multilevel framework. Data from a community survey in the United States show that structural pluralism is negatively related to local newspaper credibility. Data also reveal that conservative ideology, social trust, and political trust significantly predict local newspaper credibility. Implications are discussed for the production of news content.

The Need for Surveillance: A Scale to Assess Individual Differences in Attention to the Information Environment • Chance York, Kent State University • Individuals vary with regard to their need to psychologically attend to the information environment, including the information provided by immediate surroundings, interpersonal relationships, and news media. After I outline theoretical explanations—both biological and cultural—for individual differences in environmental attention, I develop a unidimensional scale called Need for Surveillance (NSF) to measure this construct. I show that NSF predicts news use and adhering to the correct news agenda. Implications for media effects are discussed.

Student Competition
Social Pressure for Social Good? Motivations for Completing the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge • Jared Brickman, Washington State University • The incredibly successful ALS Ice Bucket Challenge dominated social media in summer 2014. This study, guided by the ideas of diffusion, peer pressure, and concertive control systems, explores the motivations for participating in the challenge using interviews and a survey of more than 300 undergraduates. Logistic regression revealed that peer pressure, charitable intent, and a lack of perceptions of negativity surrounding the event were all significant predictors of participation.

A New Look at Agenda-Setting Effects: Exploring the Second- and Third-level Agenda Setting in Contemporary China • Yang Cheng, University of Missouri • Through two separate studies in a Chinese context, this research tests and compares the second- and third-level agenda setting effects, examines the differences between the explicit and implicit public agendas. A total of 1,667 news media coverage and 680 effective public surveys are collected and analyzed. Evidence from both studies shows strong attribute agenda setting effects at the second- and third-level, no matter the focus of issue is obtrusive or unobtrusive. Results also demonstrates that the media agenda is positively associated at a higher level with the implicit public agenda than the explicit one.

The silencing of the watchdogs: newspaper decline in state politics • Juanita Clogston • This paper analyzes the pattern in newspaper closures in state capitals to help assess the impact on democracy from the declining watchdog role of the media over state politics. Findings reveal papers in state capitals are at 1.7 times greater risk of failure than papers not in state capitals from 1955 to 2010. Based on analysis of 46 failed papers, risk factors included PM circulation and being one of two papers in the capital.

Sourcing health care reform: Exploring network partisanship in coverage of Obamacare • Bethany Conway, University of Arizona; Jennifer Ervin • Social network analysis was used to examine source use in coverage of the health care reform by CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC. While 72% of sources were unique to a particular news organization, findings indicate that in the three months prior to the bill’s passage similarities existed across networks. Further, MSNBC was much more varied in their source use. Correlations amongst sources and networks change in magnitude and significance over time.

Above the Scroll: Visual Hierarchy in Online News • Holly Cowart, University of Florida • This study considered the usefulness of hierarchical presentation of news content. It compared the news content presented as the top story on five major news website homepages three times a day for one month. Results indicate some level of agreement on what to present as the top story as well the use of conventional visual cues to identify those stories.

Outpouring of success: How the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge engaged Millennials’ narcissism toward digital activism • Andrea Hall, University of Florida; Lauren Furey, University of Florida • Jumping off the popularity of the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge, a survey of 500 Milliennials explores how social media use could lead to narcissistically induced activism. Results revealed a strong correlation between social media use and narcissism, and motives for participating were supported by social comparison theory. Results also revealed that participating in the ALS campaign was perceived as activism, which suggests it behaved as a bridge between traditional and digital activism.

Visual gender stereotyping and political image perception • Tatsiana Karaliova, Missouri School of Journalism; Valerie Guglielmi; Sangeeta Shastry; Jennifer Travers; Nathan Hurst • This online experiment aimed to explore the impact of visual stereotypical and non-stereotypical representations of political candidates on young voters’ political image perception and voting intention. It confirmed the existence of predispositions about male and female political candidates in the evaluation of their practical and emotional traits. Gender had a significant effect on how the candidates were evaluated for practical traits and type of representation had a significant effect on how they were evaluated for emotional traits.

Selfies: True self or Better Self?: A qualitative exploration of selfie uses on social media • Joon Kyoung Kim, Syracuse University • Despite of increased popularity of selfies on social media, little is known about media users’ uses of selfies. Understanding social media users’ uses of selfies in terms of self-presentation is fundamental because use of individuals’ own pictures on social media can be an important mode of self-expression. Use of selfies on social media can be useful for examining individuals’ self-presentation because an individual’s picture on his or her profile is most frequently exposed to other users on social media, it can be used to examine how individual users express themselves. The purpose of this research is to explore how social media users use selfies and perceive them. In-depth interviews were conducted to collect data from social media users in a university in the Northeastern United States. A snowball sampling strategy was used to recruit eleven participants because this study aimed to research certain users who post or share their selfies on social media. In addition, because most social media users who frequently use selfies belong to younger generation such as teenagers, this study focused on young college students who aged 19 to 22 from different majors. Four themes emerged from analysis of in-depth interview data. Selective exposure, frequency, extraversion/introversion, and feedback management emerged under the major theme of impression management. These themes explain how social media users use their selfies to give favorable impression to others and to avoid conveying unfavorable impression to others.

Cultivating gender stereotypes: Pinterest and the user-generated housewife? • Nicole Lee, Texas Tech University; Shawna White, Texas Tech University • Through a survey of 315 women, this study explored the relationship between Pinterest use, gender stereotypes and self-perceptions. Results indicate a link between Pinterest use and stereotyped views of gender roles in a relational context. The same link was not found between Pinterest use and self-esteem or body image. Open-ended questions explored cognitive and emotional effects of Pinterest use. A mix of motivation, inspiration, guilt and jealousy were reported. Directions for further research are discussed.

HPV Vaccination in US Media: Gender and regional differences • Wan Chi Leung, University of South Carolina • This study examines newspaper articles and television news transcripts about the HPV vaccine in the U.S. from 2006 to 2014. Findings reveals that media presented HPV vaccine as more beneficial to women’s health instead of men. In the South of the U.S. where the vaccination rate was the lowest among all regions, newspapers tended to talk less about HPV vaccination, and presented less benefits of vaccination, and fewer positive direct quotes.

Putnam’s Clarion Call: An Examination of Civic Engagement and the Internet • Lindsay McCluskey, Louisiana State University; Young Kim, Louisiana State University • The purpose of this research is to develop and test models of civic engagement. We examined various dimensions of civic engagement for antecedents and determinant factors related to the Internet, controlling for effects of a wide range of other variables. Using 2010 national survey data, this study found that significant and different factors (e.g., trust, satisfaction, the location of Internet use, and perceived Internet impact) for dimensions of civic engagement in full multivariate logit models.

The Audience Brand: The Clash Between Public Dialogue and Brand Preservation in News Comment Sections • Meredith Metzler • The tensions between news organizations operating in the public interest and as a business operation have not changed online, and, in fact have become more complicated. In this paper, I examine how comment sections architecture is modified to encourage a particular type of dialogue from the now visible audience. The findings in this paper indicate that the news organizations shape conversational environments occurring within the boundaries of its site.

Let’s Keep This Quiet: Media Framing of Campus Sexual Assault, Its Causes, and Proposed Solutions • Jane O’Boyle, University of South Carolina; Jo-Yun Queenie Li • This study analyzes ten American newspapers across the country (N = 500) to examine how they present stories about sexual assault on college campuses. We explore attributions for causes and which entities are framed most responsible for creating solutions to the problem: individuals, universities, fraternities, sports teams, or society. Findings indicate media attribute causes to individuals such as victims and perpetrators, but solutions to universities. Liberal newspapers framed the victim as most responsible for causes, and were overall favorable toward universities.

The Discourse of Sacrifice in Natural Disaster: The Case Study of Thailand’s 2011 Floods • Penchan Phoborisut, University of Utah • This paper investigates how the discourse of a natural disaster such as a flood is formed and featured in the Thai media. The paper adopts a textual analysis of news about the floods in 2011, reported in two major Thai mainstream newspapers during the three- month long floods. The emerging theme is sacrifice and repeated coverage on being good citizens. Meanwhile, the issues of environment and social justice were absent. I argue that the articulation of sacrifice can perpetuate social injustice imposed on the vulnerable population.

#JeSuisCharlie: Examining the Power of Hashtags to Frame Civic Discourse in the Twitterverse • Miles Sari, Washington State University; Chan Chen, Washington State University • Using the Charlie Hebdo shooting as a case study for exploratory analysis, this paper bridges the link between framing theory and the power of hashtags to frame civic discourse in the Twitterverse. Through an inductive qualitative content analysis and a critical discourse analysis, we argue that the hashtag Je Suis Charlie constructed a dichotomy of opposition that symbolically placed the massacre in the context of a rhetorical war between free expression and global terrorism.

The Third-Person Perception and Priming: The Case of Ideal Female Body Image • Jiyoun Suk • This paper explores how priming affects the third-person perception in the case of ideal female body image. Through a posttest-only control group experiment, this study reveals that after reading an article about media’s effect on shaping women’s view about their body, the third-person perception was weakened among women. This is because the perceived media effect on self has increased after the priming. It implies how the third-person effect can be easily manipulated through priming.

Is Social Viewing the New Laugh Track? Examining the Effect of Traditional and Digital Forms of Audience Response on Comedy Enjoyment • T. Franklin Waddell, Penn State University • Participants watched a comedy program that randomly varied the presence of social media comments (positive vs. negative vs. no comment control) and the sound of a laugh track (present vs. absent) during programming. Results find that negative social media comments lead to lower levels of program enjoyment through the mediating pathways of lower bandwagon perceptions and lower humor. Surprisingly, canned laughter also had an inhibitory effect on enjoyment via the mechanism of lower narrative involvement.

Heaven, Hell, and Physical Viral Media: An Analysis of the Work of Jack T. Chick • Philip Williams, Regent University • This paper advances the concept of physical viral media: that virality is not limited to digital media, and that examples of media virality predate the digital era. The work under analysis is that of Jack T. Chick, the controversial tract publisher. The paper uses media characteristics and behavior analysis to establish the viral nature of Chick’s work and demonstrate the possibility of virality with the physical form.

The Effects of Media Consumption and Interpersonal Contacts on stereotypes towards Hong Kong people in China • Chuanli XIA, City University of Hong Kong • This study examines the effects of both media consumption and interpersonal contacts on Chinese mainlanders’ stereotypes towards Hong Kong people. The framework was tested with a survey data of 314 mainlanders. Results reveal that media consumption is negatively associated with mainlanders’ positive stereotypes about Hong Kong people, while interpersonal contacts with Hong Kong people result in positive stereotypes about Hong Kong people. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

2015 Abstracts

Communication Theory and Methodology 2015 Abstracts

Open Call Competition
Fear of Social Isolation, Perceived Opinion Congruence, and Opinion Expression: Toward an Implicit Cognition Approach • Florian Arendt, Universität München (LMU) • This paper presents a test of the spiral of silence theory using an implicit cognition approach. Opinion expression is conceptualized as the correlation between inner (i.e., implicit) and overtly expressed (i.e., explicit) attitudes. It was hypothesized that fear of social isolation predicts opinion expression, but only in individuals who perceive public opinion to be hostile. A study using a cross-sectional survey with a quota-based sample (N = 832) supports this hypothesis. An implicit cognition approach can be seen as a supplement to traditional approaches because it does not rely on self-reported behavioral intentions or hypothetical scenarios to measure opinion expression.

Attitude-Based Selective Exposure: Implicit and Explicit Attitudes as Predictors of Media Choice • Florian Arendt, Universität München (LMU) • The attitude-based selective exposure hypothesis predicts that media users craft a message diet that tends to reflect their attitudinal predispositions. Previous research has relied almost exclusively on overtly expressed evaluations (explicit attitudes) as predictors of media choice. We present a web-based study (N = 519) testing whether automatically activated evaluations (implicit attitudes) can add predictive value. The use of implicit attitudes as a supplement to explicit attitudes was based on the assumption that media users are typically not aware of processes governing media choice decisions and that very little cognitive elaboration takes place most of the time. The explanatory power of implicit attitudes is assumed to be stronger in such low-cost situations compared to high-cost situations. The present study revealed that both implicit and explicit attitudes displayed incremental validity, with each attitudinal construct predicting media choice variance beyond that predicted by the other.

Connective Social Media: A Catalyst for LGBT Political Consumerism Among Members of a Networked Public • Amy Becker, Loyola University Maryland; Lauren Copeland, John Carroll University • Although research shows that social media use is associated with political consumerism, it is not clear which online activities encourage boycotting and buycotting. In this paper, we theorize that when people use social media to meet other people or discuss politics, social media use has the potential to create networked publics or imagined communities that can mobilize people to action. This means that how people use social media matters more than whether they use social media at all. To test our expectation, we analyze data from a 2013 nationally representative survey of LGBT adults (N = 1,197). We find that those who use social media for connective activities such as meeting new LGBT friends or discussing LGBT issues are significantly more likely to engage in boycotts or buycotts to promote equal rights. We also find significant interactions between connective media use and political interest. Specifically, connective forms of social media use mobilizes people with low levels of political interest to participate, and reinforces the likelihood that people with high levels of political interest will participate. These findings increase our understanding of how specific types of digital media use have the potential to mobilize issue publics. They also demonstrate that the relationship between social media use and political interest is more complex than previously assumed.

Making Them Count: Socializing on Facebook to Optimize the Accumulation of Social Capital • Brandon Bouchillon, UNC Asheville; Melissa R. Gotlieb, Texas Tech University • This study uses national survey data from U.S. adults to explore social media’s role in revitalizing social capital for a rapidly diversifying society. Results support our contention that individuals who use Facebook to expand and diversify their personal networks experience greater gains from weak-tie interactions for diversifying civic engagements and generalizing trust to the average person. Findings suggest the potential for social media to reduce perceived threat from diversity and combat the “hunker down” effect.

The scale development practices in communication research journals: 2003-2013 • Serena Carpenter, MSU • Previous content analyses of journal articles show that authors use inappropriate statistics when creating scales. This study’s purpose was to replicate previous research examining the scale development and reporting practices of scholars. The results of the quantitative content analysis of four journalism and mass communication journals indicate that scholars primarily used principal components analysis, orthogonal rotation, and the eigenvalues greater than one rule to assess their theoretical models. In addition, this research adds to the literature by summarizing how scholars created and gauged items for their new measures. The findings reveal that they rarely used qualitative research to generate items.

When everyone’s watching. A motivations-based account of selective expression and exposure • David Coppini, University of Wisconsin Madison; Megan Duncan, University of Wisconsin-Madison; David Wise, UW-Madison; Douglas McLeod; Kristen Bialik, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Yin Wu • This study integrates theories of selective exposure with an updated version of uses and gratifications to account for partisans’ motivations for consuming and sharing ideologically consistent information. Manipulating the visibility of an individual’s media choices, we investigate differences between selection of news choices when these are public and when they are private. Based on a sample of college students (N=192), our results yield two important insights. First, our findings suggest that conservatives are more likely to engage in political motivated selectivity in the public condition. Second, motivations related to identity and opinion management are more likely to be activated when news choices are public.

Extending the RISP model in online contexts: Online comments and novel methodological approaches • Graham Dixon, WSU; Kit Kaiser • This paper introduces theoretical propositions aimed at extending the prominent, but methodologically under-researched, risk information seeking and processing (RISP) model within the context of a timely issue, online comment effects. In particular, we offer propositions that expand the RISP model by (1) incorporating a specific information seeking behavior (e.g., online comment reading), (2) operationalizing antecedent variables as manipulated, momentary reactions to stimuli, rather than long term traits, and (3) examining how manipulated RISP model variables indirectly influence the effect of online user comments. Doing so not only fills theoretical gaps in mass media and information seeking, but also can prompt informed discussions regarding the ethics of using (and banning) online comment sections.

Over-Friended: Facebook Intensity, Social Anxiety, and Role Conflict • Lee Farquhar, Samford University; Theresa Davidson, Samford University • This study examines the potential for a social structure – the polyopticon – to occur on Facebook. Individuals in vast networks must perform amongst several social subgroups. The polyopticon recognizes that multiple sets of rules govern Facebook (based on social norms). Individual musts follow all of the rules simultaneously. Our survey of college students supports the concept of the polyopticon in that increased Facebook friends and involvement relate to higher levels of role conflict and anxiety.

Blowing Embers: An Exploration of the Agenda-Setting Role of Books • Michael Fuhlhage, Wayne State University; Don Shaw, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; Lynette Holman, Appalachian State University; Sun Young Lee, Texas Tech University; Jason Moldoff • Books have long been credited with social and cultural influence, but the evidence for this is largely anecdotal and fragmentary. This study proposes a model for testing the influence of books by wedding the methods of cultural studies, communication studies, and book history with the theoretical frameworks of media agenda setting to assess the relationship between four best sellers and policy and cultural changes that previously had been uncritically attributed to them: The Jungle, Fast Food Nation, Backlash, and All the King’s Men.

Testing Links Among Uncertainty, Affect and Attitude Toward a Health Behavior in a Risky Setting • Timothy Fung, Hong Kong Baptist University; Robert Griffin, Marquette University; Sharon Dunwoody, University of Wisconsin-Madison • The relationship between uncertainty and emotional reactions to risk has been explored in only a cursory fashion to date. This study seeks to remedy that by examining linkages between uncertainty judgment and such affective reactions as worry and anger within the context of an environmental health risk. It uses data from a longitudinal study of people’s reactions to the risks of eating contaminated fish from the Great Lakes, which employed the Risk Information Seeking and Processing model proposed by Griffin, Dunwoody and Neuwirth (1999) and, in the process, seeks to test the expanded model, which includes behavioral intentions. Findings supported the expanded model and indicated both that uncertainty judgment has a strong influence on worry and anger and that anger has a positive impact on attitude toward fish avoidance.

Advancing distinctive effects of political discussion and expression on political participation: The moderating role of online and social media privacy concerns • Homero Gil de Zúñiga, University of Vienna; Brian Weeks, University of Vienna, Department of Communication; Trevor Diehl, University of Vienna • Online and social media engagement, such as news use and political discussion, have been found to bolster political participation. However, the idea that online political expression is a precursor to other pro-democratic behaviors is underdeveloped. This study first addresses this gap in the literature by introducing a model in which political discussion mediates the relationship between online political expression and offline participation. This paper next explores the possible moderating effect of citizens’ online privacy concerns on this process. The study empirically addresses whether, and if so how, fears of government surveillance and other privacy concerns might have an adverse effect on offline political activity. Based on two-wave-panel US data, results indicate political discussion mediates the positive relationship between online and social media political expression and participation. Furthermore, individuals’ privacy concerns moderate the relationship between political discussion and participation, while it has no effect on the connection between expression and participation.

The “News Finds Me” Effect in Communication • Homero Gil de Zúñiga, University of Vienna; Brian Weeks, University of Vienna, Department of Communication; Alberto Ardèvol-Abreu, University of Vienna • With social media at the forefront of today’s media context, citizens may believe they do not need to actively seek the news because they will eventually be exposed to such important information through their peers and social networks: the “news finds me effect.” This effect may carry significant implications for communication and social behaviors. First, it may alter individuals’ news consumption patterns. Second, it may also relate to people’s levels of political knowledge. Based on two-wave panel survey data collected in the United States (W¹=1,816; W2=1,024), we find that individuals who believe the news will find them are less likely to use traditional sources of news like television news and newspapers and are less knowledgeable about political and civic affairs. Although the news finds me belief is positively associated with exposure to news on social media, news from these sites does not directly or indirectly facilitate political learning. Our findings illustrate that news continues to enhance political knowledge best when it is actively sought.

Media Dependency and Parental Mediation • August Grant, University of South Carolina; Larry Webster, University of South Carolina; Yicheng Zhu, University of South Carolina • A national survey of 398 parents explored relationships among parental mediation of television viewing and individual media dependency. Two new dimensions of individual media dependency are proposed: reliance of the individual upon the media system to control an individual’s environment (personal control) and the environment of others (social control). These measures proved to be significantly related to both level of parental mediation and usage of V-Chip technology, as well as to traditional television dependency measures.

The Role of Political Homophily of News Reception and Political Discussion via Social Media for Political Participation • Ki Deuk Hyun • This study investigates mobilizing function of political homophily in SNS-mediated communication. Survey data analyses found that reception of news consistent with one’s political orientations through social media was positively associated with political participation whereas reception of counter-attitudinal news was not related. Similarly, SNS-based discussion with politically likeminded others predicted political participation while discussion with non-likeminded people did not contribute to participation. Moreover, homogenous news reception and homogenous discussion had an interactive influence on political participation.

“I’m a news junkie. … I like being informed…” Uses & Gratifications and Mobile News Users • Jacqueline Incollingo, Rider University • A mixed methods research project combining quantitative survey results (n=632) with semi-structured interview data (n=30) explored how digital subscribers engage with mobile news, under the uses and gratifications framework. Themes of continuity indicate that motivations in traditional newspaper use remain salient in mobile news: information-seeking, the pleasure of reading, and powerful daily habits surrounding news use. Additional gratification concepts specific to tablet and smartphone news use, including mobility and the value of scaffolding, are suggested.

The community of practice model: A new approach to social media use in crisis communication • Melissa Janoske, University of Memphis • Building community in a crisis situation offers individuals a chance to not just survive, but potentially thrive through a disaster. This project applies the community of practice model to understand online communities’ crisis communication. Two qualitative case studies of crises (a natural disaster and a violent act, as discussed on Facebook and Twitter) are offered as exemplars of the model, and as support for the expansion of the model to improve crisis communication and recovery.

Boundary Expansion of a Threatened Self: Entertainment as Relief • Benjamin Johnson, VU University Amsterdam; Michael Slater, The Ohio State University; Nathan Silver, The Ohio State University; David Ewoldsen, The Ohio State University • The temporarily expanding boundaries of the self (TEBOTS) model identifies challenges faced by the self as an impetus for engagement with narratives. To test how everyday threats to the self-concept drive enjoyment, appreciation, and immersion into narrative worlds, self-affirmation was used to experimentally alleviate those threats. Self-affirmed people experienced less narrative entertainment and immersion. Additionally, a scale was developed to measure boundary expansion processes. Furthermore, search for meaning in life was found to moderate effects.

The perception of media community among NPR listeners • Joseph Kasko, University of South Carolina • This research examines the role of community in generating support for public radio. NPR listeners were surveyed to learn if they perceive they are part of a community of listeners and if that perception influences support. This work introduces the concept of the “media community” and the scales used to measure it. It also concludes that a sense of media community can positively influence support through listening and donating financially.

Replicating and Extending Cognitive Bridging: Connecting the Action of Recycling to the Goal of Environmental Conservation • Sherri Jean Katz, University of Minnesota – Twin Cities • Cognitive bridging refers to the connection between abstract goals and the means to achieve them – high and low construal level concerns, respectively. A 2 (bridging message/ non-bridging message) x 2 (action cue/ no action cue) experiment (n = 209), extends previous research on cognitive bridging by adding a predictor (action cue) and two dependent variables (complexity and positive affect) into the experimental design. Findings replicate previous research on cognitive bridging and offer theoretical extensions.

Theoretical and Methodological Trends of Agenda Setting Theory: A Thematic Meta-Analysis of the Last Four Decades • Yeojin Kim; Youngju Kim, The University of Alabama; Shuhua Zhou, University of Alabama • Through a thematic meta-analysis, the current study examined theoretical, topical, and methodological trends of agenda setting research over time from 1972 through 2012. Research trends, topics, media, methods, and utilization of other theories in agenda setting studies were discussed along with the evolution of the theoretical map of agenda setting studies. Findings indicated that the number of agenda setting research has been increasing over time, along with the expansion of research topics, media, methods, and use of other theories. This study provided a general overview of agenda setting studies as well as new insights for future research trends and directions.

An Attention-Cycle Analysis of the Media and Twitter Agendas of Attributes of the Nuclear Issue • Jisu Kim; Young Min • “This study examined the effect of network agenda-setting (NAS) along Downs’ issue attention cycle. To overcome limitations of traditional agenda-setting research that typically explored the hierarchical prominence among issues or attributes, this study primarily examined the transfer of relations among attributes from the media to the public network agenda using diverse social network concepts such as degree centrality and cliques. In this study “degree centrality” represented the salience of each attribute while the number and size of “cliques” showed the extent to which the network agenda contains different subgroups of attributes. As a case study we examined the nuclear issue in South Korea from March 28, 2014, to April 28, 2014. We divided the above period into three stages based on Downs’ issue attention cycle: Developing interest, Declining interest, and an Equilibrium level. Although there were not many differences among attributes that show a high degree centrality across the stages, the sum of degrees changed according to the media and the public’s interest in the issue. The degree of fragmentation was higher on the public network agendas compared to the media network agendas, which was the highest when the public’s interest was increasing. In terms of the media network agenda, the degree of fragmentation was the highest at an equilibrium level stage. Several Quadratic Assignment Procedure (QAP) analyses revealed that the network agenda-setting effect existed consistently across the stages.”

Talking about School Bullying • Sei-Hill Kim; Matthew Telleen, Elizabethtown College; Hwalbin Kim, University of South Carolina • Analyzing newspaper articles and television news transcripts, this study offers a comprehensive examination of how American news media presented the issue of school bullying. More specifically, we analyze how the media presented the questions of who is responsible for causing and solving the problem and why school of bullying is a significant social problem. We identified the presence of considerable victim blaming in news coverage of the causes. Among potential causes examined, victims and their families were mentioned most often as a cause of school bullying. When talking about how to solve the problem, the media were focusing heavily on schools and teachers, while bullies and their families – the direct source of the bullying problem – were mentioned least often as the primary target to which problem-solving effort should be applied. Finally, findings indicate that suicide was the most frequently-mentioned negative consequence of school bullying in news coverage. Implications of the findings are discussed in detail.

Disentangling Confirmation Biases in Selective Exposure to Political Online Information • Axel Westerwick; Benjamin Johnson, VU University Amsterdam; Silvia Knobloch-Westerwick, The Ohio State University • An experiment presented online messages on four controversial political topics as associated with neutral or slanted sources to 120 participants while software tracked selective exposure. Attitude measures were collected before and after the selective exposure task and 2 days later. Further, information processing styles were assessed. Results yielded a confirmation bias and a preference for neutral sources. These patterns depended on processing styles. Selective exposure reinforced attitudes even days later.

Confirmation Bias, Ingroup Bias, and Negativity Bias in Selective Exposure to Political Information • Silvia Knobloch-Westerwick, The Ohio State University; Cornelia Mothes; Nick Polavin • Selective reading of political online information was examined based on cognitive dissonance, social identity, and news values frameworks. Online reports, varied by political stance and either positive or negative regarding American policies, were displayed to 156 Americans while selective exposure was tracked. Results revealed confirmation and negativity biases, per cognitive dissonance and news values. Greater cognitive reflection, greater need-for-cognition, and worse mood fostered the confirmation bias; stronger social comparison tendency reduced the negativity bias.

The Impact of Suspense in Political News • Kristen Landreville, University of Wyoming; Silvia Knobloch-Westerwick, The Ohio State University • The current study applies entertainment concepts (i.e., suspense) and interpersonal communication concepts (i.e., uncertainty reduction) to examine the consumption of news stories that feature politicians as protagonists. This study takes advantage of the political context, with its innate affective orientations toward liked-groups, disliked-groups, and uncertainty, in order to determine how suspense impacts the behavioral outcome of discursive activities (e.g., communicating about politics, information-seeking about politics). In doing so, the current study blends multiple concepts from different subfields of communication. Additionally, political party identification is examined as a predictor of feelings of suspense and discursive activities in stories that feature politicians of the same and opposite political party. Results show that more suspense is aroused when there is a political party match between the reader and the politician the news story. Moreover, suspense produced a desire to communicate about the news stories.

Media Framing of Same-Sex Marriage and Attitude Change: A Time-Series Analysis • Dominic Lasorsa; Jiyoun Suk; Deepa Fadnis • In an attempt to advance understanding of media framing effects, this paper examined how two ideologically different New York daily newspapers framed the issue of same-sex marriage over 17 years. Changes in media framing then were compared to changes in public attitudes toward same-sex marriage over the same time as reported by Pew, Gallup and Time/CNN national polls. A random sample of articles about same-sex marriage published in the years 1998-2014 in the ideologically conservative New York Post and the ideologically liberal New York Times were analyzed (N = 474 articles). Time-series analyses revealed that changes in media framing of same-sex marriage in terms of equality and morality preceded subsequent changes in support for and opposition to same-sex marriage. These correlation and time-order findings support the argument that media frames have the potential to influence public attitudes. The implications of these findings for the advancement of media framing theory are discussed.

How User-Generated Comments Prime News Processing: Activation and Refutation of Regional Stereotypes • Eun-Ju Lee, Seoul National University; Hyun Suk Kim, University of Pennsylvania; Jaeho Cho, University of California, Davis • This study examined how user-generated comments on a crime news article, which attribute the crime to local residents’ predispositions, affect individuals’ news processing. Stereotype-activating comments heightened perceived crime prevalence in the featured region, compared to stereotype-irrelevant and stereotype-counterbalancing comments, especially for participants with a stronger regional self-identity. Participants better recalled the regions in both the focal and unrelated articles and attributed greater responsibility to news coverage for regionalism, after reading stereotype-related (vs. stereotype-irrelevant) comments.

Is the Protest Paradigm Relevant? Nuisance in the Age of Occupy and the Tea Party • Kyle Lorenzano • Protest is ubiquitous in American, yet the Protest Paradigm alleges that the news portrays protestors as radical and deviant. The Public Nuisance Paradigm argues that protest movements are portrayed in the media as inherently bothersome and ineffective. Using newspaper coverage of Occupy Wall Street and Tea Party protests, this study compares these paradigms to determine which is more relevant today. The results of a content analysis ultimately show that neither paradigm is entirely irrelevant.

Being More Attractive or Outgoing on Facebook?: Modeling How Self-presentation and Personality on Facebook Affect Social Capital • Chen Lou, Michigan State University; Kang Li • Technological affordances in the computer-medicated-communication enable people to promote more favorable online self-presentations on social network sites (SNSs). This survey-based study (N=300) examined how Facebook users’ self-images and personalities on Facebook may predict their bridging and bonding social capital. The results showed that more attractive self-images on Facebook did not contribute to any increase in either bridging or bonding capital, but being more extroverted on Facebook facilitated an increase in bridging capital. Facebook use intensity and Facebook friend number are also important predictors of bridging capital. However, none of those variables predict bonding capital. Findings not only vetoed propositions of some current Computer-Mediated-Communication (CMC) theories, such as the hyperpersonal model and self-enhancement theory in the social media context, but also provided meaningful evidence and implications to future theory building and testing.

Political talks on social networking sites: Investigating the effects of SNS discussion disagreement and internal efficacy on political participation • Yanqin Lu, Indiana University; Kyle Heatherly; Jae Kook Lee • Drawing on a national probability survey, this study explores the relationship between SNS discussion and political participation by focusing on the intervening effects of discussion disagreement on SNSs and internal efficacy. The results revealed that political discussion on SNSs contributes to off- and online political participation, and this relationship is partially mediated by SNS discussion disagreement. Furthermore, internal efficacy is found to moderate the association between discussion disagreement and political participation. The implications are discussed.

Cognition under Simultaneous Exposure to Competing Heuristic Cues • Tao Ma, University of Connecticut • Integrating theory of limited capacity of message processing and the heuristic view of persuasion, this paper examined the influence of competing heuristic cues on the cognitive and affective information process and behavior intention. The competing heuristic cues conditions were tested by the interaction of two major types of heuristics cues–consensus cue and credibility cue. Participants in an online survey were randomly assigned to one of four competing heuristic cue conditions in the context of online movie review. The conditions were displayed by the combinations of either high or low consensus cues of a movie review from the movie critics and peers audiences. Participants’ perception (i.e. trust of the movie), affective response (i.e. anxiety), and behavior intention (i.e. watch the movie in the future) were measured after the exposure. Path modeling and multiple regressions were used to analyze the hypotheses and research questions. The results of the investigation showed that high consensuses from both movie critics and peers reviewers led to increased trust of the movie from the participants. The crossed condition, where the critics’ consensus was high while peer’s consensus was low, led to high trust to the move. Both trust to the movie and anxiety led to the intention of watching the movie in the future. The findings implied a persuasion effect through processing of the competing heuristic cues– credibility and consensus.

The ghosts in the machine: Toward a theory of social media mourning • Jensen Moore, Manship School of Mass Communication, LSU; Sara Magee, Loyola University-Maryland; Ellada Gamreklidze • This article uses grounded theory methodology to analyze in-depth interviews conducted with mourners who used social networking sites (SNS) during bereavement. The social media mourning model outlines how SNS are used to grieve using one or more of the following: 1) one-way communication, 2) two-way communication, and/or 3) immortality communication. The model indicates causal conditions of social media mourning: 1) sharing information with family/friends and (sometimes) begin a dialogue, 2) discussing death with others mourning, 3) discussing death with a broader mourning community, and 4) commemorating and continuing connection to the deceased. The article includes actions and consequences associated with social media mourning and suggests several ways in which social media mourning changes or influences the bereavement process.

Who Actually Expresses Opinions Online, and When? : Comparing Evidence from Scenario-based and Website-based Experiments • Yu Won Oh, University of Michigan • This study examined the structural conditions as well as individual characteristics that facilitate opinion expression online. Two experimental methods – thought and true experiments – were implemented to measure individuals’ actual behavior of speaking out on a discussion forum. Findings from both experiments consistently revealed that race, issue involvement, issue knowledge, and the revelation of identity were crucial factors in predicting speaking out online. Yet, age and trait fear of isolation worked differently in thought and true experiments.

Perceived News Media Importance: Developing and Validating a Tool for Clarifying Dynamics of Media Trust • Jason Peifer, The Ohio State University • This study features the development and validation of a multidimensional scale for Perceived News Media Importance (PNMI). The explication and operationalization of the PNMI concept is designed, in part, to provide a tool for bringing greater clarity to patterns of public trust in the news media, as based on individual valuations of various normative news media functions. Employing survey data provided by a convenience sample (N=403) and a nationally representative sample (N=510), a Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) indicates that the theorized PNMI measurement model fits the data well. Moreover, the proposed 12-item scale also exhibits appropriate convergent (political interest) and discriminant (negative content media image; ideology) validity. Finally, while demonstrated to be distinct from media trust, PNMI is also shown to meaningfully predict perceptions of the news media’s trustworthiness, above and beyond all other variables in a hierarchical multiple regression model. Implications and research directions are discussed.

The Reciprocal Relationship Between Hostile Media Perception and Presumed Media Influence • Mallory Perryman, University of Wisconsin • Is media perceived as biased when it could influence others? Or is it considered influential when it’s perceived as biased? This experimental study (n=80) suggests the answer to both questions is — yes. Respondents told a story was undesirably biased saw more influence on others, and those who were told a story was unfavorably influential saw more hostile bias. The reciprocal relationship between two media phenomena, the hostile media perception and presumed media influence, is revealed.

Media’s influence on judgments of truth. Why people trust in bad rather than good news • Christina Peter, University of Munich; Thomas Koch, University of Munich • Valence framing affects message credibility: Negatively framed statements receive higher truth ratings than positively framed statements that are formally equivalent. The current work examines this negativity credibility bias (NCB) in the contexts of news coverage and persuasion. By conducting three experiments, we discovered that the NCB also affects source trustworthiness and examined possible reasons for this. The results indicate that one reason the NCB occurs is that recipients have learned connections between negativity and news, and between positivity and persuasive communication. Consequently, we find that a positive framing of statements can lead readers to feel that the source is trying to persuade them, which triggers reactance and consequently reduces the perceived credibility of both the message and the source.

Agenda Sharing is Caring: Relationship between Shared Agendas of Traditional and Digital Native Media • Magdalena Saldana, The University of Texas at Austin; Tom Johnson; Maxwell McCombs, The University of Texas at Austin • By comparing the agendas of traditional and digital native publications, this study provides an empirical analysis of how online news content is being shared on Facebook and Twitter. We empirically examine a new concept, agenda sharing, which poses the audience and the media work together to shape the news agenda in online contexts. Results found a significant match between the agendas of traditional and digital native media, while traditional media agenda is setting the public agenda on both Facebook and Twitter.

Getting the Facts from Journalistic Adjudication: Polarization and Partisanship Don’t Matter • Rosanne Scholl, Louisiana State University; Raymond J. Pingree; Kathleen Searles • This experiment demonstrated that journalistic adjudication works: consumers adopt correct factual beliefs, even when their party’s leaders are declared wrong. No backfire effect existed in tests on two issue contexts. Democrats are more react more strongly than Republicans to adjudication in favor of their own side. Neither the presence of agenda reasons nor the presence of bipartisanship cues enhances the effects of adjudication on partisan’s adoption of adjudicated facts.

Comparing Flow and Narrative Engagement Scales in the Context of a Casual Health Game • Brett Sherrick, Penn State • The psychological states of flow and transportation or narrative engagement are conceptually similar. Both are described as immersive, emotional states that lead to enjoyment, persuasion, and loss of self-awareness. Despite similarities between flow and narrative engagement, limited research examines their empirical relationship. This project evaluated the viability of measuring flow and narrative engagement simultaneously, with results suggesting that the concepts may not be statistically distinct, as they were nearly perfectly correlated in two game-based experiments.

Better Environment for Better Quality? In Search of Reason-centered Discussion on Social Media in China • Mingxiao Sui; Raymond J. Pingree; Rosanne Scholl, Louisiana State University; Boni Cui • Reason-centered discussion of politics is an important route toward improving the quality of public opinion. New media have created new spaces for political discussion and not only in established democracies. Political discussion, whether in old or new spaces, may not always be reason-centered. This study examines predictors of reason-centered online political discussion in China. It explored the effects of the use of a debate format with two sides displayed as opposing columns, and the effects of various characteristics of the post used to initiate the discussion. A content analysis was conducted to examine 6360 reply posts within 291 threaded discussions on Sina Weibo, one of China’s most popular venues for online discussion. Results showed that the debate format would greatly improve the overall reasoning level, with opinion presence and multiple viewpoints included in the initiating post playing a role as well. Moreover, the debate format can elicit differences in the effects of initiating post on the overall reasoning level of a threaded discussion.

Eyes Don’t Lie: Validating Self-Reported Measures of Attention on Social Media • Emily Vraga, George Mason University; Leticia Bode, Georgetown University; Sonya Troller-Renfree • Scholars often rely on self-reported behaviors to gauge interest in Facebook content, but we have reason to be skeptical of these self-reports. Using an eye-tracking study design, we demonstrate that young adults’ self-reported topic engagement for social, news, and political posts is driven more by general interest and favorability towards the topic than actual attention, with a possible exception for political posts. Implications for theory building and methodological choices regarding social media are discussed.

Bandwagon Effects of Social Media Commentary during TV Viewing: Do Valence, Viewer Traits and Contextual Factors Make a Difference? • T. Franklin Waddell, Penn State University; S. Shyam Sundar, Penn State University • Are we influenced by the social media commentary that accompanies TV programs? Does it matter if these comments appear at the beginning or toward the end of the show? We conducted a 2 (positive vs. negative tweets) x 2 (beginning vs. end of program) factorial experiment with an additional control condition (N = 186) to answer these questions. Results show the powerful effect of negative bandwagon cues, which appears to override contextual and trait moderators.

Toward a theory of modality interactivity and online consumer behavior • Ruoxu Wang, Penn State University • A model named Modality interactivity and online consumer behavior has been constructed to depict the relationship between online consumer behavior and modality interactivity. The model was constructed based on technology acceptance model and interactivity effects model. The model contains four phases: modality interactivity, interface assessment, user engagement, and attitude and behavioral outcomes. Interface assessment contains four criteria: perceived vividness, perceived coolness, perceived ease of use, and perceived usefulness. Process of constructing the model was presented throughout the paper. Limitations and potential empirical study based on the model were also discussed.

The significant other: A longitudinal analysis of significant samples in journalism research, 2000 – 2014 • ben wasike • This study examined the methodological and research patterns journalism scholars have used when studying significant samples, or “those persons who have attained an unusually pervasive and lasting reputation, regardless of whether that reputation be great or small, positive or negative” (Simonton, 1999, p. 426 – 427). Using Dean K. Simonton’s work as the theoretical guide, the study content analyzed a census of all articles published in 10 major journalism-oriented journals from 2000 – 2014. A total of 248 articles examined these subjects. The results show that the typical journalism study examining significant samples is psychometric and will also be quantitative, nomothetic, longitudinal, singularly focused and exploratory. Additionally, it will use macro-units and will observe the subject indirectly. The study also found similarities between the study of significant samples and extant work in terms of the preponderance of quantitative methods and the use of content analysis as a data collection method. The ramifications for future research are discussed within

Effects of Media Exemplars on the Perception of Social Issues with Pre-existing Beliefs • Yan Yan; Liu Jun • Exemplification studies usually reported the significant influence of media exemplars on people’s perceptions of fictional or controversial issues, but neglected the fact that people often have a certain degree of established beliefs toward social events in real life. The present research used a 3X3 experimental design to examine the effects of media exemplars on people’s perceptions of Chengguan-vendor conflicts, a social issue with established strong prior beliefs in China. The typical between-group exemplification effects were not evident in the present study. Instead, a relative, within-group exemplification effect was found, that is, the degree of change between the immediate and the initial perception was strongly influenced by the media exemplars, and the direction of change was consistent with the exemplar distribution. In addition, an on-going decaying of exemplification effects was found. Perceptions toward different variables showed an overall pattern consisting of a prolonged exemplification effect, an on-going decaying effected, and a completed delay effect.

What Comes After First Click?: A New Way to Look at Selective Exposure • JungHwan Yang, University of Wisconsin-Madison; David Wise, UW-Madison; Albert Gunther, University of Wisconsin-Madison • In this study we experimentally test the effects of news exposure to pro-attitudinal, counter-attitudinal and mixed news content on subsequent information seeking behaviors in the context of the relationship between science and religion. Using a sample drawn from two large organizations that focus on issues of religion and science, and a nationally representative sample from an online panel, we tested and compared different measure of selective exposure. Our research aims to advance knowledge in the area of selective exposure by further examining factors that may encourage or reduce selective exposure, by extending research about it into a new topical domain, and by examining measurement issues within this line of research. Our findings suggest that there is a tendency of attitude-consistent exposure when people select the first article to read, but people also search for counter-attitudinal information in subsequent information seeking. Our novel use of graphical measure of selective exposure questions the robustness of selective exposure phenomenon.

Deciphering ‘Most Viewed’ Lists: An analysis of the comparability of the lists of popular items • Rodrigo Zamith, University of Massachusetts Amherst • This study focuses on deciphering what data are represented by ‘most viewed’ lists and how comparable those lists are across news organizations. The homepages of the 50 largest U.S. newspapers were analyzed to assess the prevalence of those lists and the lists of 21 organizations were then analyzed over two months. The findings point to potential sampling biases and indicate that it is unwise to assume the lists are comparable just because they appear similar.

The Affective Dimension of the Network Agenda-Setting Model (NAS) • XIAOQUN ZHANG, University of North Texas • Based on the second level of agenda-setting theory and the network agenda-setting model (NAS), this study proposed a new model called the affective dimension of the NAS model. This model argues that the valence of an attribute of an object in the media coverage influences the public’s emotional perceptions of its corresponding attribute and those of other attributes of that object, and the valences of multiple attributes of an object in the media coverage influence the public’s emotional perceptions of one attribute of that object. The empirical examination of this model was conducted in the business news setting.

2015 Abstracts

Communicating Science, Health, Environment, and Risk 2015 Abstracts

Embodying Nature’s Experiences: Taking the Perspective of Nature with Immersive Virtual Environments to Promote Connectedness With Nature • Sun Joo (Grace) Ahn, University of Georgia; Jeremy Bailenson, Stanford University; Elise Ogle, Stanford University; Joshua Bostick, Stanford University • Immersive virtual environments (IVEs) use digital devices to simulate experiential sensory information, producing simulations that closely mimic real-life. Two experiments tested the efficacy of IVEs in promoting feelings of connectedness with nature by virtually taking the perspective of animals threatened by climate change. Experiment 1 found that embodying the sensory rich experiences of a cow in IVE led to greater spatial presence, body transfer, and ultimately more connectedness with nature than watching the experience on video. Experiment 2 extended these findings and confirmed that embodying the experiences of coral in an acidifying virtual ocean led to greater spatial presence than watching it on video, increasing the perceived imminence of the risk immediately following experimental treatments. The heightened imminence of risk resulted in greater connectedness with nature one week following experimental treatments. Theoretical implications on extending the concept of perspective taking from interpersonal to human-animal relationships with IVEs are discussed.

How Advertising Taught Us How to Consume Fruits and Vegetables in the Early Twentieth Century • Michelle Nelson, UIUC; Susmita Das, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; Regina Ahn, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign • Fruit and vegetable consumption helps prevent diseases, and the World Health Organization recommends increased daily intakes; 100+ years ago advertisers begin selling these healthier foods. Analysis of print advertisements from the early twentieth century reveals the ways that advertisers informed the public about how and why to consume fruits and vegetables. National advertisers presented them as ‘tonics’ while prescribing daily doses. Competition among fruits and vegetables resulted in mixed messages for consumers about fresh produce.

Public Attitudes on Synthetic Biology: Mapping Landscapes and Processes • Heather Akin; Kathleen M. Rose; Dietram Scheufele; Molly J. Simis; Dominique Brossard; Michael A. Xenos; Elizabeth A. Corley • This research provides one of the first representative overviews to date of U.S. public attitudes towards synthetic biology. We first outline descriptive results from a 2014 survey of U.S. adults to contextualize individuals’ awareness, personal importance, and knowledge of synthetic biology and compare these to responses about other science issues. We assess respondents’ attitudes toward relevant policies, risk-benefit perceptions, and overall support for synthetic biology. We then analyze how these characteristics impact individuals’ support for the use of this emerging science and assess how values and predispositions, including religiosity, deference to scientific authority, and trust in scientists, might interact to influence support. Our descriptive results suggest that many respondents do not feel informed about synthetic biology or believe it is personally important, which is comparable to responses about nanotechnology. However, on average, individuals express more reservations and more concern for the moral downside of synthetic biology than other issues. Our multivariate analyses show that education, religiosity, deference to science, knowledge, net risk-benefit perceptions, and trust in scientists affect support for synthetic biology. We also find significant interactions between deference to science and trust in scientists and deference to science and religiosity. We argue that deference may be more instrumental in influencing attitudes about scientific issues than other dispositions, so we should be less concerned with the impacts of short-term political or event-based influences, and more concerned with building longer-term deference and belief in the scientific enterprise.

Biological Imperatives and Food Marketing: Food Cues Alter Trajectories of Processing, Behavior and Choice • Rachel Bailey, Washington State University • This study examines how food presentation and packaging alters the time course of information processing, response and food choice. Participants were asked to categorize images of food that varied in the directness of their food cues (information about taste in terms of color, glossiness, texture, etc) before and after being exposed to a set of advertisements that also varied in the directness of their available food cues. Heart rate data also were used to access the motivational value of food cues. In general, direct food cue products enhanced motivational processes, especially if they were also advertised with direct food cues. Food products that had the least direct food cues did the opposite. Individuals also chose to eat products that were packaged with more direct food cues available compared to opaque packages. Implications and future research are discussed.

‘We just can’t talk about mental health:’ Analysis of African American urban community leader interviews • Jeannette Porter; Tim Bajkiewicz, Virginia Commonwealth University • This study conducts in-depth interviews with eleven female African American community leaders in a low-income area of a medium-sized US southeastern city asked about their perceptions of African American patterns of communication on mental health issues in their community. Findings include terms like crazy and hustle, when rarely discussed. Participants say more training is needed for professionals (including law enforcement) and children, as well as a reduction in medication use to treat mental illness.

Framing climate change: Understanding behavior intention using a moderated-mediation model • porismita borah, Washington State University • The study conducted an experiment of a national sample of adults to understand the influence of four frames on environmental behavior intention. The study uses a moderated mediated model to test the moderating role of political ideology and mediating role of self-efficacy. Findings show that positive frames such as progress and problem-solving frames increase individuals’ environmental behavior intention. The positive frames increase individuals’ self-efficacy, which leads to increased environmental behavior intention, moderated by political ideology.

The Changing Opinion Dynamics Around Global Climate Change: Exploring Shifts in Framing Effects on Public Attitudes • Michael Cacciatore and LaShonda Eaddy, ADPR • In light of recent shifts in attitudes concerning global climate change, we assess several key predictors of American attitudes toward the subject. We begin by exploring the demographic characteristics that predict attitudes toward the causes and timing of the phenomenon before investigating the role that subtle terminology differences have on perceptions of the phenomenon. While this is not the first paper to explore how question wording impacts public response to global warming/climate change, the results that we report here represent a substantial departure from previous investigations of the topic and suggest large-scale shifts in how the American public makes sense of this politically contentious issue. Most notably, we found that terminology impacts differed based on a respondent’s political party affiliation, although in a manner that was somewhat unexpected given previous work on this issue. Unlike previous work, we found there was no statistically significant difference in how Republicans responded to the terms global warming and climate change. Rather, it was the Democrats who varied in their perceptions based on the wording manipulation with use of the term global warming prompting Democrats to respond much more strongly that the phenomenon was being caused by human activity and use of the term climate change resulting in an overall lower probability of believing that to be the case.

Third-person effect, message framing and drunken driving: Examining the causes and preventions of drunken-driving behavior • Kuang-Kuo Chang, Shih Hsin University • This study applies the third-person effect hypothesis and messages framing to examine the drunken-driving issue that has plagued Taiwan society. Statistical analyses support all (12) but three hypotheses. News attentiveness and campaign messages lead to a first-person effect at both perceptual and behavioral levels; drinking capacity and risk create a perceptual third-person effect. Gain-framed messages are more appealing than loss-framed messages. Findings provide valuable strategies for policymaking, coverage and campaigns in preventing this anti-social behavior.

Examining the impact of a health literacy and media literacy intervention on adults’ sugar-sweetened beverage media literacy skills • Yvonnes Chen; Kathleen Porter; Jamie Zoellner; Paul Estabrooks • Overconsumption of sugar-sweetened beverages (SSB) has led to a number of adverse health consequences. Interventions for adults, however, rarely incorporate media and health literacy education. We evaluated a single, SSB-focused media literacy (ML) lesson embedded in a large randomized-controlled trial in rural Southwest Virginia. We found that low and high health literacy participants benefited differently from the intervention. Also, adults’ overall SSB ML skills and understanding of the representation nature of SSB messages were improved.

A Smoking Cessation Campaign on Twitter: Understanding the Use of Twitter and Identifying Major Players in a Health Campaign • Jae Eun Chung, Communication • The current study examined the usage of online social media for a health campaign. Collecting tweets (N = 1,790) about the most recent Former Smoker’s Campaign, a smoking cessation promotion by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the current study investigated the dissemination of health campaign messages on Twitter, paying particular attention to answering questions from the process evaluation of health campaigns: who tweets about the campaign, who plays central roles in disseminating health campaign messages, and how various features of Twitter are used for sharing of campaign messages. Results show that individuals and nonprofit organizations posted frequently about the campaign: Individuals and nonprofit organizations posted about 40% and 30% of campaign-related tweets, respectively. The culture of retweeting demonstrated its particular usefulness for the dissemination of campaign messages. Despite the expectation that the use of social media would expand opportunities for engagement, actual two-way interactions were few or minimal. In the current study the data analysis tool NodeXL showed its utility in collecting data and identifying major influencers in health campaigns. Drawn from the results, practical suggestions on how to strategize the use of Twitter for future health campaigns are discussed.

Weight-of-Evidence Risk Messages about Genetically Modified (GM) Foods: Persuasive Effects and Motivated Reasoning • Beatriz Vianna; Chris Clarke, George Mason University • This article extends research on conveying weight-of-evidence in risk contexts. We focus on a contentious risk topic; novel persuasive outcomes; and political ideology as a moderator of message effects. A news message experiment revealed that weight-of-evidence information emphasizing the safety of genetically modified foods for human consumption heightened participants’ perceptions of safety and affected strength of conviction, depending on prior safety beliefs. Political ideology did not moderate these effects. We discuss risk communication implications.

Environmental documentaries: How Gasland and Fracknation shape risk perceptions and policy preferences about hydraulic fracturing • Kathryn Cooper, The Ohio State University • Mass media messages are a powerful means by which to influence risk perceptions and policy preferences about controversial environmental issues. This paper presents the results of a study designed to test how the impact of the documentaries Gasland and Fracknation (which present anti- and pro-hydraulic fracturing viewpoints, respectively) varies by viewer ideology. Results indicate that Fracknation was effective across ideological groups while Gasland had limited effectiveness and only influence risk perceptions for liberals and moderates.

Compulsive Creativity: Virtual Worlds, Disability, and New Selfhoods Online • Donna Davis, University of Oregon; Tom Boellstorff • This study examines the intersection of disability and the digital through an ethnographic exploration of compulsive creativity experienced by persons living with Parkinson’s (PD) disease engaged in the virtual world, Second Life. Among this community of individuals with PD, a number of them report experiencing new forms of identity, place and making, simultaneous to alleviating symptoms of the disease. This raises questions central to current debates in media studies, health communication, anthropology and beyond.

How Caregivers Cope: The Effect of Media Appraisals and Information Behaviors on Coping Efficacy • Jae Seon Jeong; Lindsey DiTirro; Jeong-Nam Kim • This article contributes to the study of communication and coping in health contexts by exploring information appraisal and information behaviors. Drawing on theoretical perspectives, we argue that information behaviors are communicative responses that can serve as a means to increase, decrease, or maintain the efficiency of coping. Therefore, the current study examines the appraisals of health information found in the media and how they relate to caregivers’ information behaviors and coping efficacy.

The Twitter Network of the Top 50 Scientists • Elliot Fenech, University of Utah • As main stream media moves away from traditional outlets, such as television and newspaper, online social media outlets are growing in popularity. Twitter is one social media outlet where users post messages for others to read and review. This paper examines the top 50 scientists on Twitter in order to gain an understanding of how the community of scientists are using Twitter to communicate with each other beyond geographical and disciplinary divides. We examine the structure of the mention network among these scientists in terms of whether they form a Twitter community, how connected they are, and what subgroups, if any, there may be. Our data showed that a majority of these scientists formed a conversational community, in which there were a few more cohesive clusters but these clusters were not due to homophily based on areas of expertise. Future research should expand on our findings and establish a clearer understanding of how the scientific community is using Twitter to collaborate with each other and communicate with the public.

Framing News Coverage of National Parks: The Environment, Social Issues, and Recreation • Bruce Garrison, University of Miami; Zongchao Li, University of Miami • This study investigated coverage of America’s national parks, based on an analysis of 1,456 stories in 15 daily newspapers during 2000-12. Amusements, such as recreation, were the leading news frame, but social issues and environment were also commonly used. While there were no significant differences in framing approaches over time, the study found differences in how stories were framed by region and stories using amusements frames were longer, more positive, and used images more often.

Exploring the Mediating Roles of Fatalistic Beliefs and Self-Efficacy on the Relation Between Cancer Information-seeking on the Internet and Cancer-Preventative Behaviors • Eun Go; Kyung Han You, Hankuk University of Foreign Studies • This study explores the relationship between cancer-related information seeking on the Internet and cancer-preventative behaviors, with a focus on the mediating effects of fatalistic beliefs and self-efficacy. Using the structural equation modeling method (N=2,896), the present study demonstrates that while information seeking about cancer on the Internet does not exert a decrease of users’ levels of fatalistic beliefs, it does elevate users’ levels of self-efficacy. Moreover, the findings show that although information seeking about cancer on the Internet does not directly enhance users’ engagement in cancer-preventative behaviors, it has indirect effect on cancer-preventive behaviors via health-related self-efficacy. The findings also indicate that individuals’ levels of self-efficacy significantly mediate the association between fatalistic beliefs and cancer-preventative behaviors. This result demonstrates the need for consideration of such cognitive mediators in explaining the influence of cancer-related information-seeking on the Internet on cancer-preventative behaviors. Further implications of the study are also discussed.

The Framing of Marcellus Shale Drilling in Pennsylvania Newspapers • Elise Brown; Michel Haigh, Penn State; John Ewing, Penn State • This study examined how print media in Pennsylvania framed the discussion about Marcellus Shale gas drilling and development from 2008 – 2012. A content analysis (N = 783) found the most common frame employed was the environmental concerns frame, followed by the political strategy frame, scientific background frame, and public engagement frame. The scientific background frame was included more often in articles published by the agricultural media. The political strategies frame was used more often in mainstream media articles. Frames also varied over the four-year period, as well as the topics discussed.

Public Attention to Science and Political News and Support for Climate Change Mitigation • P. Sol Hart, University of Michigan; Erik Nisbet, The Ohio State University; Teresa Myers, George Mason University • We examine how attention to science and political news may influence public knowledge, perceived harm, and support for climate mitigation policies. Previous research examining these relationships has not fully accounted for how political ideology shapes the mental processes through which the public interprets media discourses about climate change. We incorporate political ideology and the concept of motivated cognition into our analysis to compare and contrast two prominent models of opinion formation, the scientific literacy model, which posits that disseminating scientific information will move public opinion towards the scientific consensus, and the motivated reasoning model, which posits that individuals will interpret information in a biased manner. Our analysis finds support for both models of opinion formation with key differences across ideological groups. Attention to science news was associated with greater perceptions of harm and knowledge for conservatives, but only additional knowledge for liberals. Supporting the literacy model, greater knowledge was associated with more support for climate mitigation for liberals. In contrast, consistent with motivated reasoning, more knowledgeable conservatives were less supportive of mitigation policy. In addition, attention to political news had a negative association with perceived harm for conservatives but not for liberals.

Consent is Sexy: An evaluation of a campus mass media campaign to increase sexual communication • Nathan Silver, The Ohio State University; Shelly Hovick, The Ohio State University; Michelle Bangen, The Ohio State University • Increased national focus on campus sexual violence has intensified the need for applied interventions. This study employed a cross-sectional online survey to evaluate a mass-mediated campus sexual violence campaign using provocative messages and images to persuade students that consent is sexy. Results show those exposed to the campaign had more positive attitudes towards consent, greater consent-related perceived behavioral control (PBC) and decreased rape myth acceptance (p<.05). PBC was also associated with increased dyadic sexual communication.

Emotional Appeals and the Environment: A Content Analysis of Greenpeace China’s Weibo Posts and Audience Responses • Qihao Ji, Florida State University; Summer Harlow, Florida State University; Di Cui, Florida State University; Zihan Wang, Florida State University • Previous studies show emotional reactions to be a precursor to behavioral change. Thus, drawing on environmental psychology and framing scholarship, this content analysis of a year’s worth of Greenpeace China’s Weibo posts and user comments explores how a post’s topic and frame influenced users’ likes, reposts, and emotional reactions via the creation of a social media emotional reaction index. Consequence, conflict, and morality frames generated the strongest emotional reactions for posts about food and agriculture.

The Effects of Framing and Attribution on Individuals’ Responses to Depression Coverage • Yan Jin, University of Georgia; Yuan Zhang; YEN-I LEE, University of Georgia; Ernest Martin; Joshua Smith • Through a 2 (episodic vs. thematic framing) x 2 (individual vs. societal attribution) between-subjects experiment of 125 college students, this study provides insights that can inform future depression news coverage aimed at addressing barriers in communicating with young adults about the risk of depression and the importance of providing social support to depressed individuals: 1) Significant main effects of news framing and attribution were detected, with episodic framing and societal responsibility attribution evoking more sympathy among participants; 2) Regardless of the type of framing and attribution, participants’ sympathy toward depressed individuals were found to be significantly associated with health issue involvement and self-efficacy in detecting depression symptoms; and 3) Male participants reported higher expectations of the social support outcomes. These findings also call for further health news framing theories by integrating the key role supportive public sentiment and positive emotions play in mediating the effects of framing and attribution on cognitive and behavior outcomes.

The National Science Foundation’s Science and Technology Survey Module and Support for Science, 2006-2012 • Besley John • The current study investigates how well the main science and technology-focused variables included in the General Social Survey (2006-2012) by the National Science Foundation do in predicting support for science funding. These questions form the primary basis of part of a biannual report to federal lawmakers and it is therefore important to consider whether the appropriate variables are included in the survey. The results suggest that, while there are some bivariate relationships between funding support and demographics, use of science communication channels, science knowledge, and attitudes about science and scientists, the overall predictive ability of the available variables appear to be relatively small. Suggestions for a potential path forward are made.

I am Willing to Pay More for Green Products: An Application of Extended Norm Activation Model • Ilwoo Ju, Saint Louis University; Jinhee Lee • With the ever-increasing attention to the environment, the current study examines the influences of consumers’ perceived environmental norms regarding major social agents (individuals, companies, and governments) on their willingness to pay more for green products. The analysis of the Simmons National Consumer Study data provides insight by revealing the path in which such effects are shaped through consumers’ general green purchase intention. Theoretical, managerial, and social implications are discussed.

The impact of message framing and evidence type in anti-binge drinking messages • Hannah Kang, University of Kansas; Moon Lee • We examined the impacts of message framing and evidence type in anti-binge drinking messages, based on Prospect Theory and Exemplification Theory. The experiment was a 2 (message framing: loss-framed message/gain-framed message) X 2 (evidence type: statistical/narrative) between-subjects factorial design with a control group. A total of 156 undergraduates participated. We found the participants in the loss-framed message condition exhibited a higher level of intention to avoid binge drinking in the near future than those who did not see any persuasive messages in the control group. We also found, regardless of evidence type, those who were exposed to the messages exhibited a higher level of intention to avoid binge drinking than those in the control group. In addition, the main effects of message framing and evidence type on attitude toward the message and the main effect of message framing on attitude toward drinking were found.

Cognitive Motivations and the Evaluation of Risk: The Role of Need for Affect and Cognition in How Individuals Act on Electronic Cigarettes • Se-Jin Kim, Colorado State University • This paper introduces a hybrid theoretical model of risk-based behavioral attitudes and intentions using the Theory of Reasoned Action, Dual Processing Risk Perception, the Heuristic Systematic Model, and Need for Affect and Need for Cognition. The model proposes that personality attributes, such as need for affect and need for cognition, information processing styles, and affective and cognitive risk perceptions are antecedents to attitudes and intentions. This study examines this model in the context of electronic cigarette consumption, and finds support for the overall model. Specifically, need for cognition, the need for thinking deeply, positively predicts systematic processing – a more effortful cognitive processing style, attitudes toward consuming electronic cigarettes, and behavioral intention toward consuming electronic cigarettes. Need for affect, the need for either adopting or avoiding strong emotions, negatively predicts heuristic processing – a more peripheral cognitive processing style, and subsequently social norms, attitudes about consuming and behavioral intentions toward electronic cigarettes.

Ties to the Local Community and South Carolinian Newspapers’ Coverage of Smoke-Free Policies • Sei-Hill Kim; James Thrasher, University of South Carolina; India Rose, ICF International – Public Health and Survey Research Division; Mary-Kathryn Craft, SC Tobacco-Free Collaborative Board of Directors; Hwalbin Kim, University of South Carolina • In this quantitative content analysis, we assess how smoke-free policies are presented in the South Carolinian newspapers. In particular, this study examines the extent to which newspapers’ coverage of smoke free-policies has represented the interests of their local communities. We compare newspapers in the communities whose economy relies heavily on the tourism and hospitality industry (The Post & Courier in Charleston and The Sun News in Myrtle Beach) and newspapers elsewhere (The State in Columbia and The Greenville News in Greenville), and see if there are meaningful differences between the newspapers in the way they portray smoke-free policies, particularly in terms of their selective uses of news sources and key arguments. Our findings indicated that South Carolinian newspapers portrayed smoke-free policies largely as a political issue. Many political reasons to either support or oppose the policies were found in almost two out of three articles. We also found that The Post & Courier and The Sun News were more likely than The State and The Greenville News to make arguments against smoke-free policies, and this was particularly so when they were talking about economic impacts of the policies. Implications of the findings are discussed in detail.

Does Stigma against Smokers Really Motivate Cessation? A Moderated Mediation Effect of Anti-smoking Campaign • Jinyoung Kim, Pennsylvania State University; Xiaoxia Cao, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee; Eric Meczkowski • Anti-smoking campaigns frequently use stigmatizing messages to promote cessation. Qualitative researchers have raised concerns over the unintended consequences of broadcasting stigmatizing messages to low socioeconomic status populations. Our study seeks to empirically test this concern through an experiment that examines socioeconomic and emotional determinants of stigmatizing message effectiveness. Results indicate that stigmatizing messages are less effective for low SES populations and SES moderates the relationship between exposure to stigmatizing messages, shame, and cessation intention.

Segmenting Exergame Users Based on Perceptions on Playing Exergames Among College Students • Youjeong Kim, new york institute of technology; Hyang-Sook Kim, Towson University • To promote physical fitness by means of exergames and maintain adherence of exergame effects, it is imperative to understand when and why exergame users (dis)continue to play. Given two separate conceptualizations tied to exergames—as a type of video game or an exercise tool—a self-instructed online survey with 158 college students showed that non-regular exercisers perceived exergames as an exercise tool more strongly and showed more positive attitudes toward exergames as an exercise tool and intention to play than regular exercisers. No difference was found among any of the group specifications (regular vs. non-regular exercisers and exergame players vs. non-players) for the perception of exergames as a type of video game. However, the exergame player group showed a more positive attitude toward exergames as video games and greater intention to play than the non-player group. Implications for exergame business and health professionals were further discussed.

Who is Responsible for Climate Change? • Sei-Hill Kim; Jeong-Heon Chang, Korea University; Jea Chul Shim, Korea University; Hwalbin Kim, University of South Carolina • Analyzing data from a survey of South Koreans’ perceptions of climate change, this study examines whether the way people attribute responsibility can affect their perceived risks. We hypothesize that those who believe that the government or large corporations – as opposed to average citizens like themselves – are highly responsible for the negative consequences of climate change will perceive a greater risk because the risk is perceived to be beyond their own control and determined largely by another entity (i.e., the government or corporations). This study then examines the role of the media in shaping the audiences’ perceptions of who is responsible. More specifically, we investigate whether individuals’ use of news media for science information is associated with the extent to which they attribute responsibility for climate change. Attributing greater responsibility to the government was positively and significantly associated with perceptions of greater risks to self, to others, and to the next generation. Attributing responsibility to large corporations also had positive associations with perceived risks. Television news viewing was negatively and significantly associated with attributing responsibility to the government and to large corporations. On the contrary, uses of online bulletin boards and blogs were positively associated with blaming the government and corporations. Implications of the findings are discussed in detail.

Cultural Effects on Cancer Prevention Behaviors: Fatalistic Cancer Beliefs and Optimism Among East Asians • HyeKyung Kay Kim; May Lwin • Culture has been recognized as an important factor that influences health beliefs and health-related behaviors. This study examines culturally influenced beliefs about cancer risk and prevention, and their impact on the performance of four cancer prevention behaviors including regular exercise, avoid smoking, fruit and vegetable intake, and sunscreen use. To make cross-cultural comparisons, we used data from national surveys of European American (HINTS 4, Cycle3; N = 1,139) and East Asians in Singapore (N = 1,200). Compared to European Americans, East Asians were significantly less likely to engage in prevention behaviors, except avoiding smoking. East Asians appear to be more optimistic about their cancer risk and to hold stronger fatalistic beliefs about cancer prevention, which in turn partially explained cultural disparities in adherence to cancer prevention behaviors. Our findings underscore the need for developing culturally tailored interventions in communicating cancer causes and prevention. We discuss practical and theoretical implications of our findings.

Crowdfunding: Engaging the public in scientific research • Eun Jeong Koh, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Linda Pfeiffer, UW-Madison • Recent studies increasingly find that the medialization phenomenon is at work among scientists. We explore scientists’ medialization behaviors that attempt to increase public visibility in new media environments. Through content analysis of an online platform for crowdfunding, we observed medialization behaviors among the scientists who seek research funding through crowdfunding. Some of their strategies were positively associated with the amount of funding they received as pledges and the number of donors who supported their projects.

Healthy Concern for the Environment: How health framing can better engage audiences with news coverage of environmental issues. • Patrice Kohl • Social scientists suggest framing environmental stories to emphasize human health consequences could help build support for addressing environmental issues by eliciting attitudes and emotions favorable toward addressing environmental issues. Early empirical evidence supports this conclusion. This study contributes to this research with the finding that health framing can also increase reader interest in environmental stories. It also extends this body of research, which has so far focused on climate change, to an alternative environmental issue.

The Effects of Message Framing and Anthropomorphism on Empathy, Implicit and Explicit Green Attitudes • Sushma Kumble; Lee Ahern; Jose Aviles; Minhee Lee • Anthropomorphizing nature is common in many cultures–Earth is often and fondly referred to as ‘Mother Earth’ and nature as ‘Mother nature’. But does making nature more ‘human’ change perceptions and attitudes toward it? The current work examined the extent to which anthropomorphism and message framing help in formation of pro-environmental attitudes and behaviors by employing a 2×2 between subject factorial design. One novel aspect of the study was that it measures impacts on implicit, automatic green attitudes, as well as on explicit attitudes. Results indicated that while anthropomorphism did not have a significant main effect, gain-framed messages led to more positive green implicit and explicit attitude. Along with that, it was also seen that empathy mediated this relationship.

Window Dressing or Public Education? How Oil Companies’ Websites Address Public Concerns About Hydraulic Fracturing • Sun Young Lee, Texas Tech University; Hyo Jin Kim; Kristi Gilmore, Texas Tech University • We examined the petroleum industry’s communication efforts in regard to water issues surrounding the controversial process of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. Using textual analysis, we examined the websites of the top 10 U.S. oil and gas companies to see whether and how the corporations addressed the issues that the public are concerned about. Results showed that all eight companies that have adopted fracking addressed water issues relating to fracking, but the way they presented the information was not friendly to the public. We discuss the implications of the findings and suggest directions for future study.

Communal Risk Information Sharing: Motivations Behind Voluntary Information Sharing of Late Blight Infection in U.S. Agricultural Communities • Wang Liao, Cornell University; Connie Yuan, Cornell University; Katherine McComas, Cornell University • The paper presents a study of a national sample of tomato and potato growers in the United States (N = 452). This study focused on motivations behind voluntary information sharing of late blight, a devastating communal risk for agricultural economics. We examined three categories of motivations, ranging from personal concerns for immediate, extrinsic payoffs (i.e., economic costs and spending time/effort), to concerns for long-term or intrinsic benefits (i.e., reciprocity and altruistic enjoyment), and to community-based concerns (i.e., shared responsibility and community cohesiveness). The trustworthiness of risk information receiver was also examined. We found growers were motivated to share or not share information of late blight infection in their own farms by (a) economic concerns for business loss, (b) cooperative concerns for reciprocation and information receiver’s trustworthiness, and (c) normative concerns derived from a sense of shared responsibility, reciprocity, and community cohesiveness. We argued that more attention should be paid to risk information sharing, especially for communal risks, in addition to risk information seeking and processing.

Frame and Seek? Do Media Frame Combinations of Celebrity Health Disclosures Effect Health Information Seeking? • Susan LoRusso, University of Minnesota; Weijia Shi, University of Minnesota • This framing effects experimental study tests whether news stories reporting on a celebrity public health disclosure using disparate media frame combinations impact online health information seeking behavior and participant’s queried search terms. Nearly half of all participants participated in online information seeking, but there were no differences between conditions. Further results show a large effect size between media frame conditions and participants’ queried search terms when seeking online information.

The Effectiveness of Anti-drug Public Service Announcements on Cognitive Processing and Behavioral Intention: A Systematic Review of Current Research • Chen Lou, Michigan State University • This systematic review examined anti-drug public service announcements (PSAs)’ effectiveness among target audience. Six databases (PsychInfo, Pubmed, EMBASE, Cochrane Library, Communication and Mass Media Complete, and Web of Science) and forward citation lists were used to locate peer-reviewed published journal articles in English through September 2014. Studies that used randomized controlled trials (RCT) to examine anti-drug PSAs persuasive effects or mediators/moderators of their effects were included. Fifteen studies were identified after two rounds of search. Included studies’ characteristics (such as, sample size, sample age, gender, intervention type, intensity of intervention, mediator/moderators), key measures, and main results were extracted. All of the included studies were appraised based on the risk of bias criteria. Only three studies claimed PSAs’ effectiveness compared to the control messages. Four studies provided evidence that some anti-drug PSAs presented in certain contexts may have deleterious effects on their target populations. There were no conclusive arguments made on the mediators/moderators’ (e.g., gender, ethnicity, prior drug use, sensation seeking, message sensation value) effects on PSAs’ effectiveness.

Moms and media: Exploring the effects of online communication on infant feeding practices • Robert McKeever, University of South Carolina; Brooke McKeever, University of South Carolina • Using a survey of mothers with young children (N = 455), this study applies Fishbein and Ajzen’s (2011) Reasoned Action Approach (RAA) to examine the relationship between online communication and infant feeding practices. Contrary to expectations, attitudes, perceived normative pressure, and perceived behavioral control did not fully mediate the relationship between time spent online and behavioral intentions. Our findings indicate a significant, direct, negative association between time online and breastfeeding intentions.

The silent majority: Childhood vaccinations and antecedents for communicative action • Brooke McKeever, University of South Carolina; Robert McKeever, University of South Carolina; Avery Holton, University of Utah; Jo-Yun Queenie Li • The topic of childhood vaccinations has received much media attention recently, prompting scholars to examine how the public has responded. This study examines why individuals may involve themselves in communication about vaccinations. Drawing on several communication theories and using a survey of mothers (N = 455) this study finds that while affective and cognitive involvement may help drive communicative action, individuals who personally support vaccinations may be less likely to voice their opinions. Implications are discussed.

The Mediating Role of Media Use in an Elementary School Health Intervention Program • Dylan McLemore, Univ of Alabama; Lindsey Conlin, The University of Southern Mississippi; Xueying Zhang; Bijie Bie; Kim Bissell, University of Alabama; Scott Parrott • Media use – television in particular – has long been considered a risk factor for obesity in children. This study considered whether children’s media use mediated the success of an elementary school obesity intervention program. The intervention significantly increased children’s nutritional knowledge. Existing media use had no effect on the intervention, nor did it correlate with BMI or pre-existing knowledge or attitudes about exercise and nutrition. Findings are discussed within the context of media effects theory and health intervention practice.

Disease outbreaks on Twitter: An analysis of tweets during the #Ebola and #measles crises • Jeanine Guidry, Virginia Commonwealth University; Shana Meganck; Marcus Messner, Virginia Commonwealth University; EunHae (Grace) Park, Virginia Commonwealth University; Kellie Carlyle, Virginia Commonwealth University; Osita Iroegbu, Virginia Commonwealth University; Jerome Niyirora, SUNY Polytechnic Institute • Recent Ebola and measles outbreaks have brought both diseases to the forefront of public debate, and social media is one of the main places people are turning to learn more about the diseases, find like-minded individuals, and express opinions. Yet little is known about these conversations, and what can be learned from them. The goal of this study was to analyze the public’s engagement on social media as the two disease outbreaks turned into online crises. This study analyzed 2,000 tweets – 1,000 Ebola-focused tweets and 1,000 measles-focused tweets – with each sample collected at the height of each disease outbreak. Tweets were analyzed using the Risk Perception Model and the Health Belief Model. The results indicate that while Ebola-focused tweets elicited significantly more engagement than measles-focused tweets, both conversations displayed a high level of perceived severity of the diseases as well as a significant presence of risk perception variables. While Ebola tweets more often refer to identifiable victims, measles tweets, and especially those that already mention a fear of the MMR vaccine, more often speak of concern and fear and of peceived deception by medical authorities.

Physician Use and Policy Awareness of Open Access to Research and Their Views on Journalists’ Reporting of Research • Laura Moorhead, Stanford University • Through funding agency and publisher policies, an increasing proportion of the health sciences literature is being made open access. Such access raises questions about the awareness and utilization of this literature by physicians, as well as the role journalists may play in physicians’ need of journal articles. A sample of physicians (N=336) was provided with access to the research for one year; a subset of physicians (n=38) was interviewed about research use and perceived impact of journalists in creating a need for immediate access to embargoed research. The physicians in this study reported mixed feelings about the work of journalists. On one hand, they relied on journalists for publicly shared information, as they often had access to press releases from academic publishers. On the other hand, physicians were regularly frustrated by what they perceived as journalists’ inadequate or flawed coverage of health and medical matters through the misreporting of research. An opportunity exists for a partnership between physicians and journalists, particularly on the local level. Additionally, physicians and journalists face a similar need for immediate access to research as a way to better inform the public about issues of health care.

College Students’ Beverage Consumption Behaviors and the Path to Obesity • Cynthia Morton, University of Floridq; Naa Amponsah Dodoo, University of Florida • Research has established that high soft drink consumption, including carbonated beverages, fruit juices, and other sugar-based beverages are correlated with increased risk of obesity. College students are an urgent priority to curbing the path toward obesity since research suggests the college stage of life is where habits are solidified and weight gain occurs most quickly. The purpose of this research is to build on previous studies that have also explored college students’ food consumption habits by providing a closer examination of college students’ knowledge, beliefs, and behaviors. Survey research examined three the relationship between knowledge, beliefs, and beverage consumption behaviors. The findings and implications for health communication practitioners present an opportunity to identify message directions that speak to the college student segment in terms important to them.

No Pain, Lotta Gain: Risk-benefit information on cosmetic surgeons’ websites • SangHee Park, Bowling Green State University; Sung-Yeon Park, School of Media and Communication, Bowling Green State University • This study analyzed the website homepages of 250 cosmetic surgeons to investigate how cosmetic surgeons’ websites provide information about the risks and benefits of cosmetic surgery. This study found that although cosmetic surgeons’ website homages emphasized psychological benefits of having the cosmetic surgery, they minimized psychological and physical risks of the surgery. They also addresses time and cost to increase perceived control over cosmetic surgery. Implications of these findings are discussed.

What Health Risk?   Constructions of Definitional Power and Complex Science in Policy News • Linda Pfeiffer, UW-Madison • This research explores whether news constructions of complex science meet the critical information needs of the public when powerful actors work vigorously to define the dominant policy narrative. A mixed-methods frame analysis reveals that NGOs appear to be emergent as key health communicators. NGOs and citizen journalists prioritize issues of health, sustainability, and procedural justice. Comparatively, traditional media constructions predominantly reflect diversionary economic and deregulatory frames, with public-relations science confusion counter-framing overshadowing health risk narratives.

Gender and Race Representations of Scientists in Highlights for Children: A Content Analysis • Kathy Previs, Eastern Kentucky University • Researchers have found that girls lose interest in science by age nine (Steinke 2005; Rosser and Potter 1990) and have attributed this finding to misrepresentations of female scientists in the media (McIntosh 2014). While television, film, the Internet and textbooks have been analyzed for such representations, this study examines the extent to which females and minorities are portrayed over time in areas of science in a popular children’s magazine, Highlights for Children. The results indicate that, while males and whites have outnumbered females and minorities in depictions of science, Highlights has consistently exceeded the number of females and minorities actually employed in scientific fields.

The Effectiveness of Entertainment Education in Obesity Prevention • Weina Ran • The purpose of the study is to investigate the effectiveness of entertainment education (EE) and explicate its underlying persuasive mechanisms. Data from a longitudinal experiment show that compared to an explicit persuasive appeal, EE is more effective in preventing junk food consumption. Results also show that identification with media characters predicts less junk food consumption indirectly through self-efficacy. Implications are discussed for EE-oriented health interventions.

Message Frames on How Individuals Contract HIV and How Individuals Live with HIV in Combination Have Different Impacts on HIV Stigma • Chunbo Ren, Central Michigan University; Ming Lei, Cameron University • HIV stigma has become one of the most pressing concerns in global HIV response, and media are a key factor in HIV stigmatization. Given the salience of media framing of how individuals contract HIV and the framing of how individuals live with HIV, the current study explored the effects of the two media frames in tandem on HIV stigma to help inform the practice of reducing stigma toward people living with HIV (PLHIV). The study was a two (pretest-posttest) by two (HIV onset controllability framing) by two (living with HIV framing) mixed model experiment with a control group. The results of the current study suggest that HIV onset controllability remains a significant factor in HIV stigma. Media framing on how individuals live with HIV can influence people’s stigmatizing attitudes toward PLHIV, intentions of social distancing from PLHIV, and intentions to support coercive measures against PLHIV. The influence, however, must be interpreted with media framing on the onset controllability of HIV. Positive portrayals of living with HIV can reduce people’s intentions of social distancing from PLHIV but only when the positive portrayals are in combination with portrayals that PLHIV have contracted HIV due to less controllable behaviors. When the negative portrayals of living with HIV are combined with the portrayals that PLHIV have contracted HIV via controllable behaviors, the results can be drastic, as they increase people’s intentions to support coercive measures against PLHIV.

Vaccine-hesitant Justifications: From Narrative Transportation to the Conflation of Expertise • Nathan Rodriguez, University of Kansas • Vaccine-preventable diseases have re-emerged as more individuals have strayed from the recommended inoculation schedule. Previous work on vaccine hesitancy is generally limited to content analyses. Using grounded theory, this project examines vaccine debates on a prominent discussion board over a period of five years. Individuals tended to justify opposition or hesitancy toward vaccines through personal experience and/or research, and narrative transportation and the conflation of expertise help describe the most prominent characteristics of such discourse.

Framing the problem of childhood obesity in White House press releases: 2010 to 2014 • Jennifer Schwartz • This article outlines how the White House framed childhood obesity as a problem in White House press releases and official documents after First Lady Michelle Obama launched Feb. 9, 2010, the Let’s Move campaign, which was a federal campaign to define childhood obesity as a public health problem and offer solutions for reducing childhood obesity. This study found a decrease in attention to childhood obesity over time and an emphasis on defining childhood obesity as a problem and suggesting system-level solutions, such as changes to the food served in schools and improving the information environment in communities.

Seeking Treatment, Helping Others: Thematic Differences in Media Narratives between Traditional and New Media Content • Sarah Smith-Frigerio, University of Missouri; Cynthia Frisby, University of Missouri; Joseph Moore, University of Missouri; Abigail Gray; Miranda Craig, University of Missouri • One in five Americans deal with mental illness (NIMH, 2010), yet misrepresentation and stigma prevail in traditional media narratives. While scholars have called for changes in media narratives concerning mental illness, traditional media have been slow to adapt, and research of narratives in new media is limited. This study demonstrates thematic differences in narratives of mental illness in new media, and discusses how future research may further understanding about the construction of mental illness narratives.

Escapism in Exergames: Presence, enjoyment, and mood experience in predicting children’s attitudes towards Exergames • Shirley Ho, Nanyang Technological University; Jeremy Sng, Nanyang Technological University; Andrew Z. H. Yee; Woan Shin Tan; Ai Sian Ng; Victor Y. C. Yen; May Lwin • Obesity is a problem faced by countries all over the world today. Unhealthy eating habits and sedentary lifestyles have contributed to the growth in obesity among children in particular. Exergaming has been discussed as a possible way to encourage children to engage in physical activity. In this paper, we report on a survey which explores presence as a mechanism through which exergames may be associated with positive mood experiences and game enjoyment. The results (n = 345) revealed that presence was positively associated with mood experience and game enjoyment, game enjoyment and mood experience were positively correlated with attitudes towards exergaming, and attitudes towards exergaming were positively correlated with preference for future gameplay. In addition, mood experience was found to be a partial mediator of the relationship between presence and game enjoyment. Conclusions regarding the impact of exergames on adolescents, and practical implications for digital health interventions and exergame design are discussed.

Information and engagement: How scientific organizations are using social media in science public relations • Leona Yi-Fan Su; Dietram Scheufele; Dominique Brossard; Michael A. Xenos • This study examines the public relations practice of 250 scientific organizations through looking into their social media uses between 2010 and 2014. We found that they have increased the use of Twitter but decreased the use of Facebook. In particular, a majority of the messages comprises public information was shared in a one-way manner. A closer examination reveals that 92% of the discussions originated from the scientific organizations, suggesting a low level of public engagement.

Revisiting environmental citizenship: The role of information capital and media use • Bruno Takahashi, Michigan State University School of Journalism; Edson Tandoc, Nanyang Technological University; Anthony Van Witsen, Michigan State University; Ran Duan, Michigan State University • We propose, from an across-national perspective, a model of environmental citizenship that includes predictors at the individual and contextual levels. The model is based on multiple theoretical considerations from environmental sociology, media studies and economics. The study found that at the individual level, media use, environmental concern, and post-materialism positively predict environmental citizenship. However, the data also allowed us to test whether the effects of these variables vary depending on social and environmental contexts.

Aware, yet ignorant: The influences of funding and conflicts of interests in research among early career researchers • Meghnaa Tallapragada, Cornell University; Gina Eosco, Eastern Research Group; Katherine McComas, Cornell University • This study investigates the level of awareness about funding influences and potential conflicts of interests (COI) in research among early career researchers. The sample for this study included early career researchers who used one or more of the 14 U.S. laboratories associated with the National Nanotechnology Infrastructure Network. Results indicate that while early career researchers are aware of potential funding and COI influences, they remain ignorant on their role in addressing or managing these issues.

Toward a nuanced typology of media discourse of climate change, impact, and adaptation: An analysis of West African online news and social media • Jiun-Yi (Jenny) Tsai, Arizona State University • This study develops a nuanced typology to investigate how online news and social media (twitter) in West Africa frame climate change as a collective action problem, its impacts, and adaption efforts. Specifically, we distinguish four classes of framing discourse – cause, threat, solution and motivation. Content analysis of 1,344 English news articles shows dominance of threat frame and solution frame. Threats of climate change to food security, human health conditions, and environmental systems are prevalent. Within the solution frame, discourse largely emphasizes creation and implementation of policy and programs proposed by international governments or NGOs to tackle climate challenge, build local farmers’ capacity, and thereby enhance resilience. In stark contrast to discourse in the West, few articles debate its causes, focusing more on blaming human activity than on scientific uncertainty. Motivational frames are very uncommon. Theoretical contribution and implication are discussed.

The Entanglement of Sex, Culture, and Media in Genderizing Disease • Irene van Driel; Jessica Myrick, Indiana University; Rachelle Pavelko, Indiana University; Maria Grabe; Paul Hendriks Vettehen; Mariska Kleemans; Gabi Schaap • This cross-national survey tested how biological sex, culture, and media factors cultivate gender-based susceptibility to diseases. Data were collected from 1,299 Millennials in two countries (US and the Netherlands), shown to differ in gender role socialization. Sex, national and individual gender role perceptions, and media use variables were entered into hierarchical regression models to predict genderization of 48 diseases. Results indicate that aside from sex and culture, medical media contribute to genderization of diseases.

How to Promote Green Social Capital?: Investigating Communication Influences on Environmental Issue Participation • Matthew S. VanDyke, Texas Tech University; Weiwu Zhang, Texas Tech University • The study proposes issue-specific measures of participation, which have been lacking from previous social capital scholarship. It examines how reliance on various communication channels influences environmental issue participation. Findings from an Internet survey suggest that perceived importance of environmental issues, reliance on print media, websites, and weblogs positively predict environmental civic and political participation. Reliance on social networking sites predicts civic but not political participation.

A Missed Opportunity?: NOAA’s Use of Social Media to Communicate Climate Science • Nicole Lee, Texas Tech University; Matthew S. VanDyke, Texas Tech University; R. Glenn Cummins, Texas Tech University • The current study examined how the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA) utilizes social media to engage publics. Results suggest NOAA doesn’t fully utilize the dialogic potential of social media and seems to be missing an opportunity to enhance science literacy and trust in science regarding climate change specifically. This study informs how public relations theory may complement science communication theory and practice as deficit model-thinking transitions to contemporary approaches for public engagement with science.

The porn effect (?): Links between college men’s exposure to sexually explicit online materials and risky sexual health behaviors & attitudes • Ashley McLain; Kim Walsh-Childers, residential • A sample of 85 undergraduate males completed an online survey to determine if their use of sexually explicit Internet material (SEIM) was associated with sexual health behaviors and attitudes toward pornography and condom use. The study, based on Social Cognitive Theory, investigated whether frequency of exposure to SEIM was associated with more negative attitudes toward condom use, decreased condom use, less partner communication about sex and greater likelihood of engaging in sexual risk behaviors. SEIM exposure was a statistically significant predictor of risky sexual health behaviors for men of all racial groups and of condom use among men who listed their race as other. SEIM was not a predictor of partner communication. For black males, a positive attitude toward pornography was a predictor of less positive condom use attitudes. Post-hoc analyses revealed that, controlling for race, sexual risk behavior increased as positive attitudes toward pornography increased. Further research is needed to determine if the associations exist among other populations and to further investigate the role that race and sensation seeking may have on these associations.

Health narratives effectiveness: Examining the moderating role of persuasive intention • Weirui Wang, Florida International University; Fuyuan Shen • Prior research has indicated that narratives are more effective than non-narrative messages. One of the reasons is that narratives’ intention to persuade is often not explicit, and as a result, stories are less likely to be disputed. The goal of the present research is to examine the moderating role of persuasive intention in narrative persuasion. To do so, a 2 (Message format: narrative vs. non-narrative message) X 2 (Persuasive intention: intention vs. no intention) experiment with a factorial design was conducted among a total of 205 participants on the effects of health narrative messages. Results indicated that persuasive intention undermined the effects of narratives on persuasion through reducing believability and increasing reactance. Both believability and reactance were found to partially mediate the effects of narrative messages on attitudes and behavioral intention.

Motivated Processing of Fear Appeal Messages in Obesity Prevention Videos • Tianjiao Wang, Washington State University; Rachel Bailey, Washington State University • This study examined young adults’ physiological and cognitive responses to fear appeal obesity prevention messages that vary in emotional valence and intensity. Results suggested that valence of these messages impacted individuals’ attention and memory as a function of intensity. Coactive high intensity messages received the most attention, though visual recognition suggests these messages were more difficult to encode.

Zombie Fiction as Narrative Persuasion: Comparing Narrative Engagement in Text-Only and Visual Entertainment Education • Amanda J. Weed, Ohio University • The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) launched a multimedia awareness campaign in 2011 to promote emergency preparedness to young audiences. At the heart of the campaign was Preparedness 101: Zombie Apocalypse, an example of narrative persuasion implemented as a comic book. The core persuasive message of the campaign was preparation for a zombie apocalypse through development of a personal emergency plan and creation of an emergency preparedness kit. As a form of narrative persuasion, comic books possibly go a step further than text-only stories by providing rich storytelling combined with vivid visual images. The purpose of this research was to examine the effect of presentation mode (text-only or comic book) on key outcomes of narrative persuasion and engagement including: a) strength of belief for the persuasive messages embedded in Preparedness 101: Zombie Apocalypse, b) participant’s perceived relevance of the story, c) character identification and experience taking, and d) counter-arguments to the persuasive messages.

Communicating to Young Chinese about HPV Vaccination: Examining the Impact of Message Framing and Temporal Distance • Nainan Wen; Fuyuan Shen • This research investigated the influence of message framing (gain or loss) and temporal distance (present or future) on the intention of HPV vaccination. A total of 156 Chinese undergraduates participated in a controlled experiment in Macau, a Special Administrative Region of China. Results showed that message framing and temporal distance interacted to impact the intention of HPV vaccination. Particularly, among participants who had no prior knowledge of HPV vaccine, the gain-present and loss-future framed messages resulted in more positive attitudes toward the message, higher degree of perceived severity of HPV infection, and more likelihood to get HPV vaccination. Implications of the findings were discussed.

Up in vapor: Exploring the health messages of e-cigarette advertisements • Erin Willis, University of Memphis; Matthew Haught, University of Memphis; David Morris II, University of Memphis • Electronic cigarettes have gained popularity in the United States, and marketers are using advertising to recruit new users to their products. Despite outright bans on traditional cigarette advertisements, electronic cigarettes have no specific regulations. This study uses framing theory to explore the themes in e-cigarette advertisements. Practical implications are discussed for both public health practitioners and health communicators.

The case of Ebola: Risk information communicated by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention using Twitter • Erin Willis, University of Memphis; Rosie Jahng, Hope College • The outbreak of Ebola in West Africa last year caused the U.S. to be on high alert. Tweets disseminated by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention during this time are examined with a focus on health literacy and health frames used to inform publics about the spread of Ebola. While the CDC has social media guidelines specifically for Twitter, the current research discusses practical implications when communicating risk information about a public health issue.

Climate Change in the Changing Climate of News Media: How Newspapers and Blogs Portray Climate Change in the United States • Lei Xie, Fairfield University • This study examines how major U.S. newspapers and grass-root blogs portrayed climate change by analyzing a combination of issue-independent and issue-specific frames: skepticism toward climate change, micro-issue salience, audience-based frames, and attribution of responsibility. Results from 372 stories show contrasting cross-media representation in terms of skepticism and other frames that inform public perception of the issue. Moreover, they provide important clues to understanding the discrepancy between the less skeptical news media and the indifferent American public and offer insights into the intricate relationship between mainstream media and grass-root blogs. Theoretical and methodological implications of this study call for a more systematic approach to frame analysis of climate change communication.

Mapping Science Communication Scholarship in China: Content Analysis on Breadth, Depth and Agenda of Published Research • Linjia Xu; Biaowen Huang; YUANYUAN DONG • This study presents data from a content analysis of published research with the keyword science communication (科学传播) in title or in key words, including academic paper published on journals and dissertations from the database China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI). 572 articles were coded using categories that identified science topics, theory, authorship and methods used in each study to examine the breadth and depth that Science Communication has achieved since its inception in China. We could see the history and scope of science communication, and juxtapose this historical overview in the backdrop of the current scholarship that appears. The depth and width of Chinese Science Communication researches are developing rapidly in the past 30 years. The focus of research topics are changing from the concepts and theories to sources and contents of communication. HPS (History and Philosophy of Science) scholars are the originator and dominance of this field rather than communication scholars. We also identified some notable trends and issues in research for the future development.

Chipping away the Stigma toward People Living with HIV: New Insights from Matching Frames of HIV Onset Controllability with Attitudinal Ambivalence • Changmin Yan, West Virginia University; Chunbo Ren, Central Michigan University • In a pre-post 2 (controllability framing: high or low) by 2 (attitudinal ambivalence: high or low) experimental design, this study investigated if stigma toward people living with HIV (PLHIV) can be reduced by matching HIV onset controllability framed stories with people’s levels of attitudinal ambivalence toward PLHIV. First, a controllability framing main effect was reported in a just-world attribution bias such that individuals in the low HIV onset controllability framing condition expressed less stigma toward PLHIV than those in the high HIV onset controllability condition. Second, an attitudinal ambivalence main effect was also observed such that people with a high level of ambivalence toward PLHIV reported less stigma toward PLHIV than the low-ambivalence individuals. Third, results also supported controllability framing by attitudinal ambivalence interaction effects. Specifically, a significant reduction in stigma toward PLHIV was recorded among people with a high level of ambivalence toward PLHIV when they read high HIV onset controllability-framed stories. Moreover, among the two high HIV onset controllability framing conditions, high-ambivalence individuals reported a significantly smaller increase of stigma than their low-ambivalence counterparts. In sum, the current study has demonstrated that stigma toward PLHIV could be temporarily reduced by matching low onset controllability stories with individuals who feel highly ambivalent toward PLHIV and that even the hard-to-change bias toward high onset controllability PLHIV can be situationally softened among the high-ambivalence individuals.

The Framing of GMOs in China’s Online Media After Golden Rice Scandal • Jinjie Yang • This study examines the framing of GMOs in Chinese news reports after the golden rice scandal using quantitative and qualitative approaches. Ninety news reports selected from related news articles published in 2013 showed five major frames: GMOs as a market issue, as a mature and reliable technology, as scientific progress, as technology that should be regulated, and as a disastrous invention. Analysis of the social factors behind each frame revealed gaps that pose challenges to risk communication.

Altruism during Ebola: Risk perception, issue salience, cultural cognition, and information processing • Zheng Yang, University at Buffalo • This study investigates how risk perception, issue salience, cultural cognition, and dual-process information processing influence individuals’ altruistic behavioral intentions. Data were collected through a nationally representative sample of 1,046 U.S. adults, who were randomly assigned to two experimental conditions that triggered different degrees of risk perception related to the Ebola outbreak. Results indicate that only in the high-risk condition, issue salience and deliberate processing increased individuals’ intentions to support families and friends to go to West Africa as Ebola responders. However, cultural cognition worldview and negative emotions such as sadness and anger were significantly related to altruistic behavioral intentions regardless of the experimental conditions. These findings suggest that affective responses diverge from cognitive processes in influencing risk-related decisions. Practically, as the U.S. continues to send experts to the affected countries in West Africa, results from this study suggest meaningful pathways to improve risk communication intended to encourage more altruistic and pro-social behaviors.

Motives and Underlying Desires of Hookup Apps Use and Risky Sexual Behaviors among Young Men who have Sex with Men in Hong Kong • Tien Ee Dominic Yeo, Department of Communication Studies, Hong Kong Baptist University; Yu Leung Ng, School of Communication, Hong Kong Baptist University • This study examines the role of motivation in the association between gay hookup apps use and risky sexual behaviors among young men who have sex with men (YMSM) in Hong Kong. Results indicate five motives for using gay hookup apps: surveillance, relationship, diversion, sex, and identity. Sexual sensation seeking moderated the relationship between sex motive and sexual encounters via apps. Romantic motivations moderated the relationship between surveillance motive and sexual encounters via apps.

Predicting Changes in Giving and Receiving Emotional Support within a Smartphone-Based Alcoholism Support Group • Woohyun Yoo, Dongguk University; Ming-Yuan Chih; Dhavan Shah; David Gustafson • This study explores how giving and receiving emotional support in a smartphone-based alcoholism support group change over time, and what factors predict the changing patterns. Data were collected as part of a randomized clinical trial of testing a smartphone-based relapse prevention system for people with alcohol use disorder. Giving and receiving emotional support were assessed by tracking and coding the 2,746 messages that 153 patients either wrote or read in a smartphone-based alcoholism support group during the 12-month study period. The final data used in the analysis were created by merging (1) computer-aided content analysis of emotional support messages, (2) action log data analysis of group usage, and (3) multiple waves of survey data. Findings suggest that giving and receiving emotional support in a smartphone-based alcoholism support group tend to decline over time. In addition, the initial value and growth rate of giving and receiving emotional support vary depending on the group participants’ characteristics. These features should be considered in building strategies for the design and implementation of smartphone-based support groups for people with alcohol use disorder.

Using Humor to Increase Persuasion of Shameful Health Issue Advertising: Testing the Effects of Individual’s Health Worry Levels • Hye Jin Yoon • Some health issues are strongly associated with shame, prompting individuals to withdraw from and avoid the issue. Using humor to communicate such issues can help buffer negative emotions and help reframe negative assessments. In testing the humor effects in shameful health issue advertising, an audience factor, a person’s general health worry level, is considered as a potential moderating variable. Three experiments found humor to benefit low health worry individuals in low shame conditions and high health worry individuals in high shame conditions. Theoretical and practical implications are given.

Social Representation of Cyberbullying and Adolescent Suicide: A Mixed-Method Analysis of News Stories • Rachel Young; Roma Subramanian; Stephanie Miles; Amanda Hinnant, University of Missouri School of Journalism; Julie Andsager, University of Tennessee • Cyberbullying has provoked public concern after well-publicized suicides of adolescents. This mixed-methods study investigates the social representation of these suicides. A content analysis of 189 U.S. newspaper articles found that nearly all articles suggest that bullying led to suicide. Few adhere to guidelines shown to protect against behavioral contagion. Thematic analysis found that individual suicides were used as cautionary tales to prompt attention to cyberbullying.

Facts, Not Fear: Negotiating Uncertainty on Social Media During the 2014 Ebola Crisis • Rachel Young; Melissa Tully, University of Iowa; Kajsa Dalrymple, University of Iowa • The recent Ebola outbreak posed communication challenges for the CDC. In a thematic analysis of more than 1,000 tweets as well as engagement with the public in Twitter chats, we found that the CDC emphasized organizational competence, extant protocol, and facts about transmission to manage public fear. An emphasis on certainty in a situation defined by uncertainty left the CDC vulnerable to charges of unpreparedness or obfuscation. Implications for future research are discussed.

Attitudes toward Antismoking Public Service Announcements: • Jay Hyunjae Yu; Changhyun Han, Sogang University • The smoking rate of younger adults (aged 18–24 years) has not changed much since 1997, even though much effort has been made by a range of organizations to encourage this group either to not initiate or to quit smoking. Among such efforts, public service announcements have been one of the major tools used to accomplish this goal. This experimental study (3 × 3 design) investigated the possible effects of using different types of endorsers (celebrities, professionals, peer groups) and different message framing styles (gain framing, loss framing, and neutral) to create better content for antismoking public service announcements. The results showed that there were not only main effects of different message framing styles, but also interaction effects of different endorsers and different message framing styles. More specifically, an antismoking public service announcement using celebrities and positively framed messages (i.e., talking about the positive consequences of quitting smoking) caused participants to show a better attitude toward the advertisement. The implications are provided for communication researchers and practitioners responsible for planning specific content for antismoking public service announcements.

The Effects of Self-Efficacy and Message Framing on Flu Vaccination Message Persuasiveness among College Students • Xuan Zhu; Jiyoon Lee; Lauren Duffy • In the present study, the authors investigated the potential interaction between self-efficacy and gain and loss message framing on the effectiveness of flu vaccination health messages in the college setting. Results from an experiment with 149 college student subjects showed that individuals with high self-efficacy exhibited greater intention to receive flu vaccination regardless of framing condition. In addition, an interaction between self-efficacy and perceived threat was evident on attitude. Implications for health intervention were discussed.

The Role of Efficacy Appraisal and Emotions on the Health Message Framing Effects • Xuan Zhu; Heewon Im, University of Minnesota • This study investigated the moderating role of efficacy appraisal (i.e., self-efficacy and response efficacy) on the message framing effects. Emotions were proposed to mediate message framing effects and the interaction between message framing and efficacy appraisal. Results from an experiment showed that efficacy appraisal moderated the message framing effects on attitude toward performing disease prevention behaviors. Happy and anger mediated message framing effects, but no supporting evidence was found for the mediated moderation effects.

2015 Abstracts