Political Communication 2019 Abstracts

Advancing a Communication Mediation Model of Participation in Sub-Saharan Africa • Oluseyi Adegbola; Melissa Gotlieb, Texas Tech University • This study uses data from the 2015 Afrobarometer survey to advance a communication mediation model in sub-Saharan Africa. In addition to examining an O-S-R-O-R model across 30 countries, this study also considered potential cross-country differences resulting from variation in level of democracy and economic development. Results suggest the overall suitability of the model, but also suggest some key departures from previous studies conducted in western, democratized nations as well as some key differences across countries.

Pathways to Polarization: Mediated Social Comparison, Affective Polarization and the 2016 U.S. Election • German Alvarez, University of Texas Austin • Op-eds, politicians, and the public alike are quick to blame social media for increasing political polarization. Social media alone, however, is not inherently political. Instead, the degree to which political information is found on these networks is bound by users, algorithms, and microtargeted advertisements. Add the spectacle of a presidential election campaign to the mix and partisan identity is made salient. As a result, people use other’s social media behavior as reference points for social comparison. The social identity theory explains that people make social comparisons between in-group and out-group in order make sense of who they are and how they are evaluated. The current study examines social networks as an online extension of offline social networks that allows for mediated social group comparison. The results indicate that mediated social group comparison is related to affective and issue polarization. The study concludes with a discussion on the permanence of past social connections online theorizing that these connections are no longer best conceptualized as strong or weak ties, but rather as gray ties.

‘Political Hooliganism.’ Political Discussion Attributes Effects on the Development of Unconditional Party Loyalty • Alberto Ardèvol-Abreu, Departamento de Psicología Cognitiva, Social y Organizacional. Universidad de La Laguna; Homero Gil de Zúñiga, University of Vienna • This study extends existing research on the influence of political discussion on attitude change. To do so, we introduce the concept of political hooliganism and explore its antecedents. Results from a multi-country, two-wave survey show that discussion network size, discussion disagreement, and offline discussion negatively predict of hooligan attitudes. On the contrary, online discussion fosters political hooliganism. The study also examines the moderating role of exposure to disagreement and discussion network size on these relationships.

Perceptions of Media Influence Among Radicalized Individuals: The Characteristics, Causes, and Effects of Islamists’ Perceptions of the Media • Philip Baugut; Katharina Neumann, Department of Communication Studies and Media Research at LMU Munich • This study examines for the first time the characteristics, causes, and consequences of radicalized persons’ perceptions of media effects, using the example of Islamists. Based on interviews with 34 Islamist prisoners and 9 former Islamists, we found that radicalized individuals perceived themselves as being immune to influence by the news media, which they generally perceived as being hostile and untrustworthy. In contrast, they believed that the media had a relatively strong effect on the general public, on political and media elites, and on judges and prison officials. This third-person effect can be explained primarily by radicalized individuals’ consumption of propaganda blaming the media for the societal rejection of their ingroup. Consequently, these perceptions contributed to the Islamists’ cognitive and behavioral radicalization by serving as a breeding ground for propaganda effects. Future research should therefore consider the use of propaganda attacking the media as a cause of individuals’ media effects perceptions.

Who paid for what? The role of visual attention to content and disclosures in Facebook political advertising • Matt Binford, University of Georgia; Bartosz Wojdynski, University of Georgia; Yen-I Lee, University of Georgia; Shuoya Sun, UNIVERSITY OF GEORGIA; Andrea Briscoe • Recently, Facebook has changed the way they display the disclosure language regarding political advertisements in an attempt to increase transparency. The goal of this study was to use eye- tracking to determine the effectiveness of the new disclosure language and to assess other important factors dealing with how users look at political ads. Findings suggest that Facebook’s new political ad disclosure language is not effective at enhancing users comprehension of who paid for the advertisement.

Media Civic-Efficacy: Predicting Civic Engagement Among Secondary-School Journalism Students • Peter Bobkowski, University of Kansas; Harrison Rosenthal, University of Kansas • This study proposes a communication model wherein school context factors—climate, principal, and advisor—relate to students’ confidence in their abilities to use media for civic change: a concept we label media civic-efficacy. We find media civic-efficacy (1) relates positively to, and partially mediates the relationship between, political interest and prospective civic engagement, and (2) increases when journalism students feel a supportive school climate and when journalism instructors exert little control over their students’ journalistic output.

Social Computing for Generalized Trust: The Value of Presence for Establishing Contact Theory Online • Brandon Bouchillon • A web survey matched to U.S. Census parameters tests whether efforts of sociability on Facebook and perceiving of interactions as realistic contribute to generalized trust. Interacting with new people on Facebook is related to social presence. Presence contributes to generalized trust in turn. The size of the indirect association between sociability and trust through social presence decreases with age as well. Younger users are more adept at converting realistic interactions into feelings of trust.

Effects of Candidate Lateral Location and Eye Gaze Direction in Political Ads: Evidence from Self-Report and Eye Movement Patterns • Saleem Alhabash, Michigan State University; Esther Thorson, Michigan State University; Weiyue Chen; Tao Deng, Michigan State University; Duygu Kanver; Mengyan Ma; Na Rae Park; Jessica Hirsch; Alan Smith • Two visual elements in a political were manipulated: lateral location of the candidate image (left vs. right) and his eye gaze direction (inward vs. direct vs. outward). Political affiliation of the candidate and of participants were also examined in an online survey sample and a lab-based study of eye movement (time to first fixation and total fixation duration on the candidate). Theoretical propositions from grounded theory and visual processing fluency were tested.

Malaise Effect or Virtuous Effect? The Dynamics of Internet Use and Political Trust in China • Xiaoxiao Cheng, School of Journalism and Communication, Tsinghua University • The rise of the Internet has led to debates about the direction of its effect in terms of eroding or enhancing political trust. Current research puts aside the dispute and focuses on the dynamic relationship between the Internet use and political trust in China. Using multilevel analysis with pooled data, the results show that the impacts of Internet use on political trust vary across generations, and that the changing social-historical context and Internet context are responsible for the dynamic Internet-trust relation. This article also bridges the gap in existing theory by showing that both the short-term malaise effect of Internet use and the long-term virtuous effect of the Internet context act together to impact political trust.

Third-Person Effect and Hate Speech Censorship On Facebook • Lei Guo; Brett Johnson, University of Missouri • By recruiting 368 U.S. university students, this study adopted an online posttest-only between-subjects experiment to analyze the impact of several types of hate speech on their attitudes toward hate speech censorship. Results showed that students tended to think the influence of hate speech on others was greater than on themselves. Their perception of such messages’ effect on themselves was a significant indicator of supportive attitudes toward hate speech censorship, and of their willingness to flag hateful messages.

Who Becomes Politically Active? Linking Personality Traits, News Use and Economic Macro-Variables to Political Participation around the World • Brigitte Huber; Homero Gil de Zúñiga, University of Vienna; James Liu • Scholars are increasingly investigating the role of citizens’ personality traits to explain political behavior. Using survey data from 19 countries, we test whether the Big Five traits-dimensions are related to offline political participation, online political participation and voting. Results indicate that extraversion, agreeableness and openness help understand people’s participation and voting behavior, and that news use partially mediates some of the relationships. In addition, the between-country variation is related to specific country economic indicators.

From political satire to political discussion: Satire talk as mediator and affinity for political humor as moderator • Min Seon Jeong; Jacob Long; Simon Lavis • This study tests the indirect effect of exposure to political satire on political discussion, mediated by talking about political satire (program). We also test this indirect effect when individuals incidentally exposed to political satire via shared posts on social media. Given the interest of this study, we also test the moderating role of social cohesion dimension of affinity for political humor in the relationship. The results support our predictions. Implications of the findings are discussed.

The Impact of Social Media Use on Mass Polarization in Hong Kong • Tetsuro Kobayashi, City University of Hong Kong • By using survey data collected in Hong Kong, where Chinese and Hong Kongese identities are dynamically constructed in a non-mutually exclusive way, this study demonstrates that the political use of social media polarizes the attitudes and affect of those who have single Hong Kongese identity, whereas it has depolarizing effects among those who have dual identities of Hong Kongese and Chinese. These contrasting effects on polarization between single and dual identifiers have downstream consequences on political participation.

Who do we Trust More? Analyzing Public Trust to Determine which Government entities are more Trustworthy, and how Communication Techniques Might Build Confidence • Jennifer Kowalewski, Georgia Southern University; Marcel Maghiar, Georgia Southern University; Cheryl Aasheim, Georgia Southern University; Gustavo Maldonado, Georgia Southern University; Meg Elwood, Savannah Technical College • Scholars have investigated the constructs of Political Cynicism, Efficacy, and Knowledge to determine the relationship on Public Trust. In a survey, researchers investigated how people trusted the Georgia Department of Transportation, as compared to its national counterpart, the United States Department of Transportation. Findings indicate that although residents had more Public Trust in the state agency, GDOT suffered from issues of trust. Findings indicated residents wanted better communication from GDOT about potential projects.

Fuel to the Fire?: The Influence of Social Media Rumors on Political Participation and Knowledge • Nojin Kwak; Daniel Lane, University of Michigan; Qinfeng Zhu; Slgi Lee; Brian Weeks • Existing research suggests that political rumors on social media can fuel political misperceptions. Yet rumors may also more fundamentally influence how citizens engage in political life. Using original panel survey data from the 2017 South Korean election, we find that rumor communication on the instant messaging app KaKaoTalk predicts increased political participation but not political knowledge and may ultimately exacerbate participatory inequality between those with weak and strong political attitudes.

Social Media, News-Finds-Me Perception, and Political Knowledge: Panel Analysis of Lagged Relationship • Sangwon Lee, University of Wisconsin-Madison • The primary aim of this study was to examine the causal effects of social media use on political knowledge as well as the underlying mechanisms through which such an effect occurs. To this end, we adopted different modeling strategies based on panel data, which allowed us to more rigorously test the causal structure of the data when compared to cross-sectional data. Our findings suggest that despite all the learning opportunities provided by social media platforms, social media use actually hinders rather than enhances an individual’s knowledge and understanding of politics. However, this simple main effect does not reflect the full picture. Further cross-lagged path analysis suggests that using social media for news fosters the “news-finds-me” (NFM) perception, which may in turn have a detrimental impact on individuals’ learning about politics. However, those who use traditional media to a substantial degree to complement their news consumption via social media are less negatively affected. We conclude with some caveats and directions for future research.

Political Talk Shows in Taiwan: Attitudinal Antecedents and Consequences of First- and Third-Person Effects • Scott Liu, University of South Florida; Shou-Chen Hsieh, University of South Florida; Lei Chang, Kunming University of Science and Technology • This study examined the perceived influence of political talk shows on the Taiwanese audience themselves (first-person effect) and others (third-person effect), the attitudinal antecedents of the perceived influences, and attitude toward restrictions on political talk shows. A sample of 645 Taiwanese citizens responded to an online survey. Results supported the hypothesized relationships between attitude toward political talk shows and perceived influence of the shows on self and others. Also supported was the looking glass hypothesis whereby the perceived influence of political talk shows on oneself was projected onto that of others. The perceived influences on self and others were unrelated to attitude toward restrictions, however.

#Donatenow!: A computer-assisted analysis of musician’s political engagement on Twitter • Josephine Lukito, UW Madison; Luis Loya, UW Madison; Carlos Davalos, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Jianing Li, UW Madison; Chau Tong, UW Madison • This study employs a computational content analysis of 2,286,434 tweets, posted by 881 musical artists from the past decade, to understand how musicians discuss politics on Twitter. A human-coded corpus is constructed, from which supervised machine learning is used to code the remainder of the dataset. Results of our study show that musicians can be grouped into three categories of political engagement on Twitter: not engaged (the majority of artists), circumstantial engagement, and active political engagement. We examine the latter categories in detail with two qualitative case studies. Moreover, we find that musicians from different genres have distinct patterns of political engagement.

Political Activist, Citizen’s Helper, and Entertainer: A Study of Professional Role Perception of Journalists in Azerbaijan • Rashad Mammadov • This study seeks to partially fill a gap in knowledge about the practice of journalism in Azerbaijan, a former Soviet republic. The study proposed here represents the first time Azerbaijan has been studied in a systematic fashion consistent with the literature of comparative journalism as represented by The Global Journalist (Weaver & Willnat, 2012) and Worlds of Journalism (Hanitzsch, 2011), studies well recognized as the standards against which all such efforts should be measured. One of the primary goals of the project is to explore the roles these journalists believe they play in the controlled, post-Soviet environment. Data, collected through an online survey of journalists indicate that several identifiable, perceived professional roles existed along the dimensions of Hanitzsch’s (2007) journalistic milieus. In addition, three other dimensions were identified that did not fit the model, but proved to be specific to the Azerbaijani media environment: Political Activist, Citizens’ Helper, and Entertainer.

The Rationalization of Anti-intellectualism: News as a Recursive Regime in Political Communication • Michael McDevitt, University of Colorado Boulder • In a zeitgeist of punitive populism, social science still lacks a framework to account for journalism’s unique contribution to anti-intellectualism. This paper models news as a recursive regime in political communication to account for journalism’s role in the activation of antipathy; alignment of anti-rationalism with anti-elitism in symbolic action; and return to equilibrium. Long after the news responds to an intellectual breach, residual resentment is left behind, awaiting reactivation when the climate is ripe.

Faked Out: Facebook, Fox News, and Exposure to and Perceived Accuracy of Fake News • Patrick Meirick, University of Oklahoma; Amanda Franklyn, University of Oklahoma • In the wake of the wide-reaching disinformation in the 2016 U.S. presidential election, it is important to identify what contributed to people seeing and/or believing fake news. This study examined data from an Ipsos survey (N = 3,015) conducted shortly after the 2016 election. Facebook was a vector for exposure to fake news in 2016. However, contrary to our expectations, reliance on Facebook as a news source was not associated with the perceived accuracy of fake news. Fox News reliance was associated both with exposure to fake news and perceiving it as accurate. This is likely because of its centrality in the dense conservative media ecosystem. Stronger affiliation with the Republican party also was related to both seeing and believing these pro-Trump, anti-Clinton fake news stories. Partisanship moderated Fox News reliance to contribute to greater perceived accuracy for both Democrats and Republicans, but more so for the former, a far cry from the polarization that motivated reasoning would predict. Implications and future directions are discussed.

Can online news consumption predict election participation? A path analysis of predictors of local and national voting • Bumgi Min, Donald P. Bellisario College of Communications; Yang Bai; Ryan Yang Wang; Jenna Grzeslo; Krishna Jayakar • This paper explores the causal relationship between demographic characteristics, the platforms on which people access news disaggregated by national and local news, and local and national voting. Using a survey database from the Pew Research Center and a path analysis methodology, it investigates whether a preference to consume news on online platforms affects local and national news consumption, and in turn, local and national voting. Results suggest that news consumption has significant impacts on political participation, defined in this paper as local and national voting. There are significant direct effects between local news consumption and local voting, local news consumption and national voting, and national news consumption and national voting. In addition, there is no direct impact of a preference for online news on local voting or national voting. However, there is an indirect effect with news consumption patterns being a significant mediator.

Laugh till I seek: A re-assessment of the gateway hypothesis • Michaele Myers, University of Minnesota; Jay Hmielowski, Washington State University • As the media becomes more fragmented, it is important to understand how one form of communication leads to use of other types of communication. In particular, scholars should expand on this line of inquiry by examining how communication behaviors predict one another within genres of communication (e.g., news), but also how these different forms of communication might work together across genres (e.g., entertainment and news). In this paper, we re-visit the gateway hypothesis, which argued that political satire programs opened the door to people using more hard news content. In this paper, we utilize over-time survey data to provide a more rigorous test of this hypothesis. Although our cross-sectional analyses show results consistent with the gateway hypotheses, our over-time data suggest that satire does not lead to increased used of news programing. However, we did find support for the gateway hypothesis when looking at a mediation model where political attitudes serve as the intervening variable between satire use and news use.

Linking Judgments of Network Characteristics With Political Social Media Use via Perceived News Trustworthiness • Rachel Neo • Little research has examined how political characteristics of online social networks influence perceived social media news trustworthiness, and how perceived news trustworthiness affects political social media use. To address these research gaps, I use two nationally representative panel survey datasets to show that network homogeneity has positive indirect effects on expressive but not informational political social media use via perceived news trust. Interestingly, these positive indirect effects tend to be stronger among Democrats than Republicans.

Conservatives trust algorithms: How mainstream media trust, discourse, correspondence, and partisanship shape attitudes towards news aggregators and search engines • Craig Robertson, Michigan State University; Rachel Mourao, Michigan State University • This study analyzes trust in algorithmic curators and how this relates to mainstream media trust. Through two surveys, we find that news aggregators and search engines benefit from a carry-over effect, with trust in mainstream media among liberals transferring to curators. For conservatives, there is a greater disjuncture in trust ratings for journalistic and algorithmic actors. Findings suggest algorithms add a perceived layer of rationality to the sorting/ranking of news produced by other actors.

The political consequences of unfriending: Social network curation, network agreeability, and political participation • Craig Robertson, Michigan State University; Laleah Fernandez, Michigan State University; Ruth Shillair, Michigan State University • This study is a theoretical and empirical probe into the political consequences of unfriending people on social media. It explores the relationship between unfriending, perceived social network agreeability, and forms of political participation. Findings from a representative survey of US adults (N=2,018) indicate a path from social network curation, through expressive participation, to demonstrative forms of participation. The study contributes to our understanding of the links between social media use and political outcomes.

Interacting with the Ordinary People: How Populist Messages and Styles Trigger Engagement on Social Media • Michael Hameleers; Desiree Schmuck, University of Vienna; Lieke Bos; Sarah Ecklebe • We conducted a comparative content analysis of Twitter and Facebook posts (N = 1010) of political candidates in two countries to investigate the driving forces of user engagement on social media in response to populist political communication. Findings show that it is rather styles conductive to populism than the actual content of populist communication that trigger user interaction. Overall, right-wing populist politicians are most successful in spreading their message via social media.

Avoiding the Other Side? An Eye-Tracking Study Investigating Selective Exposure and Avoidance of Political Advertising • Desiree Schmuck, University of Vienna; Miriam Tribastone; Joerg Matthes, U of Vienna; Franziska Marquart, University of Amsterdam; Eva Maria Bergel • This study investigates selective exposure and avoidance of political advertising using eye-tracking methodology. We exposed participants to political ads by liberal and conservative parties placed next to neutral political ads and tracked eye-movements unobtrusively. Findings showed that individuals paid more visual attention to political ads that were consistent with their partisan ideology, while they tended to avoid political ads that were inconsistent with their partisan ideology, which provides evidence for selective avoidance processes.

Drifting Further Apart? How Exposure to Media Portrayals of Muslims Affects Attitude Polarization • Desiree Schmuck, University of Vienna; Raffael Heiss, Management Center Innsbruck; Joerg Matthes, U of Vienna • We employed a two-wave panel survey (Nw2 = 559) to investigate how positive and negative portrayals of Muslims in traditional media and on social networking sites influence attitudes toward Muslim immigration. Exposure to negative but not positive portrayals of Muslims contributes to attitude polarization. While attitude-congruent negative portrayals of Muslims reinforce anti-Muslim immigration attitudes, a backfire effect emerges for those who disagree with the negative information, even resulting in more positive attitudes toward Muslim immigration.

Impact of Facebook Networks on Election Outcomes: Case of 2016 Taiwan Legislative Election • Yue Tan • This study examines the use of Facebook groups by candidates to campaign for the 2016 Taiwan legislative elections on the basis of different election features. It focuses on identifying political factors influencing the effectiveness of candidates’ Facebook activities to gain votes (e.g., posting and building social networks). To do this, the present study performs hierarchical multiple regressions and moderation analysis to determine the impact of network structure of candidates’ Facebook groups while controlling for candidates’ personal characteristics, key election features and the amount of news coverage in traditional media. Particularly, the moderation impact of Facebook campaigning efforts that the network structure of candidates’ ego network (in-degree and out-degree centrality) and their position in the peer network (closure and brokerage) on election outcomes through citizens’ reactivity (i.e., likes, shares, and comments) is examined. We found more frequent posting were positively associated with increases in final votes, but only when network resources were low. The theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed.

Motivations of personal and portable interactive devices and citizen participation: A uses and gratifications and O-S-R-O-R approach • Winston Teo, University of Auckland; Edson Tandoc, Nanyang Technological University Singapore; Nuri Kim; Andrew Duffy, Nanyang Technological University; Richard Ling • This study builds upon the prior research investigating the indirect influence of news consumption by including motivations to adopt personal and portable interactive devices. Based on a survey of 2,000 Singaporeans, results showed that information-seeking motivation had a positive effect on offline citizen participation but not on online expressive engagement. Conversely, socialising/convenience motivation had a negative effect on both offline citizen participation and online expressive engagement. Implications and directions for future work are discussed.

Sharing Knowledge and “Micro Bubbles”: Epistemic Communities and Insularity in US Political Journalism • Nikki Usher, University of Illinois; Yee Man Margaret Ng, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign • This paper explores the epistemic communities of Washington political journalists to understand the sense-making and knowledge producing contexts for their work. Using an inductive computational analysis that combines social network analysis of journalists’ tweets with qualitative data such as work history and organizational affiliation, we find that previous studies have failed to account for the diversity of specific knowledge-producing communities in political journalism, however, one significant concern is that journalists may be operating in even smaller, more insular microbubbles that previously thought, which could lead to potential blindspots and groupthink.

Could this be YUGE? The impact of heuristic and systematic cues on the 2018 elections • Tom Vizcarrondo; David Painter, David L Painter • This investigation compares the influence of heuristic and systematic cues on Florida and Georgia residents’ voter enthusiasm and affect toward the candidates in the 2018 elections. This experiment used a pretest-posttest factorial design with three conditions featuring both types of cues. Results among high information voters were marginal. However, low information voters exposed to party endorsements reported the greatest changes in voter enthusiasm while those exposed to elite endorsements reported the greatest changes in candidate affect.

Is There a Spiral of Silence in The Age of Trump? Examining the Effect of Political Partisanship on Family Communication • ben wasike, university of texas rio grande valley • Using the spiral of silence (SoS) and family communication patterns as theoretical frameworks, this study examined the likelihood of expressing opinions about Trump and his policies to family and friends. Overall, the likelihood of expressing such opinions was low. However, the SoS is not the reason, but likely the fatigue due to overexposure to related news and events and disassociation. Factors moderating the likelihood of expression were conversation-orientation, face-to-face communication, online anonymity, and opinion congruence.

Cynicism, Insults, and Emotions in the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election: An Affective Intelligence Framework • Yufeng Tian; Xuewei Zhang; Masahiro Yamamoto, University at Albany; Alyssa Morey, University at Albany • This study examines the role of political cynicism in online campaign information seeking and political expression. Data from a web survey conducted before the 2016 U.S. presidential election show that cynicism is related positively to anger and anxiety and negatively to enthusiasm. The relationships of cynicism with anger and anxiety are moderated by exposure to insult campaigning. Data also indicate that cynicism is negatively associated with online political expression through reduced enthusiasm.

Partisan media or political organizations? Rethinking right-wing media in the disinformation order • Yunkang Yang • In light of a heightened level of disinformation propagated through online channels in the U.S., scholars pointed out that many right-wing media outlets are its principal incubator and distributor. This article is driven by two interrelated questions. First, how should we make sense of the nature of right-wing media that promoted disinformation to advance political agenda? Second, if many right-wing media outlets resemble political organizations that conduct political operations (e.g. disinformation), what kind of political organizations are they? This article offers a modest step towards understanding the behavior of many right-wing media outlets by re- conceptualizing them as a type of hybrid and fluid political organization. Compared with the previous approach that treats right-wing media as partisan news organizations, this conceptual approach captures three important yet undertheorized aspects of right-wing media. First, many right-wing media set out to achieve specific political goals. Second, many right-wing media engaged in a wide range of political operations such as making deals with politicians to “catch and kill” stories. Third, many right-wing media strategically timed their actions for maximum effect and adjusted themselves to address emerging problems in the political environment. These right-wing media outlets take on a hybrid organizational form by blending partisan news with disinformation and employing repertoires traditionally seen in social movements, political parties, and online activism. This type of organization is also characterized by fluidity in the sense that many right-wing media adjust their goals and strategies, and form new political alliances to address emerging problems and opportunities in the political environment.

Emotional Contagion on Facebook: An Experiment Examining Facebook News Comments, Affective Response, and Posting Behavior • Chance York, Kent State University; Newly Paul, University of North Texas; Jason Turcotte; Nicky Bi • We used a survey experiment (n = 350) to test emotional contagion as a potential mechanism driving hostility in Facebook news comments. Results show exposure to positively and negatively valenced comments attached to news posts about three issues—DACA, arming teachers, and net neutrality—produce contagion effects, and these effects are robust to participant issue and political orientations. Moreover, experiencing contagion increases the likelihood of commenting on the news post, implying self-reinforcing spirals of emotion.

From a Dual-Information-Processing Model Perspective: Linking Emerging Facebook User Types to News Verification in the Mobile Media Age • Rebecca Yu, National Chiao Tung University • Because social media have become a primary means by which news is received and disseminated, verification to determine the accuracy and veracity of news has become an increasingly critical practice for individual users. Drawing on the theoretical framework of the dual-information-processing model, we use two-wave panel survey data collected in Taiwan to investigate the antecedents of information-processing modes and their consequences for news verification. Results reveal three user-types based on their motivations for Facebook use—advanced, mixed, and leisure-convenience seekers—and show that advanced users who are high in all motivations are more likely engage in elaborative processing and subsequent verification of news than leisure-convenience seekers who use Facebook mainly for leisure and convenience purposes. Further, the indirect effects are weaker for mixed users with higher levels of mobile Facebook use, compared to leisure-convenience seekers.

< 2019 Abstracts

Public Relations 2019 Abstracts

Doug Newsom Award for Global Ethics and Global Diversity

An Appeal to Shared Values: Faith, Advocacy, and Persuasion in the Council on American-Islamic Relations’ Public Relations • Brian J. Bowe, Western Washington University; Derek Moscato, Western Washington University; Mariam Alkazemi, Virginia Commonwealth University • While much attention has been paid to the way news media both represent and misrepresent Muslims, much less work has been devoted to Muslim self-representation in the public sphere. This study examines press releases issued by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) to begin to close this gap in understanding of Muslim American self-representation. The study explores four strategic frames related to incident reports, legal responses, public sphere engagement and interfaith solidarity. It also examines the calls to action employed in the press releases. Finally, the findings show that releases also emphasized moral language related to protect the rights of individuals to be fully included in public life.

Open Competition

Toward an Emotional Intelligence Approach to Public Relations • Weiwu Zhang, Texas Tech University; Oluseyi Adegbola • This study provides an overview of the role of emotional intelligence in public relations and assesses the research in this area. Existing research has focused mostly on emotional intelligence as a competency vital to effective leadership. This study calls for further research investigating the role of emotional intelligence in different aspects of public relations such as media and customer relations, as well as methodological pluralism in future research.

Resilient Aging: Examining how AARP Constructs Public Resilience Through its #DisruptAging Campaign • Lindsey Anderson, University of Maryland; Sylvia (Jiankun) Guo • We completed an analysis of AARP’s #DisruptAging campaign to understand how the organization crafts messages about resilience to facilitate successful aging among its publics. We found the campaign reflected the processes of resilience communication, as well as a new strategy—acceptance/appreciation. These findings illuminate the societal role of organizational discourse by showing how inclusive organizational-public communication can disrupt stereotypes; thus contributing to a fully functioning society and marking the future of public relations scholarship.

The role of self-transcendent emotions and empathy in motivating communication about social and environmental issues • Denise Bortree, Penn State University; Michail Vafeiadis, Auburn University; Pratiti Diddi, Pennsylvania State University; Julia Gessner, Penn State University; Virginia Harrison; Yiting Chai, Penn State University • This study examines the role of emotions in situational motivations toward communication. In specific, the study looks at how self-transcendent emotions and empathy predict problem recognition, constraint recognition, involvement recognition and situational motivation in problem solving for two issues – climate change and immigration. A 2×2 experimental study found that self-transcendent emotions increase empathy which significantly influences communication motivators. However, not all self-transcendent emotions work in a positive direction for both issues. Implications are discussed.

Exploring the Influence of Stakeholder Personality on Crisis Response Evaluations and Outcomes • Natalie Brown-Devlin, The University of Texas at Austin; Hayoung Lim; Lindsay Bouchacourt, The University of Texas at Austin; Michael Devlin, Texas State University • While public relations professionals are beginning to utilize psychographic data points for more refined methods of audience targeting, this study proposes a novel approach for understanding stakeholders by examining how their elemental personality traits impact 1) crisis communication outcomes (lessen levels of attributed crisis responsibility, improve individual’s image, and increase positive word-of-mouth) and 2) evaluations of employed crisis response strategies. Stakeholder personality traits provide unique psychographics about the target audience, which may assist public relations professionals by micro-targeting strategic crisis response strategies. This study utilized an experimental design with 368 collegiate participants from two Texas universities. Results suggest that several underlying personality traits predict image repair-outcomes regardless of the communication strategy used, while others are more likely to interact certain strategies that embody certain ideal crisis communication outcomes. Several theoretical and practical implications were provided.

Enhancing Perceptions of the value of public relations through MBA education • Kristie Byrum, Bloomsburg University of Pennsylvania; Kathleen Rennie Ph.D APR Fellow PRSA Professor, New Jersey City University • The Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) launched its MBA/Business School Program in fall 2012 to help MBA programs in the United States introduce strategic communication into the business school curriculum. The leading professional organization in the United States launched the program after finding that MBA curricula do not typically include a focus on communication topics. Since launching the program, the PRSA has engaged 16 colleges and universities across the country as participants in the program, allowing them to offer courses specifically designated to strategic communications. This qualitative study set out to better understand outcomes of the courses, most notably how the course can influence the individual’s perception of the public relations process. The study gauged the impact of the class on the perceptions of students (seasoned business professionals) about the public relations profession and the value of strategic communication. This study reports on the students’ perceptions of the business value of public relations, the use of strategic communication, and why the students’ perceptions are meaningful.

(Re)centering human experience: A provocation for a critical humanistic orientation for public relations • Erica Ciszek, University of Texas at Austin • The article reflects on the contemporary status of public relations, highlighting the tensions between functionalist traditions and emergent critical perspectives. It presents critical humanism as an avenue for propelling public relations research and practice. This article imagines possibilities for critical humanistic work in public relations, drawing from and building upon research on feminism, queer theory and critical theories of race, advocating for the discipline to function as an avenue for social change.

Personal Influence in Public Relations • Krishnamurthy Sriramesh, University of Colorado Boulder; Jolene Fisher, University of Colorado Boulder • Personal influence plays an important role in the functioning of public relations across all cultural contexts, yet the concept has been neglected in the field’s scholarship. This study presents a review of the origins and use of the term, an examination of the current state of the personal influence model as it relates to the body of knowledge of public relations, and a research agenda that advances understanding of personal influence in public relations.

Assessing the Relationship between Self-Benefit and Other-Benefit Message Framing, Perceived Transparency Effectiveness, and Organizational Trust • Jolene Fisher, University of Colorado Boulder; Toby Hopp, University of Colorado Boulder • The frames used in organizational transparency messages have meaningful implications as they pertain to the formation of organizational trust among publics. Specifically, in this study, we proposed that transparency messages that emphasize an organization’s commitment to the social good are more likely to elicit trust-based gains than transparency messages that emphasize the organization’s value to the self. The results of two experiments supported this contention.

Understanding the Church of Scientology’s Interpretation of Effective Public Relations • Melanie Formentin, Towson University; Cylor Spaulding, Georgetown University • Scientology’s public relations (PR) function is based on research and writing by L. Ron Hubbard, who studied PR and drafted documents directing Church communication strategies. Hubbard had the textbook Effective Public Relations reprinted with annotations for Church practitioners. Textual analysis shows Hubbard selectively adopted PR strategies; he embraced identifying primary publics and using interpersonal communication but eschewed psychological principles and media relations strategies. The findings show how a religious organization has employed industry principles.

How institutional pressure influences corporate crisis communication practice?: A comparative case study from China • Qijun He, School of Journalism and Communication, Shanghai University • This study aims to explore the influence of institutional pressure on corporate crisis communication practice in China. Through comparing six cases in three pairs of crisis type, i.e., victim, accidental and intentional, the study showed that the firms depended on its willingness to conform to institutional pressure and resistant ability to adopt various strategic responses to cope with institutional pressure in crisis, and accordingly adapt their crisis communication strategies and forms of response to satisfy both self-interest and institutional pressure with less communicative strategies yet more invisible strategies, low-profile stance, and a more timely, active and consistent form of response.

Is fake news the new social media crisis?: Examining the public evaluation of crisis management for organizations targeted in viral fake news • Rosie Jahng, Wayne State University; Scott Burgess; Maria Clara Martucci, Wayne State University • This study conducted a mixed-design experiment to test the main effect of intention to damage the brand and political motivation on crisis identification, crisis severity, and audience acceptance of crisis responses was tested. Also, the moderating role of intention to damage the brand in fake news on the proposed dependent variables were further tested. Results indicated that while fake news with high intention to damage the brands are perceived and evaluated as a severe crisis, fake news with political motivation is not considered as a reputational crisis as much. Organizations should make strategic decisions based on the strength of intention to damage the brand reputation and the presence of political motivations when they find themselves as victims of fake news spreading on social media.

Toward A Relational Theory of Employee Engagement: Understanding Authenticity, Transparency, and Employee Behaviors • Hua Jiang, Syracuse University; Hongmei Shen, San Diego State University • Based on the relationship management paradigm in public relations and the job demands-resources model, we proposed a relational theory of employee engagement integrating employees’ immediate supervisors’ authentic leadership behavior and transparent organizational communication as antecedents of engagement and contextual performance behavior and turnover intention as behavioral outcomes that engagement leads to. Results from an employee survey (N = 727) indicated that immediate supervisors’ authentic leadership exchange with employees helped promote transparent organizational communication. Both authentic leadership and transparent organizational communication predicted employees’ level of physical, emotional, and cognitive engagement, which, in turn, largely explained employees’ contextual performance behavior and turnover intention. Moreover, transparent organizational communication was directly associated with employees’ turnover intention, and indirectly related to their contextual performance behavior via employee engagement. Finally, transparent organizational communication and employee engagement directly mediated the relationship between authentic leadership and two behavioral outcome variables in our model. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Social Media Research in Public Relations, 1998 – 2018: Status and Future Directions • Ran Ju; Sandra Braun; Dat Huynh; Sarah McCaffrey • This study examined the development of social media PR research by analyzing 189 articles published between 2008 and 2018 from two leading PR academic journals through quantitative and qualitative content analysis. Quantitative findings suggested a steady increase in scholarly attention on this topic, an international development of social media research, and a shift of perspectives used to examine this topic. Qualitative findings revealed themes on prominent results and practical implications from the examined articles.

A Bibliometric Analysis of Global Public Relations as A Scholarly Field • Eyun-Jung Ki, University of Alabama; Yorgo Pasadeos, University of Alabama; Tugce Ertem-Eray, University of Oregon • This bibliometric study aims to evaluate the state of the art in the global public relations literature since its inception to 2017. A total of 24,922 citations from 442 articles permit us to conclude that the growth and popularity of global public relations is steady in the scholarship. The literature is still in the process of interdisciplinary borrowing. The topics of interest in the global public relations research can be generally categorized into three groups: culture or cultural dimensions, application of public relations theory or perspective to another country, and public diplomacy.

The Role of Social Distance, Crisis Severity, and Crisis Response Strategy in Crisis Communication: A Construal Level Perspective • Jeesun Kim, Incheon National University; HyunJee Oh; Chang-Dae Ham, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign • Despite growing research on public attributions of crisis responsibility, relatively little is known about the role of perceived social distance to organizations along with crisis severity and crisis response strategies. Applying Construal Level Theory (CLT) to the context of crisis communication, we examine the role of construal fit between social distance, crisis severity, and crisis response strategy in determining crisis responsibility and negative word-of-mouth (WOM) intention. A test of 2 (social distance: close vs. distant) x 2 (crisis response strategy: defensive vs. accommodating) x 2 (crisis severity: low vs. high) between-subjects experiment finds three two-way interaction effects: 1) between social distance and crisis response strategy; 2) between social distance and crisis severity; and 3) crisis response strategy and crisis severity on negative WOM. No interaction effect was found on crisis responsibility, however. The psychological mechanism based on social distance plays a role in drawing different public reactions to crisis response strategies and different levels of severity. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Activating constructive employee behavioral responses in crisis situations: Examining the effects of pre-crisis internal reputation and crisis communication strategies on constructive and destructive employee voice behaviors • Young Kim, Marquette University; Hyunji Lim, Marquette University • This study explores how organizational management can promote employee voice behaviors, as positive behavioral reactions with constructive ideas, in responding to organizational crisis. Using an experimental study (N=640) among full-time employees in the United States, the study found that pre-crisis internal reputation and crisis communication strategies—accommodative response and stealing thunder—positively and directly affected constructive employee voice behaviors in a crisis situation. Furthermore, the study revealed how post-crisis internal reputation mediates the influences of pre-crisis internal reputation and stealing thunder on positive/constructive and negative/destructive employee voice behaviors.

An Ecological View and A Multi-Level Analysis of Public Organizations’ Communication Behaviors on Social Media • Chih-Hui Lai, National Chiao Tung U; Rebecca Yu, National Chiao Tung University • This study applies an ecological view and a multi-level analysis to unpack public organizations’ communication on social media as embedded in the broader environment. Through manual and automated content analysis of 617 public organizations’ one-year Facebook posts in Taiwan, the data reveal the unique patterns of public organizations’ social media communication as manifested in both message function and message content, as well as the association between these two, after controlling for time and organizational influence.

Crisis Response Strategy Differences: U.S. vs South Korea • Soehyeon Lee; Moon Lee, University of Florida • In this study, we compared the types of crisis response strategies in terms of crisis types utilized in two different countries (i.e., the USA and South Korea) and tested the applicability of a major theoretical approach, Situational Crisis Theory, by analyzing 222 actual crisis cases (USA: n = 114; KOR: n = 108) happened during the last decade (from January 2009 to March 2018). Rebuilding strategy was the most often used strategy, regardless of countries. We also found differences between these two countries in terms of response strategies/specifics in organizations’ responses to crises. Theoretical and practical implications are further discussed in this study.

Toward an Integrated Model of Employees’ Communicative Behaviors on Social Media: Individual and Organizational Determinants • Yeunjae Lee; Katie Kim • To advance theoretical understanding of employees’ communicative behaviors on social media, this study proposes and tests an integrative model that incorporates individual and organizational antecedents. The model specifically examines the collective impacts of the social media-related behavioral motivations of individuals and the quality of organization-employee relationship (OER) on their positive and negative information sharing intentions on personal social networking sites and anonymous social media. The results of an online survey with full-time employees in the U.S. showed that OER significantly increases employees’ positive behavioral intentions and social media-related motivations. Further, OER significantly decreases employees’ negative information sharing intentions on anonymous websites but not on their own social media. Considerable and distinct effects of individuals’ positive (i.e., help organization, self-enhancement, enjoyment) and negative (i.e., vent negative feelings, warn others) behavioral motivations on social media are also found. Theoretical and practical implications for public relations and employee behaviors are discussed.

The Value of Public Relations in Enhancing Employees’ Health Information Disclosure Intentions in the Workplace • Jo-Yun Li, University of Miami; Yeunjae Lee • Various mechanisms and processes have been established that lead to employees’ decisions to disclose their health information in the workplace. The existing literature has emphasized individuals’ stigma, privacy, or discrimination but often overlooked the influence of organizations’ internal communication effort. This study focused on organizations’ public relations practices and explored the antecedents of employees’ health-related perceptions, communicative behaviors, and intentions to disclose their health information in the workplace. In particular, this study tested the impact of symmetrical internal communication and the quality of organization–employee relationship (OER) on employees’ perceived risks and benefits of information disclosure and their communication strategies for their health information. The results of an online survey showed that a positive OER increased the employees’ perceived benefits and direct communication behaviors within an organization. In addition, the OER quality decreased the employees’ perceived risks for disclosing their health information to their supervisors but not to their colleagues. Results also found the varying impact of employees’ perceptions and communication strategies on their intention to disclose their physical and mental health problems. Theoretical and practical implications for public relations and health communication were discussed in this study.

Being honest in crisis communication: Implications of pre-crisis engagement and stealing thunder • SANG LEE, 1961; Jiyoung Lee, WVU • This research reports on the buffering effects of two proactive crisis communication strategies: pre-crisis engagement and stealing thunder, which is an organization’s voluntary revelation of crisis information when facing a crisis. The results showed that the effectiveness of stealing thunder was moderated by the pre-crisis engagement with stakeholder petitions such that the effects of stealing thunder were only observed when the organization engaged with stakeholder complaints in the pre-crisis stage. A moderated parallel mediation model explored the underlying mechanism in which crisis responsibility and crisis severity parallelly mediated the interaction effects between pre-crisis engagement and stealing thunder.

Empowered giving: Understanding the role of psychosocial empowerment in charitable giving behavior to mental health organizations • Taylor Jing Wen, University of South Carolina; Jo-Yun Li, University of Miami • Although mental illness constitutes a large part of the burden of disease, it is one of the least funded diseases in the United States. Guided by the theoretical frameworks of giving behaviors and psychological empowerment, this study seeks to understand the effects of individual characteristics (i.e., altruistic personality traits) and contextual factors (i.e., social capital) on individuals’ cognitions of psychological empowerment and individuals’ subsequent donation behaviors. A survey of 604 participants found that individuals’ beliefs about the meanings and impacts of their charitable giving (i.e., meaning and impact) and the control they have over their ability to make such donations (i.e., competence) are the specific dimensions that reinforce the effects of altruism and social capital on donation intentions. The incorporation of different cognitions of psychological empowerment may help mental health organizations and communication practitioners to address the issue of the relative lack of monetary contributions from the public. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Information vetting as a key component in social-mediated crisis communication: An exploratory study • Xuerong Lu, University of Georgia; Yan Jin; Taeyeon Kim • In order to understand publics’ information consumption behavior in current media environment, this study addresses how and why individuals vet information (or not) in crisis situations. Grounded in dual-process model and meta-cognition theory, an initial conceptual framework of crisis information vetting was outlined. An exploratory study, including four focus groups and 13 in-depth interviews, was conducted to investigate: 1) indicators of information vetting behavior according to participants’ self-reported experience; and 2) what motivate and what prohibit participants from engaging themselves emotionally and cognitively in the process of crisis information vetting. Our qualitative data provided evidence for a two-step process of crisis information vetting, namely, primary vetting and secondary vetting. A total of 48 vetting behavior indicators were further rendered, which serve as a strong content base for future scale development and further conceptual model refinement.

Corporate vanguards: The contemporary role of organization altruism • Lincoln Lu, University of Florida; Kalyca Lynn Becktel, University of Florida; Myiah Hutchens, University of Florida • Dramatic influx of brands embracing diplomatic action as part of their strategic marketing and public relations tactics is muddying the definition of corporate social responsibility. This study utilizes the recent Central American migrant caravan as the context to examine participants’ reactions to corporate philanthropy. A 2×3 experimental design was utilized with an online sample. Organizations adopting explicit positions did not increase brand-public relationship, but perceived altruism was increased for all participants regardless of political identity.

The strive for legitimacy? Corporate diplomacy practices of European MNEs in the UAE • Sarah Marschlich; Diana Ingenhoff • Applying a neo-institutional public relations approach, the purpose of this study is to assess to what extent corporate diplomacy in the United Arab Emirates is used as a legitimation strategy. For this, we conducted in-depth interviews with public relations executives (N=20). Our findings imply that companies engage in corporate diplomacy to align with governmental social expectations in their host country, which can contribute to the companies’ moral legitimacy.

A Different Kind of Public Sector Practice: Local Law Enforcement Public Relations • Lindsay McCluskey, SUNY Oswego • Researchers have distinguished between public and private sector public relations, identifying critical environmental factors that influence public relations practices and ultimately organization-public relationships (Horsley, et al., 2010; Liu & Horsley, 2007; Liu & Levenshus, 2010; Liu et al., 2010; Liu et al., 2012). Taking these variables into consideration, scholars created (Liu & Horsley, 2007) and refined (Horsley et al., 2010; Liu et al., 2012) the Government Communication Decision Wheel, a theoretical model. The GCDW studies did not focus on understanding practices and characteristics associated with specific segments of the profession; therefore, they did not account for variables that may be specific to departments or segments within levels of government. Horsley et al. (2010) and Liu et al. (2012) acknowledged such limitations to their research. This study adds to the theoretical understanding surrounding the GCDW by addressing some of the more “nuanced differences” (Liu et al., 2012, p. 237) associated with a segment of public relations practice that shares “similar missions or tasks” – local law enforcement public relations (Horsley et al., 2010, p. 288). This work is based on 20 interviews with local law enforcement public relations personnel across the United States. Several prominent themes emerged regarding the perceived differences associated with local law enforcement public relations. These include demand and being “24/7;” the level of attention paid to, the level of interest in, and the level of media scrutiny associated with local law enforcement; and the inherent nature and complexity of law enforcement interactions and information.

Communication Strategies to Drive Internal Social Media Usage and Relationship Cultivation with Employees • Rita Men; Julie O’Neil, Texas Christian University; Michele Ewing • This study examined the administrative and communication strategies used by organizations to encourage employee participation on internal social media and analyzed whether employees’ internal social media usage engenders increased transparency and relational outcomes. Specifically, researchers proposed and tested a conceptual model that links organizational communication strategies (i.e., strategic information dissemination, two-way symmetrical communication), employee internal social media usage, perceived organizational transparency, and employee-organization relationships. Through an online survey of 1,150 employees from various organizations in the United States that had adopted internal social media, results showed that strategic information dissemination and social-mediated, two-way symmetrical communication both encouraged employees’ use of internal social media, which in turn, led to employees’ perception of organizational transparency and quality relationship outcomes with the organization. The study also found that organizations primarily use internal social media to post information about news and events in order to keep employees informed and updated. Companies most often utilized Facebook to communicate with employees. While majority companies had a social media policy in place, over half of them did not provide social media training. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Exploring the Role of Stakeholder Engagement in Enhancing Resilience in Emergency Communication: A Qualitative Study • Lan Ni, University of Houston; Weidong Shi, University of Houston • This paper explores the role and mechanism of stakeholder engagement in addressing challenges and enhancing resilience in emergency communication. Through qualitative interviews with 16 emergency managers, this study identified four levels of challenges in enhancing resilience (information challenges, expectation challenges, perception challenges, and personnel challenges). Findings also revealed how key stakeholder engagement processes such as stakeholder identification and relationship management can address these challenges and better activate and empower stakeholders to be partners.

A Human Touch and Content Matter for Consumer Engagement • Hyojung Park, Louisiana State University; Yangzhi Jiang, Louisiana State University • This study explores the roles of consumer motivations and brand communication in increasing consumer engagement with a brand on social media. Data from a survey of a quota sample of 691 U.S. consumers indicate that the motivations of entertainment and remuneration are positively associated with consuming and contributing to brand content on social media. In addition, the motive of obtaining information prompts people to consume brand content (e.g., reading a brand’s posts or watching videos), while the motivation for self-expression leads to contributing activities (e.g., conversing on a brand’s account and uploading videos). After controlling for these motivations, brand communication strategy (such as content and tone) appears to influence consumers’ brand-related activities on social media, which subsequently results in consumer intentions in favor of the brand.

Cultivating #Cupfusion: An Exploration of the Unintended Consequences of Communication in a Public Relations Campaign • Timothy Penn, Towson University • This case study is an exploration into the application of Merton’s (1936) typology of unanticipated consequences of purposeful social actions to a public relations campaign. Merton used scientific analysis to understand factors leading to unintended consequences, rather than attributing them to chance or fate. Using qualitative methods,including in-depth interviews, organization-provided document analysis, and content analysis of the Reese’s brand Facebook page, this study found four of his five factors, including lack of foreknowledge, habit, myopia, and values, have proved applicable to the 2016 Reese’s #Cupfusion campaign. Merton’s typology and the idea of unintended consequences has application for public relations theory and practice. The concept of lack of foreknowledge has implications for both chaos and complexity theory, and how they can be applied to unintended consequences and crisis. This research also supports and adds to social media and strategic campaign planning practice, by providing a lens for the analysis and execution of both pre-implementation and evaluation of public relations campaigns.

Activating Audiences: Using STOPS to Predict Engagement with Issues of Women’s Mass Incarceration • Geah Pressgrove; Crisobal Barra, Universidad de Chile; Melissa Janoske, University of Memphis • Rates of women’s incarceration in the United States are growing at an alarming rate leading to a host of negative economic and familial outcomes. Despite this, little attention has been given to the topic and few people know the extent of the issue. Employing STOPS, this study seeks to understand the confluence of factors that might lead to individuals engaging in prosocial action. Qualitative and quantitative findings indicate that both situational motivation and referent criterion predict active communication, however only situational motivation predicts passive communication. Further, passive communicative action is the best predictor of common support behaviors including donating money, volunteering time and participating in policy advocacy. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

Bollywood Diplomacy: A critical Analysis of the Role of Hindi Film Industry in International Public Relations • Mian Asim, Zayed University; Azmat Rasul, Florida State University; Muhammad Ehab Rasul • Through the lens of Propaganda Model, this article explores the relationship between the Hindi film industry, Bollywood, and the international public relations strategies devised by the Indian government during the last couple of decades. After receiving the industry status in 1998, Bollywood carefully filtered movie content due to its dependence on the Indian government for tax-relief, foreign direct investment, soft loans from the banking sector, and the government’s ability to produce flak. We focused on flak as a content filter and argued that Bollywood produced films promoting Indian government’s international public relations agenda and the movie-makers followed the official policy for fear of flak from the government. We found that Bollywood, being one of the most significant culture industries in the world, worked closely with the government and, in return, harvested tangible economic benefits (e.g., tax cuts and soft loans) from the Indian government.

Explicating Alumni Engagement: When Conversational Voice Matters More than Openness and Assurances of Legitimacy • Hongmei Shen, San Diego State University; Bey-Ling Sha, San Diego State University • The question of how organizations engage with their stakeholders has seen increasing investigation in recent years, with public relations researchers examining the concept of engagement from cognitive, affective, and behavioral perspectives (e.g., Dhanesh, 2017; Jelen-Sanchez, 2017). This study examined the engagement of university alumni with their alma mater, with data collected from qualitative interviews, a pilot survey, and a main survey. Results identified three dimensions of alumni engagement: instrumental, communicative and affective, and confirmatory factor analysis supported this three-dimensional structure. Structural equation modeling showed that, while conversational voice was conducive to alumni engagement, openness and assurances of legitimacy did not exert any significant impacts. The findings offer concrete ways in which universities can better engage with alumni, as well as conceptual and methodological ways in which public relations scholars might continue to refine the notion of engagement between organizations and their publics.

The Interplay Between Post-Crisis Response Strategy and Pre-Crisis Corporate Associations • Weiting Tao, University of Miami; Baobao Song, Virginia Commonwealth University • How should a company respond to a crisis related to its social responsibility (CSR) by capitalizing on consumers’ existing corporate associations? To answer this question, this study examined the interaction between consumers’ pre-crisis associations with a company and post-crisis response strategies. Results of an experiment render support for the predicted interaction effect. Additionally, results show in dealing with a CSR crisis, a CSR-related response works better than a response that stresses the company’s product expertise.

A Qualitative Study of the Perceptions of Physically Disabled Public Relations Practitioners • Amanda Sebesta, University of Houston; Jennifer Vardeman, University of Houston • This paper explores the perceptions of physically disabled practitioners in the public relations field. Literature about diversity in public relations, workplace discrimination, and feminist theory of disability framed this study. A qualitative study was conducted using open-ended interview questions, talking with practitioners that have a range of disabilities–including wheelchair-bound, amputee and dwarfism. Themes emerged according to structural factors contributing to a limited inclusivity of disabled practitioners in the field, negotiations of power within disability by practitioners, and complicated representation of disabled practitioners. Theoretical and practical implications are presented.

The overlooked public: The role of citizens in countries hosting mega-events • Kelly Vibber; Alessandro Lovari, Università degli studi di Cagliari • This research expands the work that has been done around nation branding and the impact of hosting mega-events (e.g., diplomacy, national reputation, soft power). Previous work has focused primarily on the ways in which hosting mega-events builds, improves or expands the perception foreign and external publics have of the hosting country and external relations. This research instead focuses inward and aims to answer questions about how hosting mega-events is perceived by citizens of the hosting country, how they view their role in interacting with foreign visitors (e.g., person-to-person or sociological diplomacy) and to what extent they communicate in support of, or against, their country’s efforts. A convenience sample of 426 Italian citizens completed the survey. Results indicate that citizens who placed high importance on their interactions with foreigners reported significantly higher scores on attitudes toward Italy hosting the World Exposition, positive megaphoning behaviors about Italy hosting the Expo and perceived themselves as ambassadors during the Expo. The findings highlight the importance of governments engaging with citizens when taking on mega-events. This intentional communication and relationship management with citizens is critical to internal relations during the mega-event, and has the potential to magnify the positive impact of hosting mega-events.

Bridging the Gap between Relationships and Situations: Exploring the Antecedents and Outcomes of Organization-Employee Relationships • Yuan Wang, City University of Hong Kong • Grounded in the frameworks of the relationship management theory and the situational theory of publics, this study examined the effects of employees’ perceived symmetrical and transparent communication on their perceived relationships with their organization and how the relationships influenced employees’ situational perceptions through a national survey of 449 employees working in large organizations in the U.S. This study found that transparent and symmetrical communication were significant predictors of organization-employee relationships (OERs). Another finding was that employees’ perceived symmetrical communication with their organization positively influenced their transparent communication. Furthermore, OERs facilitated employees’ problem recognition and level of involvement as well as weakened their constraint recognition. The theoretical and practical implications of this study were also discussed.

Volunteer motivation fulfillment: The antecedents and outcomes • Anli Xiao; Virginia Harrison; Christen Buckley • The questions of how nonprofit organizations can best fulfill people’s motivations to volunteer and how volunteers’ motivation fulfillment influences people’s supportive intentions to volunteer remain unclear. This study argues that different status of volunteer motivation fulfillment may have different implications on their future supportive intentions. This online survey found that organizations can enhance volunteers’ degree of volunteer motivation fulfillment through effective stewardship strategies. Interesting results involving the effect of volunteer motivation fulfillment were evidenced by data analysis. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.

How CEO Disclosure and Gender Affect Perceived CEO Attributes, Relationship Investment, and Engagement Intention • April Yue, University of Florida; Yoo Jin Chung; Amanda Bradshaw; Tom Kelleher, University of Florida; Mary Ann Ferguson • How does a CEO’s social media content disclosure on Twitter affect CEO attributes, relationship investment, and public engagement, and to what extent does the CEO’s gender (male vs. female) moderate how publics evaluate content disclosures? A 2 (CEO gender: male vs. female) X 4 (level of disclosure: 100% corporate vs. 70% corporate and 30% personal vs. 30% corporate and 70% personal vs. 100% personal disclosure) between-subject experimental design was used to address these questions. A random sample of 465 adult participants in the United States was selected. Results showed that posts that featured high personal disclosure did not increase the perceived likability or competence of the CEO. Neither did CEO gender impact these outcomes. However, CEO professional disclosure proved to be an effective means to gain high levels of perceived relationship investment from publics. Finally, publics may hold implicit gender bias when revealing cognitive (i.e., perceived relationship investment) and behavioral evaluation (i.e., engagement intention) toward a female CEO.

Examining the Effects of Internal Communications and Emotional Culture on Employees’ Organizational Identification • April Yue, University of Florida; Rita Men; Mary Ann Ferguson • As one of the first empirical studies investigating the emerging role of positive emotional culture within organizations, we aim to understand how a symmetrical internal communication system and leaders’ use of motivating language contribute to fostering a positive emotional culture featured by joy, companionate love, pride, and gratitude. Furthermore, we examined the linkage between a positive emotional culture and employees’ organizational identification. Through a quantitative survey with 482 full-time employees in the U.S., we found that both symmetrical internal communication and leaders’ use of motivating language induced the perception of a positive emotional culture, which in turn enhanced employees’ organizational identification. Theoretically, the study showcased the value of strategic internal communications at both the leader’s and organizational levels in fostering positive organizational outcomes and added to the body of knowledge on why emotional culture matters. From a pragmatic point of view, the study findings offered strategic insights into how organizations and leaders should communicate to create a benign cultural environment filled with positive emotions and boost employees’ sense of belonging in the organization.

Improve employee-organization relationships (EOR) and workplace performance through CSR: Insights from an electric and energy company in China • Yafei Zhang; Chuqing Dong • This study examined the impact of employee perceived corporate social responsibility (CSR) on their employee-organization identification (EOI), corporate ability (CA), employee-organization relationships (EOR), and organizational citizenship behavior (OCB). Results, based on a survey (N = 248) with employees from a large, private company in the electric and energy industry in China, revealed that employee perceptions of CSR were positively associated with EOI, CA, EOR, and OCB. In addition, there was a positive spillover effect between CSR and CA. Findings also indicated the positive associations between CA and EOR, and EOI and OCB. This study contributes to the scant research on employee-centered CSR and suggests CSR as an effective strategy to cultivate relationships with employees and to increase their job performance in the Chinese context.

Teaching

Demystifying Data: A Constructivist Approach to Teaching Statistical Concepts Using SPSS • Lauren Bayliss, Georgia Southern University • To improve public relations students’ self-efficacy and knowledge of statistics, two hands-on activities were created. One activity used data simulation in the software program SPSS, and the other used printed statistical outputs. Both activities were introduced in a flipped-classroom format as part of a crossover experimental design. The results indicate that knowledge of statistics increased through both activities. However, the activity using data simulation in SPSS led to significantly higher self-efficacy for learning statistics.

Cut Me Some Slack: Simulation, Experiential Learning, and Slack Bots to Teach Crisis Communication • Julia Daisy Fraustino, West Virginia University; Amanda Kennedy, St. Mary’s University • This research explores using the newly popular online collaboration hub Slack (and Slack bots) for in-class crisis simulation. Qualitative direct observation of two simulations—(1) a workshop and simulation shadow experience with a state National Guard and (2) a crisis communication class culminating in simulation—along with textual analyses of simulation responses and student reflections probe findings. This study partially replicates and expands previous simulation research to generate new insights and options for PR instruction based in experiential learning theory.

Media Literacy among Public Relations Students: An Analysis of Future PR Professionals in the Post-Truth Era • Jami Fullerton, Oklahoma State University; Lori McKinnon; Alice Kendrick • This study assessed various aspects of media literacy among a national sample of US public relations students. Definitions of media literacy transcended basic interpretation of messages and extended to higher-level concepts such as understanding and how media organizations operate. PR students considered themselves to be fairly media literate, and had higher estimates of their own media literacy than a sample of advertising students in a previous study. Implications for public relations educators are discussed.

Curriculum Rebuilding in Public Relations: A Multi Managerial-Level Analysis of PR Practitioners’ Expectations of Graduates • Arunima Krishna, Boston University; Donald Wright, Boston University; Raymond Kotcher, Boston University • This manuscript reports on a survey of practicing public relations practitioners about the professional attributes and job skills necessary for those who intend to enter the public relations field. Analyses compared differences and similarities between senior-level, mid-level and entry-level practitioners. Results indicate that writing, listening, and creativity are the three most significant skills aspiring public relations people should have followed by creative thinking, the ability to deal with an online reputation crisis, the ability to communicate effectively in today’s environment of disinformation, and the ability to build a crisis response plan. Results found statistically significant differences across senior management, middle management, and junior level respondents on items measuring these skills and attributes: possessing business acumen, creativity, research/measurement skills, new technologies, digital story telling, and how to best interact with public relations firms.

Creating Career Confidence: Fostering Professional Self-Efficacy Through Student-Run Agencies and Integrative Learning • Jeffrey Ranta, Coastal Carolina University/Teal Nation Communications; Debbie Davis, Texas Tech University; Andrea Bergstrom, Coastal Carolina University • This study investigates integrative learning linkages provided through student-run agencies (SRAs) and fostering professional self-efficacy (confidence). Based on survey results of 182 SRA student participants, this research measured professional self-efficacy in performing 23 communication tasks and measures attributions awarded by respondents to student-run agency experiences in developing that confidence. Results suggest changes to pedagogy and offers evidence of SRA effectiveness in preparing graduates for responsibilities in public relations, advertising, integrated and strategic communication.

Student

A Concept Explication of Stance: The Leading Strategy to an Organization’s Crisis Response • Courtney D. Boman, University of Missouri School of Journalism • The stance, or series of stances, an organization takes following a crisis encapsulates its thinking and influences its response strategies. Following requirements outlined by McLeod and Pan, this paper explicates stance as a critical and deliberate position an organization takes that is influenced by internal and external variables, that leads to response strategies. This conceptualization can lead to a vanguard of a third generation of theory development for contingency theory of strategic conflict management.

Gun Control Debate on Twitter: Social Media Advocacy & Advocacy Communication • Minhee Choi, University of South Carolina • This study explores agenda setting, message framing, and the concepts of social media advocacy and mobilizing information through content analysis of tweets from competing pro-gun and gun control advocacy organizations, the NRA and Moms Demand Action. Findings revealed that the two organizations actively set the gun rights and gun control agenda through issue framing. Tweets from both organizations were more likely to frame the cause and solution as episodic frames. Mentions of mobilizing information were actively used by both organizations. However, the NRA showed more active communication with their followers through use of hashtags, replies, retweets, and likes.

ICTs Intrusion: The Effects of Using Communication Technology after Hours on Employees’ Counterproductive Work Behaviors • Katie Kim, University of Oklahoma • The integration of information and communication technologies (ICTs) at the workplace has brought a new internal communication environment in the organization. In particular, ICTs enabled internal communication to be extended beyond the workplace and after work hours, which led to an intrusion of work into employees’ private domains. The study examines the impact of ICTs intrusion on employees’ counterproductive work behaviors (CWB) in the context of internal communication management. The results showed that the extent of ICTs intrusion is positively associated with CWB toward the organization’s members. Moreover, the effects of ICTs intrusion on CWB are accentuated when individuals perceive higher stress of being always connected to internal members during non-work hours. The findings of the study suggest practical guidance to organizational managers and public relations professionals on how ICTs should be utilized as an effective internal communication tool to promote a healthy and productive workforce.

Why Do Publics Engage in Negative Communication Behavior on Social Media? • Bitt Moon, Indiana University Bloomington; Eugene Kim, The Media School at the Indiana University, Bloomington • This study explored how consumer publics participate in negative communication behavior (NCB): Brand-related information seeking and sharing on social media. We examined the effects of cognitive, relational, and emotional drivers on NCB through an online survey of 475 participants. The results showed that cognitive factors -brand incompetence and irresponsibility- affect relational distrust and brand hate, which in turn lead to NCB. The findings indicated the significant role of brand hate in consumer publics‘ NCB.

Exploring the Social Networks of Environmental Nonprofit Organizations and Public Reactions to Facebook Postings Contingent on Message Types • Jeyoung Oh, University of Alabama; Bumsoo Kim, University of Alabama • Environmental nonprofit organizations (ENPOs) use social media to generate organization-level networks and distribute diverse informational and promotional messages to the public. However, little is known about how they build organization-level networks in social media and what types of environmental messages they mainly provide. To fill these gaps, this study explores 1) how ENPOs are likely to have organization-level networks and 2) what types of environmental messages they have distributed and publics’ reactions to them. To answer these research questions, a quantitative content analysis was conducted. The results showed that ENPOs actively maintain networks with 1) other types of nonprofit organizations, 2) community-building organizations, and 3) various news media companies or websites. Regarding the second research question, the results showed that when ENPOs provide accurate messages with informational context, social media users are more likely to respond to the message. Furthermore, when they employ human voice with informational context, social media users tend to react more to the messages.

Examining the influence of personal discussion network on consumer engagement behavior: An egocentric network study • Yan Qu, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill • Consumer engagement has been a central component in corporations’ relationship management with consumers. This study examines the antecedents of consumer online behavioral engagement through an egocentric network analysis approach. Specifically, how structural and compositional traits of consumers’ brand discussion networks influence their engagement behavior online were explored. Data from an online survey indicated that the size, heterogeneity, and density of personal discussion network were associated with certain engagement behaviors. Findings and implications are discussed.

Is the Organization Ever the Victim? Reassessing Crisis Responsibility • Erika Schneider, University of Missouri-Columbia • This research investigates the theoretical concept of crisis responsibility to realign its effectiveness in crisis communication. The revision, proposing crisis responsibility as the failure to prevent a risk, illustrates that crisis responsibility is heavily weighted on organizational deficiencies. Strategies that deny responsibility are less effective for the organization because stakeholder perceptions emphasize the preventable nature of all crises. Implications of this concept explication includes strengthening tools for scholars to measure and evaluate crisis response strategies.

Relative efficacy of differentiation and bolstering in mitigating the negative spillover effect from a rival brand’s product-harm crisis: A study of market leader and market challenger • Jun Zhang, Newhouse School of Syracuse University • In light of a brand’s recall crisis, rival brands can mitigate the negative spillover effect by distancing themselves from the brand in crisis. This experimental research examines the relative efficacy of a rival brand’s using either bolstering or differentiation strategy in mitigating the negative spillover effect. Results showed that bolstering by a market leader and differentiation by a market challenger had an indirect effect on protecting brand attitude and purchase intent through heightened message evaluations.

< 2019 Abstracts

Newspaper and Online News 2019 Abstracts

Open Competition

Embracing the visual, verbal and viral media: How post-millennial consumption habits are reshaping the news • Chris Gentilviso, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; Deb Aikat, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill • The post-millennial or Generation Z constitutes people born in 1997 or after. This study theorizes how news consumption habits of the post-millennial generation are reshaping the news. Based on a 2019 meta-analytical research review of 16 key studies (published between 2017 and 2019) of media consumption habits of post-millennials, this research study delineates news consumption habits of post-millennials. It theorizes how this new generation of media users are embracing the visual, verbal and viral media and, in turn, reshaping news content. The propensity of the post-millennials to participate in the news cycle shapes their rapidly-changing preferences and usage patterns

Written in code: Exploring the negative effects of acronyms and abbreviations in news headlines • Alyssa Appelman, Northern Kentucky University • Through an experiment (N = 131), this study looks at whether the negative effects of acronyms and abbreviations in news articles are based on their presence or their difficulty. In all, it finds support for a presence/absence effect rather than a difficulty/ease effect. Rather than explaining acronyms and abbreviations in news articles, this suggests that journalists should strive to avoid such constructions altogether.

Journalistic compatibility: How social networking sites fit with users’ preferences for consuming hard, soft news • Steve Bien-Aime, Northern Kentucky University; Mu Wu, California State University, Los Angeles • Through a MTurk survey, this study explored whether users perceived Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and Snapchat as compatible with consuming hard and soft news on those platforms. Participants reported Twitter and Facebook as the most compatible social networking sites in terms of consuming hard and soft news. Additionally, heightened perceived compatibility was significantly positively associated with individuals’ future intentions to use a SNS for news consumption.

(MacDougall Student Paper Award) Newspaper editors’ interactions with journalistic serendipity • Matt Bird-Meyer, University of Missouri • This mixed-methods study explores the information behavior of newspaper reporters regarding their serendipitous encounters with information that lead to story ideas, and how newspaper editors affect their ability to pursue such encountered ideas. As an interdisciplinary examination in human information behavior and journalism studies, behaviors and routines emerged that encouraged and potentially limited certain behaviors and routines. The findings also identify behaviors wherein newspaper editors match reporters with certain traits to certain story assignments.

Misrepresentation of cosmetic and reconstructive surgery in the American and French press • Sandrine Boudana, Tel Aviv; David Boudana • Research on media representation of plastic surgery has focused on American television and magazines to conclude that these media give a distortedly positive image of plastic surgery. Our study tests the hypothesis that, due to a more critically-orientated tradition, the print press rather emphasizes the negative aspects of plastic surgery and raises concerns about the procedures. Extending our study to a comparison with the French press, we also test the hypothesis that, given its polemicist tradition, the French press might be more critical than the American press towards plastic surgery. Content and framing analyses of 500 American and French newspaper articles show that the press is equally – although in different ways – critical of plastic surgery in both countries. However the comparison of media representations with statistical realities reveals that the negative judgment is not based on accurate representations of the realities of the profession.

Conservative News Nonprofits: Claiming legitimacy without transparency • Michael Buozis, Temple University; Magda Konieczna, Temple University • This study is the first examining and categorizing conservative news nonprofits. Using discourse analysis to explore their missions and other public statements, we note that many of these organizations draw on the legitimacy of mainstream journalism outlets while critiquing them, at once associating with and dissociating from them. This enables them to justify their engagement in the kind of activism normally found outside of journalism, even as they obscure their ideological orientations and funding sources.

Understanding the Nonprofit News Landscape in the United States • Monica Chadha, Arizona State University; Jesse Lecy, Arizona State University • This paper attempts to create a landscape of digital nonprofit news sites by examining their categorization as provided by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) through the use of National Taxonomy of Exempt Entities (NTEE). The study also used a content analysis to examine the sites’ mission statements and find out which ones emphasized public journalism, investigative journalism, or both, thus providing nuance to scholarship that until now, has highlighted both as nonprofit news offerings.

Framing of the 2016 Presidential Election of Donald Trump from the World Press • Yu-li Chang, Bethel University • The ascent of Trump as the president of the United States after the 2016 election offered an excellent opportunity to look into how the world press opined on this surprising outcome. This study examined the editorials and columns from the English-language world press on the moral judgment frame, that is, the lessons learned from Trump’s election and the future prospects of the Trump presidency. Mixed methods were chosen as the tool for data analysis – a quantitative content analysis followed by a qualitative narrative analysis to dig deeper into nuances in the thematic frames generated from the content analysis. The findings showed that the world opinion framed Trump’s election more unfavorably than favorably.  This study discovered a central narrative relating to the world’s concerns over Trump’s ability to lead the world to solve its pressing challenges and to do so on moral and cultural grounds.  World opinion framed Trump’s unpredictable personality and policy ignorance as the largest sources of uncertainty, horror, cataclysm facing the world.  Trump was viewed not only being incapable of leading the world to solve its problems; he was portrayed as being capable of bringing catastrophe to the already uncertain and dangerous situation.  World opinion also predicted a degradation of the United States as a beacon of freedom, liberty and democracy because of the resurgent racism, bigotry, xenophobia, and misogyny manifested in Trump and his followers.

Do Students Know the Code?  How Coding is (and isn’t) Taught in Accredited Journalism Programs • Jim Foust; Katherine Bradshaw • A census of ACEJMC-accredited journalism programs reveals that less than a quarter require students to learn code. Despite industry desires for journalists with coding skills nearly 40 percent of the units offer no coding classes. Among programs that require code, most rely on a course or courses taught by full-time faculty in the accredited unit. About one third of units that do not require code currently have plans to add it in the future.

Who perpetuates “fake new” in China? Rumor diffusion on mainstream news websites, Weibo, and WeChat • Lei Guo, Boston University; Yiyan Zhang, Boston University • This study examined the diffusion of online rumors on mainstream news websites, Weibo, and WeChat—the three major media platforms for online news consumption in China. The results show that Weibo was most likely to advance rumors, while WeChat performed the best in refuting rumors. Additionally, mainstream news websites set the agenda of Weibo and WeChat in both advancing and refuting rumors. Within social media, governmental accounts took the leading agenda-setting role in refuting rumors.

Examining the Narratives of Syria: A Longitudinal Frame Analysis of the Syrian Conflict • Emily Burns, Texas State University; Michel Haigh, Texas State University • This study examined news coverage of the Syrian refugee crisis from 2011-2018. Specifically, it investigated how various mainstream news publications framed the Syrian refugee story, the overall tone of coverage, and shifts in coverage of the Syrian refugee crisis over time. Refugees were depicted positively. Tone of coverage became more positive over time, and the most common frames employed were the foreign government response frame and the conflict frame.

Political Polarization and Digital Discourse: Cross-National Analysis of Negativity in Facebook News Comments • Edda Humprecht; Lea Hellmueller • Negativity in news comments arguably leads to a polarization of public debates. We examine how commercialization, but also market-orientation and political leaning of media organizations explain negativity. The study content-analyzed comments on Facebook of six news organizations (N = 1800) in the US and Germany. We find that negative sentiments are particulary prevalent in the polarized information environment of the US. Moreover, hyper-partisan outlets in both countries provoke significantly higher levels of negativity.

Does Newspaper Presence in Household Affect Subscribers’ and Non-Subscribers’ Perceptions of Their Buying Behavior? A Mixed-Method Study • Anastasia Kononova; Esther Thorson, Michigan State University; Jef Richards; Kristen Lynch, Michigan State University • With the ascendancy of digital advertising, there have been only a handful of studies of the newspaper free-standing inserts (FSIs), also known as preprint, as an advertising medium. Given the threatened health of America’s newspapers, the value of FSIs as the primary source of revenue is critical. This paper looks at the impact on newspaper presence in subscribers’ and non-subscribers’ households on their self-reported buying behavior. Individuals from two segments: 1) subscribers to a local daily newspaper (N = 60) and 2) non-subscribers (N = 58) participated in a field study, where the newspaper was delivered to their households for 14 days and was put on hold for another 14 days. Each day, participants reported if they used the newspaper and if they bought anything. Subscribers were found to be older, wealthier, more educated, more likely retired, longer-term community residents, and greater comparison shoppers than non-subscribers. They reported more instances of buying behavior than non-subscribers. Paradoxically, participants who received the newspaper during the study reported fewer instances of buying behavior. Newspaper delivery was associated with increased instances of shopping for health and beauty products. Focus groups were conducted to explain the findings, and the implications were discussed using consumer socialization approach.

Newspaper coverage of Colorado’s 2016 End of Life Options Act • Kimberly Lauffer, Ball State University, Department of Journalism; Sean Baker, Department of Journalism, Central Michigan University; Natalee Seely, Ball State University • Since 2014, several states have introduced and passed legislation permitting aid in dying. In Colorado, Proposition 106, the End of Life Options Act, passed Nov. 8, 2016, with 65 percent of Coloradans approving the law. How newspapers cover contentious issues is important because these representations influence public opinion. This study found a relationship between item type and overall stance, as well as a difference in the content produced by journalists and laypersons or columnists.

Approach or Avoid? Emotional Sentiments and Reactions in News of Sexual Assault • Yu-Hao Lee, University of Florida; Mo Chen, University of Florida • We conducted a sentiment analysis on the news headlines and the social media descriptions of 2340 news articles on sexual assault accusations and #MeToo from October 2017 to February 2018. Based on the emotions-as-frames perspective and theories of political ideologies. We examined whether news organizations with more conservative users used more words that signaled anger, anxiety, and sex. Furthermore, we examined to what extent do the news sentiments of anger, anxiety, and sexual-framed messages predict social media engagement behaviors (like, share, comments) among mostly conservative or liberal users. The results showed that news organizations with more conservative users used more emotional sentiments in their headlines and descriptions. Moreover, anxiety sentiments were associated with less engagement while sexual sentiments were associated with more engagement among most-conservative users.

Drowning out the message: How online comments on news stories about Nike’s ad campaign contributed to polarization and gatekeeping • Jinhee Lee; Zulfia Zaher; Ed Simpson; Elina Erzikova • This study examined audience commentary on Fox News, CNN, and MSNBC’s YouTube and Facebook platforms associated with news stories on Nike’s selection of controversial former NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick as spokesman for its 2018 campaign. The study, using the theory of gatekeeping as a starting point, sought evidence for a drowning effect, in which the audience strayed from the primary message of the journalism presented to it. A significant drowning effect was found, across platforms and outlets.

Understanding the Typology of Native Advertising on News Websites • You LI, Eastern Michigan U; Ye Wang • This study explored how 57 U.S. news websites integrated native advertising through placement locations and yet differentiated it from editorial content through disclosure languages and designs. The websites placed native ads in more than two locations on average. While 79% of websites met FTC’s disclosure guideline, only a quarter used maximum disclosure tactics. The publishers with more cultural capital (i.e., the number of Pulitzer awards) differentiated native advertising from editorial content to a greater extent.

News Media Credibility Ratings and Perceptions of Fake News Exposure among Internet Users in Five Countries • Justin Martin, Northwestern University in Qatar; Fouad Hassan, Northwestern University • This study examined media credibility ratings and perceptions of fake news exposure online among internet users in five Arab countries: Lebanon, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, and UAE (N=4,616). Perceptions of fake news exposure were not consistently associated with either ratings of news media credibility or news consumption; rather, respondents who said governments and the public should stop the spread of fake news online were reported coming across fake news online more often.

The Story Behind the Story: How Transparency About the Journalistic Process  Boosts Perceptions of News Outlet Credibility • Gina Masullo Chen, University of Texas at Austin; Alex Curry, The University of Texas at Austin; Kelsey Whipple, The University of Texas at Austin • This two-study package (Study 1: N = 753; Study 2: N = 599) sought to understand whether adding a transparency box that explains how journalists did a news story could improve perceptions of the credibility of a news outlet. Our findings from Study 2 demonstrated this box was effective in boosting perceptions of news outlet credibility when used with real news sites among the audience members for those sites.

Responding to Online Disagreement Comments: It’s Not What You Say, But How You Say It • Gina Masullo Chen, University of Texas at Austin; Marc Ziegele, Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf; Martin Johannes Riedl, The University of Texas at Austin & Alexander von Humboldt Institute for Internet and Society; Pablo Jost, Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz; Teresa Naab, University of Augsburg • An experiment (N = 1,231) in Germany found that moderators responding to disagreement comments on a news site’s Facebook page should use high-person-centered (HPC) messages, which acknowledge people’s emotions, rather than low-person-centered (LPC) messages, which dismiss feelings. HPC messages improved attitudes toward the news site and loyalty to the site’s online community, regardless of whether the disagreement comments were civil, uncivil, or impolite. Improved attitudes toward the news site were heightened if journalists were moderating.

Mediating Transnational Movement: Indian News Media and the #MeToo Movement • Suman Mishra • This study explores the media coverage of the #MeToo movement in India. Using thematic analysis of news articles from six prominent Indian newspapers (The Hindustan Times, The Times of India, The Indian Express, The Telegraph, The Pioneer, and The Economic Times), the study reveals the unique way in which this transnational movement was discussed in the Indian context. Patriarchal conditioning, fear of retaliation and reputational harm, and lack of recourse through slow and unresponsive judiciary, were some prominent cultural themes in the coverage. In addition, there was a focus on the entertainment industry and its celebrities. This focus limits “Me Too” movement’s potential and resonance with the larger Indian public who are likely to see it as an elite Hollywood-Bollywood phenomenon. Further discussion is provided.

Guilt by association: How chum box advertising affects news readers’ perceptions • Logan Molyneux; Bartosz Wojdynski, University of Georgia • As content referral widgets and other forms of native advertising continue to be lucrative means of subsidizing journalism, critics and industry observers have derided these “chum boxes” as damaging to the user experience and the journalism they’re adjacent to. This study theorizes mechanisms behind this proposition and tests it in two controlled experiments. Results suggest that chum box ads damage message and source credibility in circumstances where readers are motivated and attentive.

Journalism Practice in a Digital Age: Utilization of Social Media in Online News • Mirjana Pantic, Pace University; Ivana Cvetkovic, University of New Mexico • This study employed the gatekeeping perspective to examine what practices 10 prominent U.S.-based news websites embrace when deriving content and sources from social media. A thorough content analysis of 180 online news shows that journalists primarily rely on institutional, official sources when utilizing social media in the news production process. Furthermore, journalists are most likely to employ written information from Twitter in online news and publish such information in entertainment and politics sections.

“Why the h**l is there a White House Correspondents’ Dinner?” Field Theory in Political Journalism • Gregory Perreault; Kellie Stanfield, Missouri School of Journalism; Shelby Luttman • This study aimed to analyze the shifting role conceptions of journalists in the field, primarily in reference to the White House Correspondents’ Dinner. Researchers conducted 32 phone interviews with political journalists from news outlets ranging from the Los Angeles Times to VICE. This study argues that the present format of the dinner presents a challenge to the journalistic field, one that political journalists have difficulty managing within their journalistic role.

Media Literacy to Rebuild Trust in Journalism: A Typology for a Changing News Audience • Sue Robinson, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Kelly Nelson, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Carlos Davalos, University of Wisconsin-Madison • Trust in all institutions has plummeted across the board, internationally – especially trust in the political institution that is the press. One popular solution to rebuilding trust calls on increased forms of media literacy. Using a series of 15 case studies involving initiatives around the globe to rebuild citizen trust in news media, this research explores the links between media literacy and relationships with information in a digital, populist age through both textual analysis of these projects’ materials as well as in-depth interviews with their founders and directors. It puts forth a more complex definition of media literacy, typologizes kinds of literacy (settling on civic consumption, amateur (co-)production (sharing), professional information production (newsrooms), and algorithms/technology), and reimagines who is responsible to become literate and to teach literacy. We find that the notion of “literacy” has application for not only schools, universities and adult citizens, but also for journalists and platforms themselves.

Border Patrol: The Rise and Role of Fact-Checkers and Their Challenge to Journalists’ Normative Boundaries • Jane B. Singer, City, University of London • Although most research to date has focused on leading U.S. fact-checkers, similar initiatives are springing up all over the world. This study draws on a globally disseminated questionnaire, plus interviews with fact-checkers on four continents, to examine how they describe their fundamental norms, understand their social role, and engage their audiences. A conceptual framework of journalistic boundary-setting helps guide exploration of the ways that fact-checkers see themselves in relation to legacy journalists.

Diffusion of Video Advertising on Community Newspaper Websites? • Burton Speakman, Kennesaw State University; Michael Clay Carey, Samford University • This study reviews diffusion of innovation at community media websites regarding the use of video and video advertising. Results suggest that video reached a point where a sizable number of community media outlets publish them online. Yet, video advertising lags behind in use. Furthermore, it appears that elements such as circulation and size of a media corporation have little influence in the development and use of video and video advertising on community media websites.

When do people share fake news online? The effect of social network size and homophily • Ruoyu Sun, University of Miami; Cong Li, University of Miami; Barbara Millet; Khudejah Ali; John Petit • “This study examined the impact of social network size and homophily on people’s intention to share news, especially fake news, on Facebook. Based on an experiment, it was found that perceived homophily with Facebook contacts was positively associated with news sharing intention. A significant three-way interaction effect between network size, homophily, and news type on news sharing intention was also discovered, and this effect was mediated by motivation to socialize with online contacts.

Enacted Journalism Takes the Stage: How Audiences  Respond to Reporting-Based Theater • Ori Tenenboim, The University of Texas at Austin; Natalie (Talia) Jomini Stroud, The University of Texas at Austin • From offering comment sections to hosting town hall meetings, news organizations have experimented with different ways of engaging audiences. This paper focuses on reporting-based live-theater performances followed by conversation. Drawing on surveys of audiences attending performances of three different plays (n=279) and in-depth interviews with 13 people involved in the plays, this paper shows that what we term “enacted journalism” can increase knowledge, boost efficacy, and influence what people think about the media’s role.

A New Kind of Journalistic Paradigm Repair: How U.S. News Outlets Rejected the Label “Enemy of the People” • Leslie-Jean Thornton, Arizona State University; Susan Keith, Rutgers University; Sue Robinson, University of Wisconsin-Madison • “In August 2018, more than 600 news organizations answered the Boston Globe’s call for a united editorial stand against more than two years of unprecedented attacks by the U.S. President. Qualitative analysis revealed movement beyond paradigm repair into paradigm justification through oppositional identity markers, affinity reminders, and validity claims. This represents a more substantial defense of the foundational idea that a press is necessary for a vibrant democracy.

Here’s what to know about clickbait: Effects of image, headline and editing on audience attitudes • Fred Vultee, Wayne State University; Scott Burgess; Darryl Frazier, Wayne State University; Kelsey Husnick, Wayne State University • “This quantitative study examines responses to three features of news practice: headline style, selection of illustrations and level of processing applied to the text. The strongest influence on perceptions of quality or credibility come from editing, and the presence of editing also influences whether traditional or clickbait headlines are associated with better memory for story details. News use, Internet use, news source and field of study also influence outcomes.

Whistleblowing, leaking, or both? A text-mining analysis of definitional discrepancies in major metro newspapers • Stephenson Waters • Using a framing-centered text-mining analysis, the purpose of this study was to examine the content of 2,100 news stories from major metro daily newspapers to uncover if and how the connotations surrounding whistleblowing and leaking acts may vary depending on a journalist’s word choice. Considering the risks whistleblowers take when disclosing information to the news media, the question of how they are defined by journalists is consequential. Crucial to the success of a whistleblower’s intention of actionable change or remedy of misdeeds is the public dissemination of their claims and evidence, so media coverage matters. Initial results found journalists overall tend to frame whistleblowers and leakers in objective language in the majority of their coverage of these subjects. More subjective terminology was infrequent, considering the vast number of stories in the overall data set; however, the occurrences of subjective language is still instructive, as it showed preliminary results that leakers and leaking are framed negatively and with more skepticism than whistleblowers and whistleblowing. Limitations and directions for future research are discussed.

Report for America, report about communities: local news capacity and community trust • Andrea Wenzel, Temple University; Sam Ford, Tow Center for Digital Journalism; Efrat Nechushtai, Columbia University • This study looks at Report for America’s efforts to strengthen the capacity of local news and increase trust from the perspective of a neighborhood on Chicago’s West Side, and a rural county in Eastern Kentucky. Using a communication infrastructure theory framework, it follows 28 residents through project-start and end focus groups. This is complemented by 15 interviews with journalists and RFA staff, and content analysis of local stories from the Chicago Sun-Times and Lexington Herald-Leader.

Look Around and Learn: Effects of 360-Degree Video in Online News • Bartosz Wojdynski, University of Georgia; Ivanka Pjesivac, The University of Georgia; Jihoon Kim; Matt Binford, University of Georgia; Keith Herndon, University of Georgia • In a between-subjects eye-tracking experiment, adult readers of a large metropolitan daily newspaper (N=48) viewed and evaluated one of two versions of the same online news feature: one with an embedded 360-degree video alongside text and images, and the other using exclusively text and static images. Findings show that the presence of 360-degree video increased attitudes toward the article, article credibility, and visual attention to article content, but did not significantly affect recall of the story

Keepers of the comments: How comment moderators handle audience contributions • David Wolfgang, Colorado State University; Hayley Blackburn, Colorado State University; Stephen McConnell, Colorado State University • “As news commenting has evolved as a participatory tool and journalists have developed traditional practices for moderation, there are increasing questions about how to promote quality spaces for news discourse. Using gatekeeping theory, this study analyzes in-depth interviews with 13 news comment moderators to understand how these individuals establish moderation routines and define their professional role. This provides new insight into the journalist-audience relationship and the development of new media practices for online news production.

Commenters as a threat to journalism? How comment moderators perceive the role of the audience • David Wolfgang, Colorado State University; Stephen McConnell, Colorado State University; Hayley Blackburn, Colorado State University • “Journalists and commenters have struggled to negotiate the appropriate use of news forums. But research about perceptions of commenters has typically focused on journalists and not the comment moderators who specifically manage content. This study uses in-depth interviews with 13 U.S. news comment moderators to understand through a field theory analysis how moderators perceive commenters as possible threats to the profession and, potentially, help to develop quality commenting into a form of journalistic cultural capital.

Student Papers

Democracy’s gatekeepers? How editorial boards constructed moral equivalence between 2016 presidential candidates • Kirsten Adams, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill • Through a mixed-method analysis of 75 major U.S. newspapers’ 2016 editorial endorsements, this study asks how editorial boards evaluated the two most controversial and unpopular major-party presidential candidates in U.S. history and the threats they posed to democratic norms and institutions. I find that while attempting to fill the seemingly vacated role of “democracy’s gatekeepers,” news organizations simultaneously undermined these efforts by actively constructing moral equivalence between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump.

Darker cloud or silver lining? News framing of the opioid crisis and organ donation • Alexis Bajalia, University of Florida; Amanda Bradshaw • America’s opioid crisis is doing more than taking lives. It is contributing to a substantial increase in organ donation, which some conclude is saving lives. A qualitative framing analysis of 59 U.S. news articles explored how journalists frame the relationship between the opioid crisis and organ donation. Four major themes emerged: silver lining and hope out of tragedy; shortcut to saving lives, times, and organs; medical acceptance, innovation, and evolution; and rewriting the narrative and changing the stigma. Because news articles tended to frame the relationship between the opioid crisis and organ donation as having a positive effect on society, this study provided practical and theoretical implications about how such framing may impact consumers’ knowledge, attitudes, and/or beliefs about the opioid crisis and/or organ donation.

Similarities and Differences in Western Media Portrayals of the Greek Economic Crisis • Tryfon Boukouvidis, Louisiana State University • This study examines newspaper coverage of the Greek economic crisis in the summer of 2015 through a qualitative content analysis on the attribution of responsibility to the actors involved. Prior literature indicates that American newspapers present economic crises from an elite perspective, possibly distorting public opinion to reflect elite views. Newspapers have become more rigorous in interpreting the underlying mechanisms of a crisis instead of superficially covering episodic events, but most analysis comes from editorials.

Biased Optimism: Online Fake News and Their Influence on Third-Person Perception and Corrective Action • Hyungjin Gill; Moonhoon Choi • This study examines the potential presence of 3PE in fake news and investigates at what third-person perception (“3PP”) may do to people’s willingness to engage in different forms of corrective action. Additionally, based on the root-idea embedded in 3PE (i.e., anticipation of media influence on self vs. others), the study delves into whether such perceptual distinction exists in presumed corrective action intention as well. And finally, the research aims to identify various kinds of corrective actions that may exist in different forms of reactions in response to online mis/disinformation to further previous communication research findings on undesirable media and attitudes toward censorship. Results shows presence of third-person effect (presuming greater effect of potentially harmful media content on others than self) in fake news exposure. Respondents also saw others as having more willingness to engage in corrective behaviors to counter fake news than themselves, serving as potential explanation for the spread of mis/disinformation during elections. Implications of corrective action items and the association between third-person perception and corrective action intention are discussed.

Framing Immigration:  Criminal Frames of Latinx Immigrants and Social Distancing • Elizabeth Hurst, University of Oklahoma; Juliana L. Barbati • This experiment sought to examine how manipulation of high-order social identities can impact the perception of different news frames at four different levels (i.e., the communicator, the receiver, the text, and the culture. The results indicate that political party identification had the most significant impact on social distance towards Latinx immigrants and national identity salience. Implications for single-exposure framing experiments, the level of culture within framing research, and social identity research are discussed at length.

Interpretation, participation and negotiation in China’s online news: A study of The Paper • RAN JU • This article selects The Paper (Pengpai), a Chinese online news media which incorporates the functionality of the party press into market-oriented journalism, to examine how online news embraces an interpretive journalism paradigm to collaborate with the party-state, to encourage the community involved in, and to find a place in the Chinese digital market. In addition to in-depth interviews with reporters and editors in The Paper, this study analyzes 2239 news articles posted on The Paper website and the comments underneath these articles over the period from 2015 to 2016. It is argued that the connection and disconnection between the journalistic role conception and performance are shaped by the negotiation between multiple groups and institutions that are constituted by interpretive communities. Journalistic interpretation in the online platform, on the one side, enlarges the boundaries of journalists’ collective authority, and on the other side, equips engaged readers with discursive resources in public debates.

Tweets, Statements, and Quotes: News Source Selection, Gatekeeping, and Bias coverage of Indian #Metoo movement • Shreenita Ghosh, University of Wisconsin Madison; Kruthika Kamath, University of Wisconsin–Madison • This study explores the source categorization, source prominence, gender representation, journalist gender, and the coverage of #metoo movements in India. A content analysis of nine major English-language daily newspapers coverage of the movement shows that the digital age has only made a marginal dent in norms of inclusion and credibility of ordinary and minority citizens as sources. Further, medium selection and journalistic gatekeeping are considerably different in the two phases of the Indian #metoo movement.

Battle of the Frames: Perspective Collision and Hyper-Mediation at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington D.C. • Chelsea Bonser; DI LAN; Stephen McConnell, Colorado State University • A collision of perspectives at the Lincoln Memorial revealed how one moment in today’s digital news environment can rapidly produce news frames that define and redefine “reality” along ideological lines. Through a content analysis of media outlets that vary on the political spectrum, the authors found significant associations regarding how each outlet distinctly portrayed and framed the main actors of the event, as well as how new frames rapidly formed as new information became known.

Addressing News Media Image in an Age of Skepticism • Soo Young Shin, MSU • This study explored news media image as perceived by the public by employing a concept used in marketing literature—image. Journalism stakeholders and scholars suggest the public’s perceptions of news media is not favorable, which consequently decreases readerships and makes the public lean towards alternative news (i.e., fake news). Considering this growing negative sentiment toward news media, it is crucial to understand the public’s perceptions of news media to address the public’s negative perception(s) and hopefully change them. Particularly, the news media industry has not yet possessed broad concepts, not to mention measures, to capture the public’s overall perceptions in terms of news organizations. The perceptions of 44 participants (over the course of nine sessions) living in the Midwestern U.S. were investigated using focus group methods. The results revealed eight dimensions of news media image: news quality, news usefulness, social responsibility, personality, usability, transparency, perspective-taking, and news selection bias. Participants believed that news media organizations are mostly biased in their selection of news stories, as news organizations are under pressure to make profit. Despite holding this view, certain ideals of news media, such as the potential role of the media as community watch-dogs and “protectors” of democracy, are highly valued. Participants particularly valued transparency, rather than objectivity, of news organizations and indicated that news is generally useful in acquiring information directly relevant to their lives.

The Emergence of Social Justice Journalism • Allison Steinke, University of Minnesota-Twin Cities • Social justice journalism is an emerging style of newswork in for-profit and nonprofit newsrooms in the United States. This qualitative study provides in-depth analysis of interviews with journalists who cover social justice topics at mainstream legacy media and nonprofit newsrooms across the U.S. Some reporters have formal social justice beats while others are general assignment reporters, investigative reporters or columnists who occasionally cover social justice topics or beats including criminal justice, government corruption, marginalized populations, immigration, and homelessness. Through the conceptual lens of the sociology of newswork and imagined audiences, this study explores social justice journalists’ beats, identities, and constructions of their audiences. This study argues that journalists who cover social justice often identify as advocates within the public sphere while others oppose advocacy in their work and prefer to pursue traditional journalistic values of fairness, accuracy and objectivity.

< 2019 Abstracts

International Communication 2019 Abstracts

Robert L. Stevenson Open Paper Competition

“Newsmaker-in-Chief”? Presidents’ Foreign Policy Priorities and International News Coverage from LBJ to Obama • Kirsten Adams, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; Daniel Riffe, UNC-Chapel Hill; Meghan Sobel, Regis University; Seoyeon Kim, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill • Through a mixed-method analysis of country mentions across 50 years of U.S. presidents’ speech transcripts (N = 284) and New York Times’ international news coverage (N = 20,765) across nine presidencies, we find the phenomenon of an “echoing press” following the “presidential gaze” toward foreign-policy priorities steadily declining over time and within administrations. This study examines the complex roles of the “newsmaker-in-chief” and the press who cover – and sometimes “echo” – his administration’s foreign affairs agenda.

Investigating Empathic Concern, Reporting Efficacy & Journalistic Roles as Determinants of Adherence to Peace Journalism • Oluseyi Adegbola; Weiwu Zhang, Texas Tech University • This study examines the influence of empathic concern, perceived journalistic roles, and reporting efficacy on journalists’ adherence to peace journalism. Quantitative surveys (N=324) and semi-structured interviews (N=10) of Nigerian journalists were conducted. Results suggest that Nigerian journalists adhere to peace journalism more than to war journalism and that empathic concern, perceived reporting efficacy, and subscription to the interventionist role are strong predictors of adherence to peace journalism.

Reporting Bias in Coverage of Iran Protests: An Analysis of Coverage by Global News Agencies • Oluseyi Adegbola; Janice Cho; Sherice Gearhart, Texas Tech University • This study examines reporting of intense Iranian protests by global news agencies located in the United States (Associated Press), United Kingdom (Reuters), France (Agence France-Presse), China (Xinhua), and Russia (Telegraph Agency of the Soviet Union). A census of reporting (N = 369) was content analyzed. Results show reporting remains influenced by political systems. News agencies also vary in their assessment of causal agents, moral evaluations, and treatment recommendations. Implications for reporting foreign conflict is discussed.

Intimate Partner Violence: What do Nollywood Movies Teach Us? • Ajeori agbese • Scholars have long criticized mass media for largely ignoring, negatively stereotyping and downplaying the seriousness of intimate partner violence (IPV). However, considering few studies have examined this issue in movies, this paper examined Nollywood movies to determine the messages audience get about IPV in Nigeria. The paper also wanted to find out if the movies challenged societal stereotypes about IPV and gender roles in intimate relationships. The contents of nine IPV-themed movies were interpretively analyzed, using social learning and cultivation theories as guides. The analysis showed that while Nollywood movies depicted the severity of the issue, the portrayals mostly mirrored the stereotypes and beliefs people already have about IPV and gender roles in intimate relationships. The movies largely blamed victims and other outside forces for abuse in intimate relationships. In addition, the portrayals barely challenged the perception and problem of IPV in Nigeria and did not provide realistic solutions.

The role of media for young Syrian Refugees at a time of uncertainty and changing living conditions • Miriam Berg • A considerable number of refuges that came to Germany in 2015 and 2016 were unaccompanied minors. This study examines the Syrian minor refugees among them, who now, as young adults, are using media as a whole in their everyday life and how their usage has changed since their arrival in Germany. There is a particular focus on correlations with the changing living conditions of the minors from mass emergency shelters to refugee accommodation and youth flats. The study also explores how media was used in their home country and during their flight to Germany. The research was carried out in the form of 30 semi-structured interviews with refugees between the ages of 18-21 who arrived in Hamburg, Germany in 2015 as unaccompanied minors. Findings of this study have shown that digital media and internet connectivity is seen as a necessity in contemporary living for young refugees and is considered as important as food and shelter to survive. However, despite internet access being seen as the most efficient way to stay informed and connected with families, friendships developed offline were found to be more important and helpful in terms of adjusting to a new environment, coping with loneliness and the feeling of being unwanted in their host country.

Journalists, Newsmakers and Social Media in East Africa • Steve Collins; Kelly Merrill; Chad Collins; Kioko Ireri; Raul Gamboa, University of Central Florida • This study involved an analysis of 1,784 Twitter accounts representing journalists, news organizations and newsmakers in East Africa. An analysis of social media influence metrics suggests that although news organizations are on even ground with the people and organizations they cover, individual journalists are not. The data suggest a digital divide, with Kenya and Uganda ahead of Rwanda and Tanzania. By one measure, female journalists have more social media influence than men.

Framing Syrian refugees: US Local News and the Politics of Immigration • Aziz Douai, Ontario Tech University; Mehmet Bastug • The article investigates news coverage and media framing of the Syrian refugee debate as a public opinion issue in US local news in 2015. Political response to the Syrian refugee crisis was divided, but public attitudes shifted after the terrorist attacks on Paris in November 2015 with calls for more restrictive immigration policies and smaller refugee quotas. In the US, GOP leaders demanded “extreme vetting” and “screening” of refugees and many opposed resettling them. The study analyzes local news coverage variation across the states that welcomed, not welcomed or did not commit to accepting Syrian refugees at the height of the Syrian refugee crisis in 2015 and 2016. The findings of the study demonstrate that the editorial framing of the Syrian refugee crisis downplayed the global responsibility and international commitment of the US, highlighted the administrative costs, and framed them security threats. The implications of these frames are discussed.

India’s Mediated Public Diplomacy on Social Media: Building Agendas in South Asia • Nisha Garud Patkar • One tool in India’s mediated public diplomacy is the increasing use of social media platforms to build agendas among foreign audiences. In 2017, the Indian government ranked seventh in the world in its use of social media for diplomacy and had more than 1.2 million users following its diplomatic accounts on several social media platforms. Despite this high ranking and a sizable following on social media, little research has been done to understand India’s mediated public diplomacy through Twitter and Facebook. To address this literature gap, this study examined: (i) the agendas the Indian government builds on its social media accounts and (ii) the rank order of these agendas with the perceived agendas of the followers of these accounts. A quantitative content analysis of 6,000 tweets and status updates published on the 15 Indian diplomatic accounts along with a survey of 500 followers of these accounts were conducted. Results showed that politics, culture, economy/finance, and infrastructure were the top-ranked agendas of the Indian government on social media. These agendas rank ordered with a few top-ranked agendas for followers which were education, health and medicine, environment, economy/finance, and infrastructure.

Gatekeeping and the Panama Papers: an analysis of transnational journalism culture • Nana Naskidashvili, University of Missouri; Beverly Horvit, University of Missouri; Astrid Benoelken; Diana Fidarova • ICIJ’s Panama Papers transnational journalism project was analyzed on three levels suggested by Hellmueller (2017): the evaluative, the cognitive and the performative. The gatekeepers interviewed demonstrated a common understanding (evaluative) of what it means to be an investigative journalist. Regardless of a journalist’s location, prominent people were deemed newsworthy (cognitive), and the journalists created rules for searching and double-checking their data. At the performative level, the gatekeepers agreed when the stories would emerge.

Cognitive and Behavioral Factors of Online Discussion as Antecedents of Deliberation and Tolerance: Evidence from South Korea, United Kingdom and United States • Irkwon Jeong; Hyoungkoo Khang • The current study examined cognitive and behavioral factors of online discussion as antecedents of attitudes toward opposing views and two aspects of social norms, perceived importance of public deliberation and social tolerance. Employing surveys in South Korea, United Kingdom and United States, this study found that adjustment motive and discussion heterogeneity are positively associated with perceived importance of public deliberation and social tolerance in all three countries.

Framing Newsworthiness on Twitter: Analysis of Frames, News Values, and Tweet Popularity in Lebanese Media • Claudia Kozman, Lebanese American University • This content analysis of Lebanese newspapers and television stations’ accounts on Twitter revealed the media frame their tweets in terms of conflict and responsibility, while relying mostly on the news values of prominence and entertainment/human interest. Compared to newspapers, television stations were more likely to use impact instead of conflict as a news value. Judging tweet popularity, analysis revealed conflict and impact stories are the most attractive in terms of favorites, retweets, and comments.

Mainstream media, social media, and attitudes toward immigrants: A comparative study of Japan & South Korea • Heysung Lee, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Gaofei Li ; Yibing Sun; Hernando Rojas • The paper examines media effects on attitudes toward immigrants in Japan and South Korea, through an online survey with 500 respondents from each country. Analyses show mainstream media associates to positive attitudes in both countries. However, regarding social media, Kakaotalk use in South Korea elicits negative attitudes, while Line use in Japan is not related to attitudes. The interaction effects indicate that Kakaotalk dampens the positive effects of mainstream media, whereas Line amplifies them.

Will internal political efficacy predict news engagement equally across countries? A multilevel analysis of the relationship between internal political efficacy, media environment and news engagement • Shuning Lu, North Dakota State University; Rose Luwei Luqiu, Hong Kong Baptist University • This study serves as the first to document the current status of news engagement with regard to the three proposed dimensions (e.g., overall news engagement, user-user, and user-content news engagement) across 36 countries. We employ hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) to test the individual, aggregate, and cross-level effects on news engagement based on the multi- national cross-sectional survey data (N=72,930). This study demonstrates how internal political efficacy, the media environment, both political and technical, together shape news engagement. The findings reveal that internal political efficacy is positively associated with news engagement. Internet penetration could negatively predict the three indicators of news engagement. Press freedom moderates the effect of internal political efficacy on news engagement. The study contributes to the existing literature on the formation of news engagement regarding both individual and contextual mechanisms.

Africa in the News: Is News Coverage by Chinese Media Any Different? • Dani Madrid-Morales, University of Houston • In recent years, Chinese media have been challenging European and North American dominance of African news. While Chinese journalists claim they Africa coverage is quantitatively and qualitatively different, previous research has challenged this claim. Based on a content analysis of 1.1 million news from two Chinese and two non-Chinese media (2015-2015), this paper shows that Chinese reporting is more abundant, positive and diverse. However, for most countries, coverage is rare, episodic and monothematic.

Portrait of an Azerbaijani Journalist: Unpaid, Dissatisfied, but nevertheless Passionate and Committed • Rashad Mammadov • This study seeks to partially fill a gap in knowledge about the practice of journalism in Azerbaijan, a former Soviet republic. The study proposed here represents the first time Azerbaijan has been studied in a systematic fashion consistent with the literature of comparative journalism as represented by The Global Journalist (Weaver & Willnat, 2012) and Worlds of Journalism (Hanitzsch, 2011), studies well recognized as the standards against which all such efforts should be measured. One of the primary goals of the project is to explore the roles these journalists believe they play in the controlled, post-Soviet environment. Data, collected through an online survey of journalists indicate that several identifiable, perceived professional roles existed along the dimensions of Hanitzsch’s (2007) journalistic milieus. In addition, three other dimensions were identified that did not fit the model, but proved to be specific to the Azerbaijani media environment: Political Activist, Citizens’ Helper, and Entertainer.

Press Freedom in Ghana • Jason Martin, DePaul University • This paper analyzes original survey data (N=241) to investigate Ghanaian journalists’ attitudes toward libel law protections, Right to Information legislation, and professional ethics. Journalists in Ghana perceive themselves as straddling normative press freedom roles of watchdog and social responsibility while incorporating unique elements of their culture in their work. The results provide context for the successes and challenges of Ghana’s journalists and contribute to the more precise theoretical explanations of international press freedom protections.

Diagnosing Newsjunkies: Fielding and Validating a Measure of Intrinsic Need for Orientation in Three Arab Countries • Justin Martin, Northwestern University in Qatar • This study introduces an intrinsic need-for-orientation scale, and assesses reliability and validity of the measure in nationally representative samples from Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the UAE (N=3,239). Since the 1970s, need for orientation has been called an intrinsic motivation to consume news, but in operationalization, relevant research has not measured an inherent motivation, but rather the strength of political party identification and interest in an upcoming political event—usually an election—as the markers of a strong need for orientation. As this approach is inappropriate in many countries, which may not have political parties or campaigns, and also given there is likely a broader, intrinsic need for orientation (INFO) that motivates people to regularly seek news about current events, this study tested a parsimonious, four-item scale. The scale demonstrated robust internal reliability in both Arabic and English, and among nationals and non-nationals in the three countries. In line with the hypothesis that news use and certain media-related attitudes, such as support for freedom of expression, should be positive correlates of an intrinsic need for orientation, regression models of media-use variables and media-related attitudes explained considerable amounts of INFO variance in Saudi Arabia (52%) and the UAE (30%), and a more modest share in Qatar (15%).

Journalism during global disasters: Healing, coping and recovery • Michael McCluskey, U. Tennessee-Chattanooga; Lacey Keefer • Journalists often apply themes of healing, coping and recovery in news following significant traumas. Eight natural disasters on five continents were analyzed for the presence of nine themes of healing, coping and recovery in both international and local news outlets. Analysis (n = 528) found evidence that contextual factors like centralization of the disaster, type of disaster and number of casualties, along with structural factors like political freedom, had significant influences on the nine themes

Explaining the Gap Between Journalist’s Role Conception and Media Role Performance. A Cross-National Comparison • Claudia Mellado; Cornelia Mothes; Daniel Hallin; Maria Luisa Humanes; Adriana Amado; María Lauber; Jacques Mick; Henry Silke; Colin Sparks; Haiyan Wang; Olga Logunova; Dasniel Olivera • This cross-national study combines survey (N=643) and content analysis data (N = 19,908) from nine countries to investigate gaps between journalists’ ideals and their media organizations’ performance of the interventionist, watchdog, loyal, service, civic and infotainment roles. The findings show significant gaps for all roles across all countries, with the ‘civic’ and the ‘watchdog’ role showing the largest gaps. Multilevel analyses also reveal that organizational and individual-level influences explained the gaps better than country differences. Implications are discussed with regards to journalism as a profession in times of increasing media skepticism.

Public Diplomacy for the Media: A Survey of Exchange Program Alumni • Emily Metzgar, Indiana University; Yusuf Kalyango, Ohio University • This research surveys alumni (N=66) of the American government’s Study of the U.S. Institute for Scholars (SUSI) on Journalism and Media. The program brings scholars and media professionals to the United States to study and build professional networks. Framing discussion in the international communication literature, we assess SUSI’s potential as a public diplomacy effort with implications for both the study and practice of journalism and promotion of improved attitudes toward the United States.

Esto no es un problema político, es moral: Examining news narratives of the 2018 border policy • Lisa Paulin, NC Central University • This study analyzes the news narratives of a controversial U.S. immigration policy that included the separation of children from their families when attempting to enter the United States along the border with Mexico during the spring and summer of 2018, under the Donald Trump administration by analyzing the stories in Spanish-language media and English-language media by two news services: EFE, in Spanish and the Associated Press (AP), to see how these stories fit into cultural ideologies. The AP told a story of a political battle while EFE told a story of immoral policy and community solidarity.

Global media and human rights: Teaching the Holocaust across national fault-lines • stephen reese, university of texas; jad melki, Lebanese American University • Media literacy requires a ‘global outlook’ in dealing with issues across national and tribal affiliations. These challenges are explored here with a multi-national group of student, engaging with the Holocaust to better humanise global issues and understand how media are implicated in genocidal dynamics, using a survey of 165 previous participants in the programme over 11 years. We find that a historically-rooted but globally reflective approach is needed to understand genocide across national fault-lines.

Testing the Spiral of Silence Model: The Case of Government Criticism in India • Enakshi Roy, Western Kentucky University • This study extends the spiral of silence theory to India and examines self-censorship on Facebook and Twitter with regards to government criticism. Survey (N=141) results suggest while respondents with liberal attitudes were unwilling criticize the government on social media, respondents with pro-censorship attitudes, even if they deemed the opinion climate as hostile, were willing to support Prime Minister Narendra Modi on social media. Findings from this study expand understandings of online opinion expression and self-censorship in India.

Everybody Loves a Winner: Legitimation of Occupational Roles among Award-winning Financial Journalists in Africa • Danford Zirugo, City, University London of London/University of Minnesota Twin Cities; Jane B. Singer, City, University of London • Through an examination of award-winning stories and the discourse around them, this study explores how the interpretive community of African financial journalists defines and legitimates preferred occupational roles. Contrary to research immediately following the global financial crisis, which suggested that financial journalists primarily serve elites in their everyday coverage, this study concludes that stories deemed exemplary by the community are instead public service-oriented and fulfill a watchdog role.

Naming names or no? How Germany fits in an international comparison of crime coverage • Romayne Smith Fullerton, University of Western Ontario; Maggie Jones Patterson, Duquesne University • “Naming names and ethnicity or no? How Germany fits in an international comparison of crime coverage” offers the final installment of a nine-year study examining mainstream media’s crime coverage choices in ten democracies, and how journalists’ voluntary ethical choices reflect underlying cultural attitudes. Previously, the authors have argued protectionist policies that do not identify accused persons are common in Northern and Central Europe and are part of established cultural attitudes that construct everyone as community members, but new German data, collected in 2018, suggest journalistic choices to protect an accused’s identity, and all that practice implied, is no longer the reporting default.

The Aftermath of 2019 Pulwama Terror Attack • Nihar Sreepada, Texas Tech University; Ioana Coman, Texas Tech University; Simranjit Singh, Texas Tech University • The study analyses the coverage of the 2019 Pulwama terror attack by two major newspapers of India and Pakistan – The Times of India and Dawn. The online news stories and the dialogue within the comment sections are compared and examined through a qualitative content analysis. The findings are explored from a social psychological perspective along with the ramifications of the conflict on the international community.

Automated framing analysis of news coverage of the Rohingya crisis by the elite press from three countries • Hong Vu; Nyan Lynn • Triangulating several methods including automated framing analysis and critical assessment of texts, this study examines how the press from three countries frames the Rohingya refugee crisis in 2017. It finds that The Irrawaddy (Myanmar) tends to incorporate a nationalist narrative into news content. The New Nation (Bangladesh) frames the crisis according to the country’s priorities. The New York Times uses a Western hegemonic discourse. Findings are discussed using the lens of ideological and cultural influence.

Welcome to Canada: The challenge of information connections for resettled Syrian refugees • Melissa Wall, California State University – Northridge • Based on interviews with Syrian refugees resettled in Canada, as well as volunteers, NGO workers and government officials, this paper considers the ways the refugees interact with both formal (government, NGO) and informal (family, volunteers and shared heritage Canadians) in their communication practices. Refugees (“newcomers”) use a combination of digital tools such as social networks and interpersonal interactions to access information and work toward understanding and adapting to their new environment.

Distinguishing the Foreign from Domestic as Defensive Media Diplomacy: Media Accessibility to Credibility Perception and Media Dependency • Yicheng Zhu, Beijing Normal University • Given the fact that some foreign media (e.g. Twitter, The New York Times) have limited accessibility in China. This study conceptually distinguishes foreign media and domestic media, and examines the relationship between perceived media accessibility, media credibility and media dependency for both foreign and domestic media. It found that foreign media accessibility perception is an antecedent of foreign media credibility and foreign media dependency. In terms of foreign v.s. domestic media credibility competition, the final model showed that foreign media credibility positively relates with domestic media credibility. In sum, the model illustrated the role of accessibility perception in the media dependency formation process, the results imply that controlling foreign media accessibility may be an effective method to limit foreign media influence domestically.

James W. Markham Student Paper Competition

A devil’s dissection: Thematic analysis of the discussion of the Mexican documentary The Devil’s Freedom on Twitter • Gabriel Dominguez Partida • Mexican documentary films have tried to raise awareness among citizens against violence – for instance, The Devil’s Freedom, a story of violence’s testimonials of victims and victimizers. Three months of tweets related to the film’s discussion were analyzed to identify how people react to the message. The analysis suggests a group of citizens concern and sending signals to others about a social change; however, they urge the government to take actions instead of themselves.

Trollfare: Russia’s disinformation campaign during military conflict in Ukraine • Larisa Doroshenko, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Josephine Lukito, UW Madison • This study explores the strategies of information warfare of the Russian Internet Research Agency (IRA) against Ukraine during the military conflict in Donbass. Using a 10% Twitter gardenhose archive, we investigated the type of information spread by the IRA accounts and analyzed how they increased followers. Our study shows that the IRA created news websites and spread links to these pages on social media, accumulating followers by including these links and @mentioning other IRA accounts.

Health information sharing for a social exchange on WeChat in China • Lu Fan • WeChat has become an important platform of high sociability and social exchange in China. This study conducted a survey (N = 329) in China to understand people’s health information sharing behavior with the purpose of social exchange. The results reveal that people are motivated by the goal of sharing useful information, showing care and maintaining the social relationship when they share health information on WeChat, and older people are more likely to do so.

For whom do we do this work and in whose voice? Examining the role of International Communication in Africa • Greg Gondwe, University of Colorado-Boulder; Rachel van-der-Merwe, University of Colorado-Boulder • This study offers an overview of the state of the field of international communication in Africa. It argues that despite the boom in international communication scholarship, a schism still exists between theory emphasizing the perpetuated colonial tendencies and those that seek to situate African scholarship at an interactive position with other continents. The study operates under some founded hypotheses that International Communication studies in Africa are peppered with tales of marginalization, poverty, wars, and tribal conflicts. Literature asserts that such labels have impeded the quest for African scholars to realize the true definition of the field, therefore, reproducing a systemic litany of what the other world expects of them. While some scholars call for a broader and mutual interaction of the global communications systems, others hanker on ostensible arguments that perpetuate the propagandist approaches, which emerged as a result of the cold war. The two approaches underscore the western values versus the ‘African’ communication and postcolonial debates that have characterized much of the postcolonial discourses.

Social media network heterogeneity and the moderating roles of social media political discussions and social trust: Analyzing attitude and tolerance towards Chinese immigrant women in Hong Kong • Macau K. F. Mak, The Chinese University of Hong Kong; Lynette Jingyi Zhang, The Chinese University of Hong Kong • The social and political antagonism between China and Hong Kong has led to the stigmatization of mainland Chinese in Hong Kong. In particular, the Chinese immigrant women, a minority group faced with social and economic plight, have been viewed as locusts who exploit social resources in Hong Kong without any contributions. This study examines how social media network heterogeneity influences the social tolerance and political tolerance of local citizens in Hong Kong towards the Chinese immigrant women through general attitude towards these women. It also addresses the moderating role of social media political discussions and social trust in the influencing process. The analysis of survey data (N = 728) illustrates the moderated mediation process in which a more heterogeneous network on social media is indirectly related to higher levels of both social and political tolerance towards Chinese immigrant women through a more positive attitude towards these women. This indirect effect is enhanced by more political discussions and greater social trust. Implications of the results are discussed.

Reporting (ethno)political conflict in former colonies: An exploration of British and French press coverage of the Cameroon Anglophone crisis • Pechulano Ngwe Ali, The Pennsylvania State University • This study explores how the press in Africa’s former colonial masters frame (ethno)political crisis in their former colonies. Using a qualitative textual analysis approach, the study investigates how British (the BBC) and French (Radio France Internationale; rfi) framed the ongoing Cameroon Anglophone crisis, using news stories published from October 1, 2016 to April 2018. The case of Cameroon is unique because what has been politicized is a nexus between ethnicity and linguistic identity where a minority ethnopolitical group that is seeking greater rights. Findings point evidence that suggest that the British press validates and legitimizes the ‘actions’ and ‘requests’ of Anglophone Cameroonians (the return of federalism or complete separation of the duo), while the French press outlet suggest alignment with the ideas of the Cameroon government (one and indivisible nation), casting doubt on marginalization claims of Anglophone Cameroonians. Considering that the current Cameroon Anglophone is historically rooted in European (British and French) colonialism, it is important study from a postcolonial perspective, how the press in these countries that and created what is now a bilingual and ‘bicultural’ Cameroon, would report political crisis half a century after independence. Findings have implications on the development a fresh perspective of postcolonial media theory.

East Asian man ideal types in contemporary Chinese society: fluidity and multiple parameters of masculinity • Janice Wong • Asian masculinity is always an important, but under study area. There are concrete ideas of masculinity in the Western society, but in the East Asian culture, masculinity is not well-defined. Moreover, the way man tackles the fluidity and multiple parameters of masculinity is always changing in modern East Asia. Male surely have some ideal types of male images in their mind that they will try to manage their appearance included face and body, impression and images to achieve an ideal type. This study tries to generalize those male ideal types in East Asia culture through the wen-wu dichotomy. This exploratory study found that there are about eight ideal types of masculinities in East Asia. These ideal types are models or categories that for man to achieve. During the process of achieving an ideal type, male disclosed their reasons: social “other’s” expectations, institution’s expectations and also constructed by the consumer market, and the strategies they used to modify and improve their face and body. For men, they will depend on the inherent they owned, which can influence their self-perception, then select an ideal type that they can associate with or the standard they can reach and go toward that type. Men will control and modify their appearance, both face and body, manage their impression (or their front stage) toward the ideal beauty image standard or improve their impression (through symbolic capital) to satisfy the criteria of an ideal type.

The Moderating Role of Media Freedom on the Relationship Between Internal Conflict and Diversionary External Conflict Initiation: 1948-2010 • Kai Xu, Wayne State University • Conflict-as-functional theorists argue that since a critical function of initiating international conflicts for a country is to divert public attention away from its domestic problems, there must be a significant relationship between a country’s internal conflict and the likelihood of creating external conflict. This study aims to further examine this relationship by introducing a new moderator – the effect of a country’s domestic conflict on external conflict initiation is moderated by its media freedom level.

< 2019 Abstracts

Communication Theory and Methodology 2019 Abstracts

Open Call Competition
Social Networking for Interpersonal Life: Facebook Use and the Forms of Competence • Brandon Bouchillon • This study considered associations between Facebook use, computer-mediated communication competence, and interpersonal competence over time. Results indicate CMC competence contributed to interpersonal competence, and interpersonal competence related to CMC competence. Facebook use related to CMC competence as well, but not to interpersonal competence, at least not directly. Facebook use did contribute to interpersonal competence indirectly, through increasing CMC competence over time. Social networking can facilitate real-world interactional capability by first adding to its online counterpart.

Beyond the What to the Who: Advancing Archetype Theory to Improve Branded Communication • Katie Wiliams; Karissa Skerda; Jared Brickman, Carnegie Dartlet • Archetypal theories have been long studied to better define human personality. Concurrently, brands looking to separate from their peers have attempted communication strategies that take advantage of emotional storytelling through the voice of a personified protagonist. However, bringing consensus around this vision is difficult in organizations with varied stakeholders. This paper extends archetypal theory in communication specific to organizations while also proposing a method for consensus-driven research to uncover the “who” of higher education institutions.

Mediation analysis in communication science: Examining the study of indirect effects in communication journals between 1996-2017 • Michael Chan; Panfeng Hu; Macau K. F. Mak, The Chinese University of Hong Kong • Mediation analysis is one of the most popular techniques in communication research. However, a systematic synthesis of the trends, tools and statistical methods used to conduct mediation analysis in the field is lacking. This content analysis examined 595 journal articles published in 14 communication journals from 1996 to 2017. Results showed an exponential increase in the number of studies employing mediation analyses in the past two decades using both regression and SEM-based approaches. The proportion of studies using regression-based approaches in particular has grown rapidly in the second decade, due to the popularity of user-friendly macros that simplifies necessary procedures to test indirect effects. Bootstrapping has become the most popular method for testing indirect effects while uses of the Baron & Kenny and Sobel approaches have declined over time. Many studies though claim mediating mechanisms without formally testing the indirect effects, and others report the indirect effects, but not how they were tested. Findings and implications for practice are discussed.

Climate frame dynamics over time: Computer-assisted detection and identification of news frames • Yingying Chen, College of Communication Arts and Sciences, Michigan State University; Kjerstin Thorson; John Andrew Lavaccare • We analyze the evolution of news frames about climate change over the course of four years, between 2012-2015. We use a structural topic model combined with human coding to detect frames in news coverage of twelve climate-related events between 2012-2015. Findings suggest that frame usage strongly varies by event, and that some events seem to constrain the diversity of news media framings. Journalists also consistently rely on a small set of “default” frames about climate.

That’s not news: Audience perceptions of ‘news-ness’ and why it matters • Stephanie Edgerly; Emily Vraga • How do people identify news on social media sites? This study uses an experimental design to isolate two features of a headline shared on Twitter to determine the impact on audience ratings of ‘news-ness.’ We find that headline story type (breaking, exclusive, opinion, fact check) and source (AP, MSNBC, Fox News) separately impact news-ness, with partisanship conditioning the influence of source on news-ness. News-ness then mediates these effects on outcomes of tweet credibility and verification.

What makes gun violence a prominent issue? A computational analysis of compelling arguments and partisanship • Lei Guo, Boston University; Kate Mays; Yiyan Zhang, Boston University; Margrit Betke; Derry Wijaya • Drawing upon theories of compelling arguments and selective exposure, this study examines the impact of mainstream and partisan media on U.S. public opinion regarding a highly polarized issue: gun violence. Results demonstrate that episodic framing of gun violence in the mainstream media increases the issue prominence among conservatives than liberals, thus to some extent narrowing the opinion polarization. Exposure to conservative media, however, makes people believe gun violence is a less important issue.

Priming Postpartum Prejudice: Comparing Media Effects and Embodied Risk to Accessibility of Mental Illness Concepts • Lynette Holman, Appalachian State University; Robert McKeever, University of South Carolina • A between-subjects experimental replication (N = 581) was conducted to ascertain whether a media exemplar could prime a stereotype of mental illness among women who are pregnant or of child-bearing age and how that media effect compared to the effect of one’s health status. The findings suggest that the provocation of the exemplars alone was not significant predictor of participant perceptions of risk. Pregnancy prominently predicted mental illness stereotypes, increased risk perceptions, and treatment avoidance.

Foundations for the development of communication that works with, not against, stakeholders’ existing viewpoints • Sadie Hundemer, University of Florida; Martha Monroe, University of Florida • The scientific and social complexity of natural resources issues can yield perspectives that vary substantially among stakeholder groups. This diversity can make it difficult to structure communication that promotes outreach objectives and cross-group collaboration while also attending to existing viewpoints. This study uses cultural domain analysis to examine stakeholders’ mental models of regional water challenges and explore ways natural resources communicators can use this information to bridge cognitive divides.

Mapping the Corporate Social Responsibility Research in Communication: A Network and Bibliometric Analysis • Grace Ji, Virginia Commonwealth University; Weiting Tao, University of Miami; Hyejoon Rim • This study evaluates how scholarly research on corporate social responsibility (CSR) in communication has developed over the last four decades and discovers the pattern of knowledge diffusion during this process. Comprehensive bibliometric analyses were conducted with 290 peer-reviewed articles published between 1980 to 2018 by 490 authors in 61 communication journals. Taking a network perspective, invisible colleges of CSR research were unveiled via co-authorship and co-citation analyses. The study identifies the studies and publication sources that have the most significant influence over the construction of CSR scholarship in communication and uncovered the social networks of scholarly collaboration. Results empirically demonstrate the area of CSR research in communication is notably multidisciplinary, which is investigated by scholars from public relations, advertising, organizational communication, and environmental communication. In addition, results also show the joint impact from management and marketing literature to CSR scholarship and their transformation into the communication field via public relations and advertising research. Future paths of CSR research in communication are suggested.

Inferential statistical analysis with Inaccurate self-reports Comparing correlational outcomes with self reported and logged mobile data • Mo Jones-Jang; Yu-Jin Heo, University of South Carolina; Robert McKeever, University of South Carolina; Leigh Moscowitz; David Moscowitz, School of Journalism and Mass • Research on the social and psychological effects of mobile phone use primarily employs self-report measures. However, recent findings suggest that such data contain a significant amount of measurement errors. The key question of this study is not only to examine discrepancies between survey and logged data, but also to compare correlational outcomes resulting from two different measures. Two hundred ninety seven college students participated in this study by providing both self-reported and digital trace data of daily minutes of screen time and number of phone screen unlocks over seven days. We specifically examined correlations between smartphone use and four social variables, including bridging, bonding, well-being, and problematic use of smartphone. The results indicate that the effect sizes of correlations using self-reported data are in fact smaller compared to inferential statistical results with logged data. Theoretical and methodological implications are discussed.

Classifying Twitter Bots • Michael Kearney, School of Journalism | Informatics Institute | University of Missouri; Lingshu Hu, University of Missouri; Iuliia Alieva, University of Missouri – Columbia • The current study sought to leverage public Twitter lists in order to develop a machine learning classifier of “bot” accounts. In addition to developing a Twitter bot detecting-classifier, we have also exported this classifier in two ways. First, we have exported the classifier as an interactive Shiny web application. Second, we have exported the classifier as an R package, tweetbotornot. As a programatic tool, it is possible to leverage the classifier to get probability estimates of up to 90,000 Twitter accounts every fifteen minutes. Through our work to develop and share list-leveraging Twitter bot classifier tools, we threfore offer three major contributions. First, we provide a novel and flexible approach to the classification of Twitter accounts. While accounts were initially labelled using well-known “bot” accounts and lists published in previous research, additional labelling was achieved via a new snowballing method wherein additional accounts were identified if they appeared on similar Twitter lists. Second, we provide a transparent, user friendly (Shiny web application), and scalable tools (R packages) for classifying Twitter accounts. These tools can be used by members of the public and academics alike. Finally, we provide a template for a flexible and dynamic approach to the construction of Twitter classifiers. Twitter lists can similarly be leveraged for other types of accounts, allowing researchers to further maximize information gleaned from the large trove of Twitter data.

Culling on Social Media: Antecedents and Consequences of Unfriending and Unsubscribing • Dam Hee Kim; Kate Kenski; Mo Jones-Jang • This paper investigates whether selective avoidance actions on social media such as unfriending and unsubscribing in the context of elections are determined by motivated reasoning styles. Analyses of a two-wave national survey collected before and after the 2018 midterm election revealed that individuals with a high need for cognition and a high need to evaluate were most likely to selectively avoid over time, which then positively predicted political expression on social media.

Framing Effects of Numerical Information in Communicating Risk • ByungGu Lee; Jiawei Liu, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Hyesun Choung; Douglas McLeod • In messages that present information about risk, the same piece of information can be presented in alternative ways. This article investigates the interplay between risk statements (i.e., positive versus negative portrayal of risks) and number formats (i.e., raw frequency versus percentage) in influencing readers’ comprehension of numerical information and their subsequent emotional and cognitive evaluations. Experimental findings across two issue contexts (impaired driving and endangered species) showed that statistics in the form of percentages reduced the effects of positive versus negative risk statements and produced more accurate and reliable comprehension of risks as compared to statistics with raw frequency formats. Moreover, the comprehension of risk statistics determined the level of emotions readers experienced, which in turn affected their risk perceptions. Implications are discussed.

Highlights of Two U.S. Presidential Debates: Identifying Candidate Insults that Go Viral • Josephine Lukito, UW Madison; Prathusha Sarma, UW Madison; Jordan Foley, UW Madison; Jon Pevehouse, UW Madison; Aman Abhishek; Dhavan Shah, UW Madison; Erik Bucy, Texas Tech University; Chris Wells, Boston University • This study analyzes social media discourse and debate rhetoric during two U.S. Presidential debates: the first 2012 debate between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney, and the first 2016 debate between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. Using a combined strategy involving time series analysis to identify potential viral moments in social media and natural language processing to determine whether words shifted in use in the pre-viral and post-viral moment, we find and examine several viral moments in both debates. Notably, the majority of 2016 debate viral moments were insults or remarks about a scandal, rather than gaffs or mistakes. Overall, the results of both 2012 and 2016 suggest that candidates can induce viral moments on social media to temporarily increase attention towards themselves.

Processing News on Social Media. The Political Incidental News Exposure Model (PINE) • Joerg Matthes, U of Vienna; Andreas Nanz, U of Vienna; Raffael Heiss, Management Center Innsbruck; Marlis Stubenvoll • This paper outlines the Political Incidental News Exposure Model (PINE). The PINE model understands incidental news exposure (IE) as a dynamic process by distinguishing two levels of IE: the passive scanning of incidentally encountered political information (first level) and the intentional processing of incidentally encountered content (second level). The PINE model further differentiates intention-based and topic-based IE, and it conceptualizes IE with respect to political and non-political content. Theoretical and methodological implications are discussed.

Agenda Setting by News and by the Audience in a News Portal Experiment • Martina Santia; Raymond Pingree, Louisiana State University; Kirill Bryanov, Louisiana State University; Brian Watson • A 12-day experiment embedded in a purpose-built online news portal tested effects of the news agenda and the “user agenda.” Participants were randomly assigned to encounter more or fewer real, timely news stories on particular topics (the news agenda) and altered rankings of stories in a recommended or trending sidebar (the user agenda). News agenda setting effects were found only on education. A user agenda emphasizing racism increased perceived importance of immigration, particularly among Republicans.

Why Defining Automation in Journalism is not Automatic • Jia Yao Lim, Nanyang Technological University Singapore; Ruoming Zheng, Nanyang Technological University Singapore; Edson Tandoc, Nanyang Technological University Singapore; Andrew Prahl, Nanyang Technological University Singapore; Shangyuan Wu, Nanyang Technological University Singapore • This paper examined the ways automation has been defined in manufacturing, education, healthcare, and journalism, arguing that the journalism industry can learn from the experience of other industries when it comes to understanding the impact of automation. In the context of journalism, most definitions include references to an autonomous system that entails the replacement of humans, consistent with fears that algorithms might displace human journalists when it comes to writing stories. However, many of these definitions have focused on automated writing, when journalism is more than just writing articles.

Personality factors differentiating selective exposure, selective avoidance and the belief in the importance of silencing others: Further evidence for discriminant validity • Yariv Tsfati, University of Haifa • Recent research proposed self-report measures tapping three different strategies used by people to place themselves within an ideologically homogeneous information environment: selective exposure, selective avoidance and the belief in the importance of silencing others (BISO). However, demonstrating that people are able to answer survey questions about these strategies falls short of establishing that people are able to distinguish between them. Using online survey data collected in Israel (n = 749), the present investigation explores the discriminant validity of these constructs. Confirmatory factor models and model comparisons support their empirical differentiation. In addition, it is argued that the constructs are empirically different given the fact that they correlate differently with personality factors. BISO is more strongly and positively associated with authoritarianism. Selective avoidance is more strongly negatively associated with openness to experience. Selective exposure was positively associated with empathy, with which selective avoidance was negatively associated. Further differences in the correlates of these constructs are discussed.

Theorizing News Literacy: A Proposed Framework for Unifying a Fractured Field • Emily Vraga; Melissa Tully; Adam Maksl, Indiana University Southeast; Stephanie Craft, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign; Seth Ashley, Boise State University • News literacy research has received increased attention as we consider the role of news in a chaotic public sphere. However, existing research lacks a consistent definition of news literacy or guiding theoretical framework. Therefore, building from the Theory of Planned Behavior, we propose a model for exploring critical news consumption in which we add news literacy – defined as knowledge and skills in five domains – to the model. We conclude by proposing a continued research agenda.

News About Victims’ Delayed Sexual Harassment Accusations and Effects on Victim Blaming: A Mediation Model • Christian von Sikorski; Melanie Saumer • We lack research on how news about delayed sexual harassment accusations affect victim blaming. Drawing from construal level theory and attribution theory, we experimentally tested how participants react to news about a victim’s delayed accusations (harassment occurred years ago), non-delayed accusations (harassment occurred days ago), or accusations with no time cue. Findings showed that delayed accusations resulted in the attribution of negative motives toward the victim. Negative motives, in turn, increased victim blaming.

Testing the Role of Positive News in the Empathy-Helping Relationship • Masahiro Yamamoto, University at Albany; Chun Yang, Louisiana State University • This study integrates two types of news consumption, positive and crime news, into the Empathy-Altruism Hypothesis. Data from an online survey of Japanese citizens reveal that positive news use at Time 1 has a positive effect on helping at Time 2. Data also indicate that positive news use does not have a significant effect on empathic concern and personal distress. Rather, empathic concern at Time 1 has a positive effect on both positive news use and crime news use at Time 2. Implications are discussed for the role of positive news in promoting prosocial, helping behaviors.

Exploring Genetic Contributions to Motives for News Use: A Study of Identical and Fraternal Twins • Chance York, Kent State University; Paul Haridakis, Kent State University • Prior research conducted within the Uses and Gratifications theoretical framework has considered the contribution of numerous social and psychological (e.g., personality) differences to media use and effects. In this study, we explore whether an additional fundamental source of individual differences—genes—also may explain motives to use media. Utilizing original data collected on identical and fraternal twins, we find differences in underlying genetic traits explained 35% of the variance in news consumption for surveillance purposes.

Understanding privacy concern in using social media: The extension of Marshall McLuhan • Bu Zhong, Pennsylvania State University; Tao Sun, University of Vermont; Yakun Huang, Jinan University; Yu Zhou, South China University of Technology • The advances of information and communication technologies (ICT) have reinvigorated a long tradition of searching for the links between the dominant communication technology of an age and the key features of society. Guided by Marshall McLuhan’s media ecology theory highlighting the ICT role in defining historical stages, this study analyzes the Internet privacy concern (IPC) among social media users (N = 1,340) from the United States and China. It has found a generation gap concerning IPC between people growing up with social media as a dominate media platform and those who did not. A significant correlation between the power use of social media and IPC was also identified, which was further moderated by respondents’ cultural background. The findings expand media ecology theory by providing empirical support to it in terms of the impact of dominant ICT on societal perceptions, thus contributing to the understanding of IPC in a cross-cultural setting.

Student Paper Competition
Realtime Distributed Cognition: A Conceptual Framework • Wes Hartley, Regent University • While the broad framework of distributed cognition has proven to be a versatile theoretical lens through which to view team problem-solving structures, this broad use of distributed cognition theory has, perhaps, allowed the theory to drift away from some of the root ideas that grounded the original concept. This paper seeks to advance the distributed cognition framework by narrowing the parameters of the theory and providing a new conceptual framework with clear boundaries for identifying distributed cognition units. Two real-world scenarios will be evaluated using this new conceptual framework in order to demonstrate its functionality.

An Approach for Measuring Partisan Segregation in Political Media Consumption • Jacob Long • Despite the amount of research on the topic, there are few direct measurements of partisan segregation in media use. Of those that do exist, none are easily transferable to multi-party systems. Using a network analytic approach, I use data from a nationally representative survey of the United States to describe the amount of partisan segregation in media consumption and discuss further applications for these measures.

Improving the Generalizability of Inferences in Quantitative Communication Research • Jacob Long • This paper discusses the quality of quantitative communication research in light of the so-called “replicability crisis” that has affected neighboring disciplines. I discuss some of the problems these fields have faced and suggest implementing some of their solutions in communication research. I then argue for greater consideration of generalizability and propose a theoretical framework for assessing the quality of studies suited to a variable field like communication.

A Territorial Dispute or An Agenda Battle? A Cross-National Examination of the Network and Intermedia Agenda-Setting Effects between Newspapers and Twitter on Diaoyu Islands Dispute • Yan Su, The Edward R. Murrow College of Communication, Washington State University; Jun Hu, Department of Earth Sciences, University of Southern California • Within the theoretical frameworks of Network Agenda-Setting (NAS) model and intermedia agenda-setting, this study analyzed the media agendas in China, Japan, and the U.S. on the Diaoyu Islands dispute – a geopolitical issue involved multiple subjects, in terms of the theme, directionality, and valence of present relationships. Further, the study analyzed the discussions on Twitter and probed the intermedia power flow between Twitter and the selected media. The findings showed that the Chinese media’s depictions were more biased. Although reciprocities emerged, Twitter exhibited an overall stronger power in predicting traditional media’s agenda. Moreover, Chinese and the U.S. media had stronger transnational intermedia effects, whereas Japanese media is less likely to exert influence across the national boundaries.

< 2019 Abstracts