Anne Oeldorf-Hirsch

A Little Bird Told Me, So I Didn't Believe It: Twitter, Credibility, and Issue Perceptions

This article investigates how media use of the microblogging tool Twitter affects perceptions of the issue covered and the credibility of the information. In contrast to prior studies showing that ordinary blogs are often judged credible, especially by their users, data from 2 experiments show that Twitter is considered less credible than various forms of stories posted on a newspaper Web site, and fails to convey importance as well as a newspaper or blog.

Social and Technological Motivations for Online Photo Sharing

The popularity of social media sites for posting pictures has given rise to a new form of mediated communication: online photo sharing. This article explores motivations for sharing photos online, using the 2-step procedure common in Uses and Gratifications research. Focus groups revealed 42 motivations which were rated in importance by survey respondents (N = 460). Factor analysis revealed 4 classes of gratifications: seeking and showcasing experiences, technological affordances, social connection, and reaching out. These results suggest that photo sharing is driven by social needs and facilitated by interface features, with important implications for theories of technology and user psychology.

The Role of Engagement in Learning From Active and Incidental News Exposure on Social Media

The growing reliance on social media as news platforms may lead to more passive news consumption but also offers greater potential for engaging in news. This study investigates the role of engagement with news content on Facebook and Twitter between news exposure and current events knowledge. An online survey (N = 400) tests the relationships between social media news seeking, incidental exposure to news on social media, engagement in shared news content, cognitive elaboration, and current events knowledge. The results show that both active seeking of and incidental exposure to news on both sites are linked to engagement, which is linked to greater cognitive elaboration about the content. Furthermore, engagement mediates the relationship between both types of news exposure and cognitive elaboration. However, engagement and elaboration are not related to knowledge. These results indicate that the key role of social media in news content is not knowledge gain but the ability to engage users who may be passively receiving news on these sites. This study extends the cognitive mediation model of learning from the news in the context of current social media, with updated news consumption norms such as engagement with news on these sites, and incidental news exposure.

Your post is embarrassing me

While Facebook is a popular venue for sharing information about ourselves, it also allows others to share information about us, which can lead to embarrassment. This study investigates the effects of shared face-threatening information on emotional and nonverbal indicators of embarrassment using an experiment (N=120) in which pairs of friends posted about each other on Facebook. Results show that face-threatening information shared by others produces a powerful emotional and nonverbal embarrassment response. However, it is not the content of the face-threatening post that produces this effect. Rather, the level of embarrassment depends primarily on whether that information violates the individuals identity and if they perceive that unknown members of their audience can see it. In response, individuals were most likely to joke about the post, although those who were most embarrassed were more likely to delete it. These results inform our understanding of how the process of embarrassment works online. The emotional embarrassment response is similar to offline, but is affected by the features of these sites, such as a large, invisible audience, and the need for ideal self-presentation. This finding has important implications for treating online social networks and their effects to be as real as those offline. Face-threatening posts produce strong emotional embarrassment responses.Identity violation and an unknown audience are key to embarrassment on Facebook.The known process of embarrassment is altered on Facebook by site features.Online social networks must be considered as real as offline social settings.

Clickwrap Impact: Quick-Join Options and Ignoring Privacy and Terms of Service Policies of Social Networking Services

A qualitative survey analysis was conducted, assessing user interactions with the consent materials of a fictitious social networking service, NameDrop. Findings reveal that the quick-join clickwrap option, common to social networking services, hinders consent processes by making privacy and terms of service policies difficult to find, and by discouraging engagement with privacy and reputation protections by suggesting that consent materials are unimportant. Implications for the future of notice policy are discussed.

The Clickwrap: A Political Economic Mechanism for Manufacturing Consent on Social Media:

The clickwrap is a digital prompt that facilitates consent processes by affording users the opportunity to quickly accept or reject digital media policies. A qualitative survey analysis was conducted (N = 513), assessing user interactions with the consent materials of a fictitious social media service, NameDrop. Findings suggest that clickwraps serve a political economic function by facilitating the circumvention of consent materials. Herman and Chomsky’s notion of the “buying mood” guides the analysis to analogize how social media maintain flow to monetized sections of services while diverting attention from policies that might encourage dissent. Clickwraps accomplish this through an agenda-setting function whereby prompts encouraging circumvention are made more prominent than policy links. Results emphasize that clickwraps discourage engagement with privacy and reputation protections by suggesting that consent materials are unimportant, contributing to the normalization of this circumvention. The assertion that clickwraps serve a political economic function suggests that capitalist methods of production are successfully being integrated into social media services and have the ability to manufacture consent.

Count Your Calories and Share Them: Health Benefits of Sharing mHealth Information on Social Networking Sites

ABSTRACT This study investigates the relationship between sharing tracked mobile health (mHealth) information online, supportive communication, feedback, and health behavior. Based on the Integrated Theory of mHealth, our model asserts that sharing tracked health information on social networking sites benefits users’ perceptions of their health because of the supportive communication they gain from members of their online social networks and that the amount of feedback people receive moderates these associations. Users of mHealth apps (N = 511) completed an online survey, and results revealed that both sharing tracked health information and receiving feedback from an online social network were positively associated with supportive communication. Network support both corresponded with improved health behavior and mediated the association between sharing health information and users’ health behavior. As users received greater amounts of feedback from their online social networks, however, the association between sharing tracked health information and health behavior decreased. Theoretical implications for sharing tracked health information and practical implications for using mHealth apps are discussed.

For the birds: Media sourcing, Twitter, and the minimal effect on audience perceptions

Twitter has emerged as a key news source, but questions remain about the ethics of relying on it as a source and the implications of such reliance for audience impressions. Two experiments test perceptions of news attributed to Twitter. Study 1 (N = 699) tests the effects of quoting from Twitter and showing actual tweets. The results suggest minimal influences on credibility or quality perceptions. Study 2 (N = 311) tests the equivalence of quotes attributed to various sources and investigates the effects of attributing the origin of a news story to Twitter. Results suggest that visual representations of tweets may have a negative effect, but otherwise perceptual effects remain minimal.

There is Something I Need to Tell You: Balancing Appropriateness and Efficiency in Modality Choice for Interpersonal Disclosures

An array of communication technology, such as text messaging, social networking sites, and mobile apps, have become the platforms through which many self-disclosures take place. This brings forth questions about which factors determine media selection for self-disclosure, such as media appropriateness and efficiency. Survey participants (N = 598) indicated modality preferences for disclosing hypothetical negative, positive, private, and public scenarios to a friend. For positive or public disclosures, modalities considered most convenient were more likely to be chosen; for negative or private disclosures, participants were more likely to select modalities that were considered most appropriate. Results also show a discrepancy between perceptions of appropriateness and motivations for media selection. These findings present implications for the balance between media appropriateness and efficiency in self-disclosure strategies.

Examining Twitter Content of State Emergency Management During Hurricane Joaquin

Those tasked with disseminating life-protecting messages during crises have many factors to consider. Social media sites have become an information source for individuals during these times, and more research is needed examining the use of specific message strategies by emergency management agencies that may elicit attention and retransmission. This study examines Twitter content concerning Hurricane Joaquin. Content analysis of tweets from state emergency management accounts was performed to provide an overview of the content and stylistic elements used in tweets associated with the event. The findings are discussed in the context of both past research on the matter and implications for emergency management agencies responding to high-consequence events.