Social Media Commons^™

Evaluating Vulnerability To Fake News In Social Networks: A Community Health Assessment Model, Bhavtosh Rath, Wei Gao, Jaideep Srivastava

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Understanding the spread of false information in social networks has gained a lot of recent attention. In this paper, we explore the role community structures play in determining how people get exposed to fake news. Inspired by approaches in epidemiology, we propose a novel Community Health Assessment model, whose goal is to understand the vulnerability of communities to fake news spread. We define the concepts of neighbor, boundary and core nodes of a community and propose appropriate metrics to quantify the vulnerability of nodes (individual-level) and communities (group-level) to spreading fake news. We evaluate our model on communities identified using …

Asserting Librarian Expertise And Value In Strategic Marketing Efforts, Memo Cordova, Elizabeth Ramsey

Library Faculty Publications and Presentations

This case study of librarian-led marketing efforts at a mid-size academic library examines workarounds to obstacles that librarians frequently encounter when taking on marketing for their libraries. These obstacles often stem from a combination of misunderstanding and/or misplaced priorities at both the unit and administrative levels. Challenges in this case study include a number of factors: no marketing strategy at the administrative level, a lack of understanding from colleagues generally, little time to complete tasks or improve marketing skills, and no dedicated funding. To address these challenges the authors embarked on an internal marketing campaign engaged extensively on social media …

Cyberspace Is Becoming Unsafe For Women In Pakistan, Sara Tanveer

MSJ Capstone Projects

This study explores the challenges faced by students in Pakistan who become victim of cyber harassment. Due to the lack of awareness, people do not know about cyber-crime and do not know that it is the violation of human rights. The Human Rights Ministry has no sense of urgency to work on the issue. According to the Human Rights report 2018, since 2004, the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan has recorded more than 6,000 cases of sexual violence and 2,200 cases of domestic violence against the women. The violence is mostly connected with the online harassment in the form of …

Afro-Latinx Online Communities: Creating Connections Through Social Action., Rita Damiron Tallaj

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

Considering the power of online media to create communities, this thesis examines how the power of social media is harnessed by the Afro-Latinx individuals to mobilize and call to actions those who identify under the same social category and create a powerful online community to come together in support and advocacy virtually. Through a digital ethnography, this research observes three Instagram pages and performs a textual analysis on 3 posts to further understand the Afro-Latinx community and their adoption of Instagram to create online communities. Find-ings emphasize the importance of creating and maintaining a niche, user engagement and mem-ber satisfaction

Can Cooler Heads Prevail? New Media Technology And Affective Polarization, Brian Kendall Watson

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Are new media technologies stirring up negative partisan feelings in the American public? Can researchers find ways of using new media tools to reduce affective polarization? Relying on a series of experiments featuring online newsfeeds and social media discussions, this dissertation seeks to answer these questions by testing the influence of partisan news and political discussions in realistic Internet environments. Two custom news “portals” (2016, 2018) expose participants to actual partisan news content. Two Facebook discussion experiments (2017, 2019) randomly assign participants to start real political discussions on their personal social media accounts, using discussion-initiation strategies designed to reduce partisan …

View, Like, Comment, Post: Analyzing User Engagement By Topic At 4 Levels Across 5 Social Media Platforms For 53 News Organizations, Kholoud K. Aldous, Jisun An, Bernard J. Jansen

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

We evaluate the effects of the topics of social media posts on audiences across five social media platforms (i.e., Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, YouTube, and Reddit) at four levels of user engagement. We collected 3,163,373 social posts from 53 news organizations across five platforms during an 8month period. We analyzed the differences in news organization platform strategies by focusing on topic variations by organization and the corresponding effect on user engagement at four levels. Findings show that topic distribution varies by platform, although there are some topics that are popular across most platforms. User engagement levels vary both by topics and …

2019 Technical Report: A Review Of Age Verification Mechanism For 10 Social Media Apps, Paola Zippo, Liliana Pasquale

Reports

This technical report analyzes the 10 most used apps among children aged 8-12: Snapchat, Instagram, Tiktok, Viber, Skype, Facebook, HouseParty, Discord, Messenger, WhatsApp. For each application we assess whether the terms of use specify a minimum age that is compliant with the GDPR and whether the specified age is the same across all EU countries. We also verify whether each app provides mechanisms to verify the age of the user and how easy is to circumvent the verification mechanisms. The remainder of this report discusses the results of our study providing evidence to support the answers provided for each question.

The Technology Gap Across Generations: How Social Media Affects The Youth Vote, Yamiemily Hernandez

Political Analysis

There appears to exist today a generational tug-of-war between Millennials and Baby Boomers. Baby Boomers tend to see Millennials as lazy kids who do not appreciate the value of hard work, spend all day glued to their cell phones, and expect successes to be handed to them on a silver platter. Millennials seem to think that Boomers have harbored all the wealth and success in America without thinking about future generations; they cannot wait for Boomers to retire and create vacancies for key positions in companies. While the accusations generations make against each other rely on stereotypes and may not …

Posting Straight From The Art: An Analysis Of How Nonprofit Performing Arts Centers Use Social Media To Engage Audiences, Sean Quinn

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

With the NEA in jeopardy under President Donald Trump, nonprofit performing arts centers need to connect with potential donors now more than ever. Yet little research has been done into how venues should accomplish this. This project attempted to remedy that by analyzing what types of messages six nonprofit performing arts centers in the New York metropolitan area posted on Facebook and Twitter over a one-week period and which kinds of messages online audiences engaged with the most. Using the results, the study proposed seven recommendations public relations staff members can use to enhance their social media efforts and build …

What Role Has Social Media Played In Violence Perpetrated By Incels?, Olivia Young

Peace Studies Student Papers and Posters

This paper aimed to answer the question, what role has social media played in violence perpetrated by Incels?

Incels, or Involuntary celibates, are members of an online subculture who define themselves as unable to find sexual partners. Incels have been responsible for a number of violent attacks and mass killings in recent years.

This exploration involved a content analysis of online incel forums such as such as reddit and 4-chan, and of news articles about incel attacks. The content analysis of social media examined incel ideology and online rhetoric of hate and violence; while the analysis of news articles examined …

Worcester Chamber Of Commerce: Recruiting Minority Business Owners, Ryan Dimaria, Alexander Hull, Xikun Lu, Haopeng Wang, Jiacheng Hou, Danning Zhao

School of Professional Studies

Our capstone project was to help the Worcester Regional Chamber of Commerce identify how to re-frame their marketing so it would be appealing to immigrant and minority owned businesses. Based on interviews and external research, our group was able to create a tangible and resourceful data set that provided justified recommendations and ideas on how the Chamber could make adjustments to their marketing plan to attract more businesses of this particular demographic in the city of Worcester. By implementing these recommendations, we believe the Chamber has the opportunity to create a more diverse group of Chamber members, add value to …

The Effects Of The Source Of Celebrity Information On Parasocial Relationships, Noelle Roys, Monique Newman, Mark Spooner-Leduff

Student Scholar Symposium Abstracts and Posters

The purpose of the study is to examine how the source of information about celebrities affects media users’ feelings toward them. Specifically, we will focus on two ways in which people relate to media figures. Parasocial relationships (PSR) are one-sided relationships that people form with media figures. The concept of parasocial interaction (PSI) is closely related in that it entails one-sided involvement with a media figure, but the experience is restricted to the duration a person is viewing the figure. Due to the nature of social media and to celebrities’ increasing use of social media platforms, existing research implies that …

User's Ability To Detect Fake News In Online Environments., Aleeza N. Gardner

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Technology has drastically changed the way people consume news. Due to the rise of online spaces built for users to share content, there has been a rise in the spread of false information. Social media platforms, Facebook specifically, provide their users with personalized content based on their interests. The ease of spreading information online coupled with the anonymity of the Internet, creates a breeding ground for potential misuse of information. This study sought to examine how users view themselves and others were influenced by fake news on social media if the post is denoted as fake, or if the post …

The Impact Of The Web And Social Media On The Performance Of Nonprofit Organizations, Namchul Shin

Journal of International Technology and Information Management

This research empirically analyzes the impact of both the Web and social media on the performance of nonprofit organizations by using 100 nonprofit organizations ranked by web traction measures, including Facebook Likes and Twitter Followers. Our findings from ANOVA and non-parametric tests demonstrate that nonprofit organizations with higher web traction have greater contributions and grants than others with lower web traction. These findings suggest that the use of the Web coupled with social media promotes better, interactive (two-way) communications with the public, as well as fundraising and that nonprofit organizations that attract more supporters on the Web and social media …

Lgbt+ Teens, Social Media Use & Depressive Symptoms, Megan Curtis, Danielle Ryder

Thinking Matters Symposium Archive

Sexual and gender minority youth are statistically more likely to face severe mental health challenges than their cisgender, heterosexual peers; they consistently comprise a disproportionate percentage of youth who report experiencing depression, suicide ideation and attempted suicide in the United States every year (e.g. Abreu & Kinney, 2018). The aim of this study was to fill a gap in the current literature base by investigating the effects of social media use on sexual and gender minority youth mental health. The researchers conducted an online anonymous questionnaire targeted toward American LGBT+ (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, etc.) youth ages 14 to 18, …

Reclaiming The Intellectual, Emily M.S. Houh

Ohio Northern University Law Review

No abstract provided.

Evolution Of Corporate Reputation During An Evolving Controversy, Siyoung Chung, Mark Chong, Jie Sheng Chua, Ji Cheon Na

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to investigate the evolution of online sentiments toward a company (i.e. Chipotle) during a crisis, and the effects of corporate apology on those sentiments. Design/methodology/approach: Using a very large data set of tweets (i.e. over 2.6m) about Company A’s food poisoning case (2015–2016). This case was selected because it is widely known, drew attention from various stakeholders and had many dynamics (e.g. multiple outbreaks, and across different locations). This study employed a supervised machine learning approach. Its sentiment polarity classification and relevance classification consisted of five steps: sampling, labeling, tokenization, augmentation of semantic …

Gender Differences In Social Media Use And Cyberbullying In Belize: A Preliminary Report, Grace Mariko Kasahara, Daniel Houlihan, Collin Estrada

Psychology Department Publications

Cyberbullying is a global issue that usually occurs with increased social media usage. A number of studies have found significant gender differences in social media use and cyberbullying, although gender differences are not consistent across studies. Despite the increase in access to cellphones and Internet in Belize, no studies have investigated how adolescents are using these resources. The purpose of this study was to investigate gender differences involving how adolescents in Belize are using social media and if cyberbullying is a problem. Results provide preliminary information about social media use and cyberbullying in Belize. It indicates that gender differences exist …

Analytical Framework For Evaluating Digital Diplomacy Using Network Analysis And Topic Modeling: Comparing South Korea And Japan, Sejung Park, Dahoon Chung, Han Woo Park

2019 Faculty Bibliography

This study introduces a data-driven approach for assessing the practices and effectiveness of digital diplomacy, using the cases of South Korea and Japan. The study compared the networking power of public diplomacy organizations based on social media use, engagement with the public, interaction patterns among the public, and public perceptions and attitudes toward organizations. This was accomplished through a three-step method employing social network analysis and topic modeling. The network analysis found that the Korean public diplomacy organization generated a larger, more loosely connected, and decentralized comment network than the Japanese organization, which presented a “small-world” connectivity pattern with highly …

Social Media And Censorship: Rethinking State Action Once Again, Michael Patty

Mitchell Hamline Law Journal of Public Policy and Practice

No abstract provided.

We Love Or Hate When Celebrities Speak Up About Climate Change: Receptivity To Celebrity Involvement In Environmental Campaigns, Sejung Park

2019 Faculty Bibliography

This study investigates public receptivity to celebrity's climate change advocacy on YouTube through a semantic network analysis. The results of this study suggest that the YouTube video generated a number of viewers' responses. Celebrity endorsement not only leaded public voices on climate change issue, but also their opinions on the celebrity endorser. This study found that most of viewers were polarized in their judgment and attitude toward the celebrity advocate either positively or negatively. This study offers an exploratory examination of the perceived star power and the role of celebrities as spokespersons for social causes. This study contributes to the …

Live Ambience And Homestead Away From Home: Social Media Use And Dependency By Visiting Chinese Students In The United States, Zixue Tai, Jue Lu, Fengbin Hu

Journalism and Media Faculty Publications

This study investigates social media dependency relations among Chinese college students during their three-month study abroad sojourn in the United States. Data were collected using a multimethod approach of ethnography, field observation, and in-depth interviews. Inspired by the lens of media system dependency (MSD) theory, the analysis focuses on the diverse goals and motivations that drive student behavior in social media engagement, as well as various contextual factors leading students to adapt and transition to the U.S. social networking sites (SNS), and the subsequent outcomes. The findings indicate that task-driven and assignment-centered goals dominate social media use, and that multidimensional …

Positive And Negative Effects Of Social Media On Adolescent Well-Being., Katie Kennedy

All Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Other Capstone Projects

Social media use is rapidly growing among adolescents, studies cite that the rates of “constant use” doubled from 2015 to 2018 (Anderson & Jiang, 2018; Lenhart, 2015). Social media use can have a serious negative impact on areas of well-being including feelings of depression, anxiety, fear of missing out, body image, bullying and sleep. Mojtabai, Olfson and Han (2016) cite the problematic use of mobile phones and social media applications as one of the trends aligning with the increase in major depressive episodes. Conversely, use of social media can promote positive feelings of well-being including creating a sense of community, …

Making Social Media More Social: A Literature Review Of Academic Libraries’ Engagement And Connections Through Social Media Platforms, Elia Trucks

University Libraries: Faculty Scholarship

This chapter explores how academic libraries have used social media for broadcasting information, responsive communication, and engagement. Many libraries focus on the marketing aspect of social media, since it is a successful method of promoting events, services, and resources. However, exclusively using social media as a marketing tool ignores the best part of social media: the connections it fosters between people. The online community is just an extension of the in-person community that the academic library serves. This chapter examines the state of the literature on libraries’ use of social media through the lens of increasing engagement and connections with …

Social Networking Sites And Indian Students: A Study On The Usage Pattern, Dhanyasree V.K., Jaideep Sharma

Library Philosophy and Practice (e-journal)

Social networking has become an inevitable part of our routine life. Such media open up a wide variety of tools that facilitate communication with fellow beings. This study tried to understand the use of social networking sites by the youth; especially the engineering students. Data was collected through survey method using a structured questionnaire. The results show that students keep profiles on multiple social networking sites, but use only one site actively. Majority of the students use them at least once a day, major purpose of visit being keeping in touch with their existing friends and finding old friends. Chat …

Applying A Modified Technology Acceptance Model To Qualitatively Analyse The Factors Affecting Microblogging Integration, Tian Luo, David Richard Moore, Teresa Franklin, Helen Crompton

STEMPS Faculty Publications

The purpose of this research is to examine factors affecting students’ perception and engagement of microblogging integration using a qualitative approach. We employed a qualitative case study design to explore potential factors affecting microblogging integration in a hybrid course. Using the technology acceptance model (TAM) model as an umbrella framework, we examined through in-depth interviews with 18 participants the impact of microblogging integration into instruction that affected students’ reported use and perceptions of their microblogging-supported learning experiences. We found that individual differences, system characteristics, social influence and facilitating conditions all have impact on student participation and engagement in microblogging integration …

Influencer Marketing: Consumer Responses To Instagram Influencers, Gloriann Schaefer

Senior Honors Theses

Influencer marketing is the promotion of services and products through individuals with a large social media following. The research contained within this thesis will discuss the topic of influencer marketing and the responses of the consumers targeted. This study observed the different types of responses and comments that followers of Instagram influencers left on their posted content.

The themes and characteristics of responses of Instagram influencer followers will be found through a qualitative content analysis. The study is supported by self-presentation theory, which suggests that individuals, in this case social media influencers, present themselves in a way that results in …

What Works And What Doesn't: An Analysis Of Brand Engagment On Facebook, Laurie Hiebert

All Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Other Capstone Projects

Brands and organizations utilize Facebook ‘likes’ and connections in order to promote brand awareness, a positive brand image, and improve purchase intention. Compared to Twitter and Instagram, Facebook remains the dominant platform for brands to sell products and engage consumers with new and upcoming merchandise and events. Consumers are dependent on their friends ‘likes’ and comments in order to make decisions about brands more than they are brand-made posts. This study looks at brand intention, message type, and the ‘like’ to determine what messages, days, and months are the most effective in generating consumer engagement.

Tweeting In Public: How Florida's Public Information Officers Use Twitter To Engage The Publics They Serve, Jessica B. Scott

UNF Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This study expands Twitter interactivity research in the area of public relations. A content analysis of tweets from public information Twitter accounts in Florida counties examines the degree to which county public information officers interact with the publics on Twitter. Engagement on Twitter is examined using a coding scheme adapted from previous research (McMillan, 2002; Otterbacher, Shapiro, & Hemphill, 2012; Parmelee & Deeley, 2017), which is a more sophisticated measure of interactivity than merely counting the presence of replies and retweets. Findings indicate that when public information officers engage in mutual discourse, or the exchange of information in two-way communication, …

Youth Study Recruitment Using Paid Advertising On Instagram, Snapchat, And Facebook: Cross-Sectional Survey Study, Kelsey Lynett Ford, Tashuna Albritton, Tara A. Dunn, Kacy Crawford, Jessica Neuwirth, Sheana Bull

Publications and Research

Background:The use of paid social media advertising for targeted study recruitment is an effective strategy in health research and evaluation, specifically to reach diverse youth participants. Although the literature adequately describes the utility of Facebook in recruitment, limited information exists for social media platforms that are more popular with youth, specifically Instagram and Snapchat.

Objective:This paper outlines a paid advertising approach using Instagram, Snapchat, and Facebook to evaluate a statewide youth marijuana prevention campaign. The objective of this study was to compare recruitment metrics across Instagram, Snapchat, and Facebook for two surveys documenting youth knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors related to …