Digital Commons Network^™

Exploration Of The Process Of Building Brand Equity As A Digital Painter, Andrew Lim

Theses

The mainstream debut of the World Wide Web in the 20th century has increased the use of branding from its simple origins of being a visual marker into a multi-faceted entity. Branding has evolved to become a multi-faceted effort that creates rational and emotional attributes and can foster interactions and develop and deepen relationships with customers (Rubinstein, 2002).

The boom of the Internet brought forth new inventions and software that affected many industries, particularly the arts. A new emergent form of art known as digital painting emerged where a drawing tablet, stylus and digital image rendering software such as Adobe …

Evolving Crisis Communication In Social Media Era: Analysis Of Tweets And News Stories Of The Manchester Arena Bombing, Allyson R. Staton

Honors Theses

The purpose of this research study was to better understand the evolving crisis communication methods used on traditional media and social media following organizational crises such as the Manchester Arena bombing. The research was primarily conducted by analyzing the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) online article archives and stakeholder Twitter accounts, including @ManchesterArena, @ManCityCouncil, @ArianaGrande and @GMPolice. Tweets under the hashtags #ManchesterBombing, #Manchester, #OneLoveManchester as well as the Manchester Bombing Twitter Moment were also analyzed for crisis communication responses to understand how traditional media and social media were used to communicate with the public following this crisis.

The results of this …

Calling Out The Trolls: Responses To Witnessing Use Of The “Troll” Label As A Defense In An Online Group Context, Dene E. M. Wamsley

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Although the term “troll” has existed since the 1980s, its meaning has shifted in recent years as social media use has increased. People provide contrasting and imprecise definitions for what constitutes “trolling,” and often apply the term subjectively to describe online discussants who are uncivil, who are deviant, and who and present counter-attitudinal opinions. Exposure to deviance, counter-attitudinal information, and incivility often leads to unwanted psychological effects. In theory, labeling an uncivil, counter-attitudinal deviant as a “troll” proposes that their intention is to disrupt the conversation and upset other discussants, which provides a reason for why incivility is used, and …

Instagram And Eating Disorders: An Empirical Study Of The Effects Of Instagram On Disordered Eating Habits Among Young Girls, Katherine Wayles

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Scholars have studied the relationship between body dissatisfaction and social media use, particularly focusing on young women as vulnerable consumers. Many studies concentrate on the amount of media consumed, rather than the specific activities and behaviors associated with feelings of low self-esteem or poor body image. It is important to determine exactly what behaviors and social media engagements contribute to disordered relationships with food, assessing a user’s pre-existing weight/body concerns in relation to the amount and type of media they consume. Instagram in particular is included in this study, as it is an image-based social networking site where users can …

Social Media’S Impact On Customer Satisfaction In The Hospitality Industry, Alexander Freund

Hospitality Graduate Student Scholarship

No abstract provided.

From The Desk Of Philip D. Hall, Pharm.D, Professor And Dean, April 28, 2020, Philip D. Hall

College of Pharmacy From the Dean's Desk

No abstract provided.

Moving Away From The Alt-Right: How The Proud Boys Utilize Image Conscious Populist Media To Re-Brand White Nationalism, Christina Blankenship

Communication ETDs

Unite the Right, deemed a ‘failure’ by major media outlets, generated two important developments: One, it highlighted the increased public mobilization of the Far-Right, challenging the established notion that such groups existed only in online spheres and two, gave factions the motivation to disassociate from the Alt-Right’s message and carve out an identity for their own. This project examines the Proud Boys, a ‘men’s group’ formed in 2016 by Gavin McInnes. In studying the group’s online blog (The Proud Boys Magazine), this project demonstrates that while the group tried to distance themselves, much of their success in generating …

A Case Study On A Grassroots, Student-Led Facebook Community For Online Graduate Students And Alumni, Caroline E. Frankel

Instructional Design Capstones Collection

This case study explores the evolution of a grassroots, student-led Facebook graduate student community to support graduate students within the University of Massachusetts Boston Instructional Design Program. The study explores literature supporting social presence construction within formal course environments, informal learning networks, and how social media can help bridge the gap between the formal and informal course space. A questionnaire administered to graduate students and alumni within the Instructional Design Facebook community suggests that a grassroots model has been highly effective at helping students feel more connected to each other. Conclusions and recommendations provided by this study will help inform …

Hair: How Naturals Are Using Social Media To Reshape The Narrative And Visual Rhetoric Of Black Hair, Shari E. Drumond

All HCAS Student Capstones, Theses, and Dissertations

Black women’s natural hair has been subject to both praise and scrutiny, though the latter is more common despite the steps taken towards inclusion and diversity. In the age of social media, members of the natural hair community have been able to voice and communicate ideas and issues that are specific to their discourse community. This study explores how the natural hair community uses social media, more specifically Instagram, to discuss the complex issues that surround natural hair including historicization, workplace bias, colorism, and social justice. Additionally, this study argues that natural hair is a form of visual rhetoric as …

Relationships Between Jealousy In Intimate Partnerships The Use Of Snapchat, Mariem Laaraj, Cody Andrus, Ellie Begin, Mary Pritchard

2020 Undergraduate Research Showcase

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to examine the relationships between jealousy in intimate partnerships and the use of the social media platform, Snapchat.

Methods: Using a self-report survey design, this study examined jealousy in relationships of134 students enrolled in a Psychology 101 course. The use of Snapchat was expected to be a significant cause of conflict in relationships.

Results: Individuals who reported more spying on Snapchat were also more likely to engage in more “mate guarding” and were more likely to report that they feared their partner would leave them and that they had experienced conflict with their …

Event Management: Defining Digital Marketing Trends, Teresa Gray

MBA Student Scholarship

The purpose of this paper is to define and explore the trends of digital marketing in event management. As confirmed by Hensel and Deis (2010), digital and social media must be employed in a way that will ultimately improve that will improve marketing efficiency (as cited in Cole, DeNardin & Clow, 2017). Research by Cesaroni and Consoli (2015) further established that it is important how small businesses in particular social media -as many event management firms are utilizing digital and social media in such a way that they take full advantage of every feature and tool that are available and …

Social Media As Occupation: Implications For Occupational Therapy Practice, Sheryl Eckberg Zylstra, Kimberly Erler, Wendell Nakamura, Brenda Kennell

The Open Journal of Occupational Therapy

No abstract provided.

The George-Anne Daily, Georgia Southern University

George-Anne Media Group: Newsletters & Magazines

No abstract provided.

Multimodal Mental Health Analysis In Social Media, Amir Hossein Yazdavar, Mohammad Saeid Mahdavinejad, Goonmeet Bajaj, William Romine, Amit P. Sheth, Amir Hassan Monadjemi, Krishnaprasad Thirunarayan, John M. Meddar, Annie Myers, Jyotishman Pathak, Pascal Hitzler

Publications

Depression is a major public health concern in the U.S. and globally. While successful early identification and treatment can lead to many positive health and behavioral outcomes, depression, remains undiagnosed, untreated or undertreated due to several reasons, including denial of the illness as well as cultural and social stigma. With the ubiquity of social media platforms, millions of people are now sharing their online persona by expressing their thoughts, moods, emotions, and even their daily struggles with mental health on social media. Unlike traditional observational cohort studies conducted through questionnaires and self-reported surveys, we explore the reliable detection of depressive …

The Enemy Of Digital Literacy Is Digital Marketing, Erika Hurth

New Jersey English Journal

This article considers the role that targeted advertising might play in reading comprehension. It is concerned with how the addictive design of online platforms may influence adolescent learning and well-being.

Limited Early Warnings And Public Attention To Coronavirus Disease 2019 In China, January–February, 2020: A Longitudinal Cohort Of Randomly Sampled Weibo Users, Yuner Zhu, King-Wa Fu, Karen A. Grépin, Hai Liang, Isaac Fung

Biostatistics, Epidemiology & Environmental Health Sciences: Faculty Publications

Objective:

Awareness and attentiveness have implications for the acceptance and adoption of disease prevention and control measures. Social media posts provide a record of the public’s attention to an outbreak. To measure the attention of Chinese netizens to coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), a pre-established nationally representative cohort of Weibo users was searched for COVID-19-related key words in their posts.

Methods:

COVID-19-related posts (N = 1101) were retrieved from a longitudinal cohort of 52 268 randomly sampled Weibo accounts (December 31, 2019–February 12, 2020).

Results:

Attention to COVID-19 was limited prior to China openly acknowledging human-to-human transmission on …

Attitudes Towards Social Media Regarding Age, Benjamin Marlow

Lake Campus Research Symposium Abstracts and Posters

Social media has increasingly worked its way into the everyday lives of individuals from a vast array of ages and backgrounds. Notably, the perceived effects and attitudes towards social media can vary with age. Through this proposed study, attitudes and feelings towards social media from 80 individuals, across four age groups, will be compiled from the Mercer and Auglaize county area via survey. An explanation from every participant explaining how social media affects their lives will be provided. From the responses, a better understanding of how social media is perceived to affect society, as well as it’s perceived effect on …

Gen Z & Social Media Influencers: The Generation Wanting A Real Experience, Alexandra Wolf

Honors Senior Capstone Projects

No abstract provided.

Digital Development: What It Means For Teachers, Amy Lightfoot

Teacher India

Technology can be leveraged for teachers’ professional development. Amy Lightfoot explains how.

Nothing Has Changed Since Yesterday, Why The Role Of Social Media In Radicalization Is More Complex Than It Seems, Robert T. Pollard

Honors Theses

In recent years there has been a seeming resurgence of political radicalism such as the alt-right and openly socialist groups that have coalesced around former presidential candidate Bernie Sanders. This sudden resurgence of radicalism has often been blamed on Social Media and its perceived ability to create echo chambers and help these groups organize. The goal of this paper is to refute the idea that social media is the sole cause of this recent wave of radicalism by building a framework of radicalization agnostic of social media, and then to explore how social media interacts with that framework. The paper …

The Networked Question In The Digital Era: How Do Networked, Bounded, And Limited Individuals Connect At Different Stages In The Life Course?, Barry Wellman, Anabel Quan-Haase, Molly-Gloria R. Harper

FIMS Publications

We used in-depth interviews with 101 participants in the East York section of Toronto, Canada to understand how digital media affects social connectivity in general--and networked individualism in particular--for people at different stages of the life course. Although people of all ages intertwined their use of digital media with their face-to-face interactions, younger adults used more types of digital media and more diversified personal networks. People in different age-groups conserved media, tending to stick with the digital media they learned to use in earlier life stages. Approximately one-third of the participants were Networked Individuals: In each age-group, they were the …

Social Media Influencer Marketing And Implementing The Return On Investment, Natalie E. Zacek

Selected Honors Theses

This thesis dives into the importance of social media marketing within a business. It starts off with a literature review that explains how much people use social media, how businesses have begun to recognize this trend, and how to turn this trend into a successful marketing strategy. This strategy can be demonstrated through online ads, influencer marketing, and a strong social media presence. The thesis will identify and examine all of these methods. The second part of this thesis is based on an online survey provided to the general public (over 18) in order to discover if the findings in …

Social Media Effects: Arab Readers, Writers, And Instagram, Afra Atiq Juma Faraj Nasib

Philosophy Dissertations

This dissertation discusses the intersection of social media, particularly Instagram, Arab writers, and Arab readers in terms of social media effects. It examines the phenomenon of using social media in the literary ecosystem from both a user and producer perspective. The research is based around a theoretical framework of the uses and gratifications theory and the Gatekeeping theory. These theories are used to which understand Arab readers’ choice of platform, motivations, and attitudes. Furthermore, the perspectives of Arab writers are investigated, through the theories, leading to a holistic understanding of the Arab literary ecosystem. The main objective of this dissertation …

Social Media Responses To Self-Concept Threats, Tess Wild , '19, John C. Blanchar

Psychology Faculty Works

Several studies demonstrate that individuals carry out observable behaviors in order to achieve positive self-concepts. These behaviors can be related to engagements with social media. Thus, two studies tested whether the sharing of self-relevant symbols on user-heavy social media platforms is an engagement used to achieve positive self-concepts. In these studies, participants viewed resumes (Study 1) or Linkedin profiles (Study 2) intended to threaten their self-definition and then considered their own accomplishments in comparison. They were then asked to rate and choose one article, either relevant or irrelevant to their self-definition, to hypothetically share on their own social media page …

The Threat Of Virality: Digital Outrage Combats The Spread Of Opposing Ideas, Curtis Puryear

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The prevailing stage for conversations about politics and morality has shifted from private and face-to-face to public and digital. Moreover, the digital landscape itself changed considerably in the past decade. The era of static webpages has been replaced by dynamic social networks where ideas and reactions to events spread rapidly. With every comment we, or a political adversary makes, numbers quantifying social approval tick up or down. Instead of holding digitized versions of one-on-one conversations, we argue in front of audiences who throw digital “points” at and accelerate the spread of the winning side’s ideas. I argue this subjectively raises …

Empty Streets, Active Feeds: Moroccan Youth Activism In The Age Of Social Media, Samantha Jaloza

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Since the February 20 movement in 2011, Morocco has not witnessed large waves of political activism from its young population. However, Moroccan youth are not inactive citizens, and it would be a mischaracterization to call young Moroccans apolitical or disinterested. Rather, Moroccan youth are finding new ways to interact with political and social issues. With the increase in access to the Internet over the last fifteen years, social media has become an important forum for Moroccan youth, who have often felt marginalized from more traditional forms of political participation like unions and political parties. This research explores the ways that …

Social Media Posts' Influence On College Athletes' Protein Knowledge, Kriston T. Love

Theses and Dissertations

This research aimed to examine how Instagram can be used as a means of education for collegiate athletes and their knowledge of protein. More specifically this research aimed to compare the prior knowledge about protein that collegiate athletes have to the knowledge they may have retained after being exposed to posts on Instagram about protein. It also aimed to determine the knowledge of protein collegiate athletes already had and if their sport and year in school influenced their protein knowledge. This study surveyed Division I collegiate athletes on their social media use and knowledge of protein before and after being …

Navigating Lgbtq+ And Disabled Intersections Online: Social Support And Identity Construction In The Age Of Social Media, Bianca Sturchio Msw

All Student Scholarship

There is a lack of research about the lived experiences of self-identified lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and otherwise-identified (LGBTQ+) young adults with disabilities who use the Internet to achieve particular social aims. Using open-ended survey questions, the researcher applied multidimensional and overlapping frameworks of intersectionality, feminist-disability theory, and social work to answer the following: What are the lived experiences of disabled, LGBTQ+ young adults who use social media for social support and identity construction? Using secondary data, fifteen (N=15) cases of LGBTQ+ disabled young adults aged 18 to 31 living in the United States were selected, and data was …

Blockchain Empowers Social Resistance And Terrorism Through Decentralized Autonomous Organizations, Armin Krishnan

Journal of Strategic Security

The invention of the Internet has changed the way social resistance, revolutionary movements and terror groups are organized with new features such as loose network organization, netwars, social media campaigns, and lone wolf attacks. This article argues that blockchain technology will lead to more far-reaching changes in the organization of resistance to authority. Blockchain is a distributed ledger that records transactions using a consensus protocol, and when it meets objective conditions, it also enables smart contracts that execute transactions. Blockchain technology is not only a system for transferring value, but also it is a trustless system in which strangers can …

Extension Needs Outreach Innovation Free From The Harms Of Social Media, Jonathan J. Swinton

Extension Research

Despite the outreach-building benefits of social media for Extension, it is time for Extension professionals to find new innovative ways to reach out that do not involve social media. An increasing body of research has demonstrated the harms social media use imparts on the health and well-being of those in our communities. Our future use of social media as a primary method of outreach may perpetuate these harms, requiring our best efforts to develop new methods of outreach that do not negatively affect those we serve.