Social Media Commons^™

Structural Decomposition Of Deviant Cyber Flash Mobs On Twitter: Examining Statistical And Network Features Using Focal Structure Analysis, Billy Spann

Theses and Dissertations

Online Social Networks (OSNs) are largely considered a powerful vehicle to disseminate information. It is common to see social media used for propaganda maneuvering, disinformation campaigns, and crowd manipulation. These platforms also provide a method to coordinate and influence behavior. Many crime organizations use social media to coordinate events and then quickly disperse making it difficult to identify the actors. The focus of this study is to advance our understanding of the use of collective action theory measurements in communication networks extracted from Deviant Cyber Flash Mobs (DCFMs). We assess the formation of these cyber collective groups by analyzing the …

A Framework Towards Computational Narrative Analysis On Blogs/Social Media, Kiran Kumar Bandeli

Theses and Dissertations

Social media is widely used to express views and share opinions with others. With the availability of inexpensive and ubiquitous mass communication tools like social media, creating narratives, false information and propaganda is both convenient and effective. Social media users leverage this platform to further their views by framing narratives and participating in online discourse. Almost all events, issues, crises are discussed on social media. Blogs are a good source of data for sociologists and political scientists to gain situational awareness by tracking different opinions, political views, and narratives being shaped. Blogs, unlike other social media platforms, are not regulated …

Role Of Multiple Social Media Platforms In Online Campaigns, Muhammad Nihal Hussain

Theses and Dissertations

Social media that started as a tool that connected high school students has found various uses. We are now connected more than ever. It has altered the way information reaches us. People use social media to learn not only about their family and friends but also to stay updated about news and global events. Organizations use social media to learn about their customers, politicians use it to reach out and influence voters, and protesters use it to plan and coordinate their activities. Social media is playing a central role in various campaigns be it marketing campaigns by companies to political …

Climate Change, Social Media, And Generation Z, Melanie Morris

Theses and Dissertations

Recent publications report that adults known as Generation Z, between the ages of 18 to 23, increasingly rely upon social media to gain knowledge of social issues. Given social media's embeddedness in Generation Z's life, this study sought to understand if or how social media has influenced and possibly empowered Generation Z to act on social issues, particularly global climate change. This study used a phenomenological research method, which focused on the commonality of Generation Z's lived experience. Emerging themes collected through a literature review and data portray Generation Z as maturing into adulthood as tech-savvy, diverse, and inclusive self-starters. …

"Thanks For The Free Products! #Ad": The Effects Of The Number Of Followers And Sponsorship Disclosures On The Credibility Of Instagram Influencers, Allison Renee Cox

Theses and Dissertations

Instagram influencers regularly promote products for brands. Some influencers follow Federal Trade Commission rules on advertising disclosures, such as putting "ad" or "sponsored" in a visible line of text, whereas others do not. Disclosures alert users that they are viewing an ad. Many social media users view influencers as authentic, trusted information sources, so it is important they are aware when viewing paid ads. How disclosures affect source credibility remains unclear. This study used 2 x 2 factorial design to evaluate the roles of two possible credibility enhancing factors: number of followers and advertising disclosures. Instagram users (N = …

140 Characters Of News: An Examination Of Twitter Usage During The 2016 Presidential Election And How Candidate’S Tweets Are Reported In Traditional Media Nationally, And In Red, Blue, And Swing States, Lillee Hill

Theses and Dissertations

During the 2016 federal election cycle, Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton made use of the social media tool Twitter in opposing ways. The thesis looks at how the print media reported on candidate’s uses of Twitter on a national level by looking at The New York Times, The Washington Post, and USA Today. On a state level, papers in Georgia, Ohio, Florida, Washington, and California were examined to see how the tweets were reported on. Qualitative content analysis was used to determine how the papers reported on tweets sent by the candidates from the date when each was formally nominated …

Studying Online Deviant Groups (Odgs): A Socio-Technical Approach Leveraging Social Network Analysis (Sna) & Social Cyber Forensics (Scf) Techniques, Samer Al-Khateeb

Theses and Dissertations

In today’s information technology age our thinking and behaviors are highly influenced by what we see on the Internet and our smartphones screens, e.g., watching a fake or photo-shopped image of a well-known individual makes some of us think it is true. But in many cases, it is not. The initial use of social media for benign purposes, e.g., to socialize with friends or browse pictures has increasingly transitioned to include malicious activities, e.g., cyber-terrorism and cyber-warfare. These nefarious uses of Online Social Networks (OSNs) pose a significant threat to society and are under-studied, thus requires research attention. Online Deviant …

In Media Res, Christopher Andrew Sisk

Theses and Dissertations

We are inundated by a constant feed of media that responds and adapts in real time to the impulses of our psyches and the dimensions of our devices. Beneath the surface, this stream of information is directed by hidden, automated controls and steered by political agendas. The transmission of information has evolved into a spiral of entropy, and the boundaries between author, content, platform, and receiver have blurred. This reductive space of responsive media is a catalyst for immense political and cultural change, causing us to question our notions of authority, truth, and reality.

Orthodontists’ And Patients’ Preferences In Website Design In The Selection Of An Orthodontic Practice: A Comparative Study, Taylor R. Brown

Theses and Dissertations

Objective: To determine which website characteristics are preferred by orthodontists, adult patients, and parents of patients.

Materials and Methods: 1,000 active members of the American Association of Orthodontists and 750 active orthodontic patients/parents were sampled. Participants rated the importance of website characteristics, indicated presence of those characteristics on the current website, and ranked sample website images. Preferences were compared between orthodontist and the patient/parent group using t-tests and sample websites were compared using ANOVA models and Tukey’s adjusted post-hoc tests. Significance level was set at 0.05.

Results: 11 of the 16 website features showed significant differences between patients/parents and orthodontists. …

Effectiveness Of Online Health Communities: Assessment Of Social Support And Stress, Amit Saha

Theses and Dissertations

With increasing prevalence of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) among the younger generation, there is a shortage of adequate resources to deliver care for the individuals dealing with autism. Families dealing with autism face enormous economic costs and emotional stress to provide care for personnel diagnosed with ASD. Globally, almost two billion people use social media regularly to connect and stay in touch with their friends, family, and acquaintances irrespective of distance. For the families dealing with autism, social media provide an open and easily accessible platform to share, gather and exchange information. Systematic analysis of this extensive interaction among autism …

A Statistical Approach To Characterize And Detect Degradation Within The Barabasi-Albert Network, Mohd-Fairul Mohd-Zaid

Theses and Dissertations

Social Network Analysis (SNA) is widely used by the intelligence community when analyzing the relationships between individuals within groups of interest. Hence, any tools that can be quantitatively shown to help improve the analyses are advantageous for the intelligence community. To date, there have been no methods developed to characterize a real world network as a Barabasi-Albert network which is a type of network with properties contained in many real-world networks. In this research, two newly developed statistical tests using the degree distribution and the L-moments of the degree distribution are proposed with application to classifying networks and detecting degradation …

The Future Of Arabic Music: No Sound Without Silence, Nesma Magdy Khodier Vcuq

Theses and Dissertations

For centuries, Arabic music has been intrinsically linked to Arab culture and by extension bonded to the environmental landscape of the region, reflecting their emotions, moods, and behaviors. Numerous technological advancements in the latter half of the twentieth century, have greatly affected the rich legacy of Arabic music, significantly impacting the natural progression of traditional Arabic musical genres, scales, and instrumentation.

This thesis serves as an introduction to generative methods of music production, specifically music generated through gestures. Through generative music, and its unique ability to map gestures to different musical parameters, music can be produced using computer algorithms.

The …

A Risk Based Approach To Node Insertion Within Social Networks, Chancellor A. J. Johnstone

Theses and Dissertations

Social Network Analysis (SNA) is a primary tool for counter-terrorism operations, ranging from resiliency and influence to interdiction on threats stemming from illicit overt and clandestine network operations. In an ideal world, SNA would provide a perfect course of action to eliminate dangerous situations that terrorist organizations bring. Unfortunately, the covert nature of terrorist networks makes the effects of these techniques unknown and possibly detrimental. To avoid potentially harmful changes to enemy networks, tactical involvement must evolve, beginning with the intelligent use of network in filtration through the application of the node insertion problem. The framework for the node insertion …

Online Privacy Issues: Awareness, Attitudes, And Perceptions Amongst Internet Users In Egypt, Dalia Nagy Khalil Alfred

Theses and Dissertations

This study gauges the level of awareness, attitudes towards, and perceptions of online privacy policies for Internet users in Egypt. It examines how demographics as in age, gender, and education may affect the level of Internet users’awareness, attitudes, and perceptions of online privacy issues. Further, it surveys what personal information Internet users in Egypt perceive as private and accept to share with web providers, search engines or third parties. The theory of Communication Privacy Management (CPM), which was developed by Sandra Petronio, poised that Internet users choose and manage the usage of privacy policies and rules based on their cultural …

Visualization, Viewer And Emotion: An Empirical Study Of Cognition And Affective Responses To Infographics Used For Crisis Communication, Sean M. Stewart

Theses and Dissertations

A 3 (crisis response strategy) x 3 (medium) factorial design experiment was conducted to determine if information graphics conveyed through online news sources may be more beneficial for organizational reputations during some crisis situations than the use of news videos and text-based news stories. Variables examined include cognitive and affective appraisal, third-person effect, behavioral response and crisis response strategy.

Recent research in organizational crisis communications has pointed to the fact that more information is needed regarding how individuals react cognitively and affectively to crisis communications. Current crisis communications literature is also sparse concerning the behavioral aspects of crisis message reception …

Aggregation Techniques To Characterize Social Networks, Sara E. Sterling

Theses and Dissertations

Social network analysis focuses on modeling and understanding individuals of interest and their relationships. Aggregation of social networks can be used both to make analysis computationally easier on large networks, and to gain insight in subgroup interactions. Aggregation requires determining appropriate closely knit subgroups as well as choosing a measure or measures to represent the network data. This thesis provides the analyst with several techniques for using aggregation to analyze the characteristics of social networks. The contribution of this research lies in its ability to analyze a wide variety of social network structures and available data through two methods for …

Influence Of Feedback And Comment Labels On Information Sharing In A Computer Mediated Collaborative Environment, Gary D. Denney

Theses and Dissertations

A group support system (GSS) uses a combination of networked personal computers, software, and human facilitation to improve the group decision-making process. Group support Systems are being used in the Air Force today in a variety of capacities and in particular by the Warner-Robins Air Logistics Center (WR-ALC) to assess acquisition risks. Prior GSS research has found that certain structural and social dimensions of GSS designs might influence whether optimal process improvements take place. However, the dimensions that positively influence group performance have continued to be a matter of debate. This thesis looked at several structural and social contingencies to …