Hyunjin Seo

Teens’ social media use and collective action:

This research examined how social self-efficacy, collective self-esteem, and need to belong can be used to predict teens’ use of social media. The particular focus was on how these social psychological variables together with social media use account for variation in teens’ participation in a flash mob – an exemplar of 21st-century collective action. Empirical data come from a survey of teens in a major Midwestern city in the USA. Teens’ need to belong was positively associated with the amount of time they reported spending on social networking sites, even when controlling for gender, race, and household socio-economic status. Both teens’ social self-efficacy and time spent on YouTube were positively associated with their intention to participate in a flash mob in the future. These and other findings are discussed in the context of the role of social media in youth culture and collective action.

International media coverage of North Korea: study of journalists and news reports on the six-party nuclear talks

This study examines what factors influence journalists’ perceived importance of different attributes of North Korea. In particular, this study analyzes the degree to which journalists’ perceived credibility of their sources influences their perceptions of different attributes of North Korea, even after controlling for individual, organizational, and social-system factors. To examine these issues, this study conducts a survey of South Korean and Western journalists who covered North Korea and a content analysis of media reports on North Korea. The results show that the influence of factors at different levels can vary depending on the issues or aspects of issues that journalists deal with. In the case of North Korea issues, sources at the institutional level had significant influence on journalists’ perceived importance of the rogue state dimension of North Korea. In comparison, journalists’ nationality at the social-system level best predicted journalists’ perceived importance of the dialogue partner dimension of North Korea.

Visual propaganda on Facebook: A comparative analysis of Syrian conflicts

Social media platforms have become important in spreading propaganda images during conflicts, as demonstrated in several recent cases including the Israeli–Hamas confrontation in 2012 and graphic internet videos by the self-proclaimed Islamic State in 2014. This study examines the role of visual propaganda in the social media age by analyzing themes, frames, and structural features of images posted on the official Facebook pages of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and the National Coalition of Syrian Revolution and Opposition Forces in 2013 and 2014. Our content analysis shows interesting differences and similarities between the two sides in using images to promote their political agendas during the recent Syrian conflicts following the 2011 uprisings. The Syrian government used visual frames to support its narrative that President Assad is a fearless leader protecting its people and that life has continued normally throughout Syria. The Syrian opposition used various images to solidify its narrative of the Assad regime’s brutality and sufferings of Syrian civilians. There were significant differences in terms of audience reactions to images with different themes and frames. These and other issues are discussed in the context of visual propaganda and framing in social media-based information warfare.

Meaning of Democracy Around the World: A Thematic and Structural Analysis of Videos Defining Democracy

This study examines thematic and structural features of 120 short films submitted to a worldwide video competition encouraging global dialogue on democracy. Each video is analyzed to identify prominent themes of democracy, such as equal participation and diversity, along with audio and visual structural elements. Authors investigate whether and how thematic and structural aspects of videos differ depending upon the geographical region and political system of the country from which each video is submitted. Implications of the findings are discussed in the context of procedural and substantive democracy.

Media and foreign policy: A comparative study of journalists’ perceptions of press—government relations during the six-party talks

This study examines journalists’ role conceptions in their coverage of diplomatic issues, based on a survey of South Korean, US, and European journalists who covered the six-party talks on North Korea’s nuclear program. The author found differences between South Korean, US, and European journalists in their perceptions of the role of journalists in the multilateral nuclear talks. Compared with US and European journalists, South Korean journalists believed more strongly that journalists are participants in the negotiation process and that news sources have significant influence on their judgments of the newsworthiness of issues related to the talks. This comparative study offers important implications for the press—government relationships in foreign affairs issues.

A mixture model of global internet capacity distributions

This article develops a preferential attachment‐based mixture model of global Internet bandwidth and investigates it in the context of observed bandwidth distributions between 2002 and 2011. Our longitudinal analysis shows, among other things, that the bandwidth share distributions—and thus bandwidth differences—exhibit considerable path dependence where country proportions of international bandwidth in 2011 can be substantially accounted for by a preferential attachment‐based mixture of micro‐level processes. Our preferential attachment model, consistent with empirical data, does not predict increasing concentration of bandwidth within top‐ranked countries. We argue that recognizing the strong, but nuanced, historical inertia of bandwidth distributions is helpful in better discriminating among competing theoretical perspectives on the global digital divide as well as in clarifying policy discussions related to gaps between bandwidth‐rich and bandwidth‐poor countries.

Urban Youth's Perspectives on Flash Mobs

Flash mobs are new, emerging, and evolving social phenomena that have recently been associated with youth violence in the US cities. The current study explores how youth understand flash mobs through focus groups conducted in Kansas City, Missouri (a site of violent youth flash mobs). Results indicate that youth have varying familiarity with flash mobs and define them in different ways; that youth perceive youth boredom to be the most frequent cause of problems with flash mobs; that youth connect ongoing social disorder with the violence associated with flash mobs; and that while social media are facilitators of flash mobs, flash mobs have their roots in youth activities that have been going on for generations (e.g., hanging out in groups and cruising). Results illustrate the importance of conducting formative research with youth, particularly about emergent phenomena, when developing interventions and communication campaigns aimed at reducing youth violence.

Global Internet connectedness: 2002–2011

We examine the communications networks formed by direct international Internet links, weighted by bandwidth capacity, each year over the 2002–2011 period. While the 2011 network closely resembles that of 2002, the network has become more tightly interconnected over time. With countries as nodes, connectedness was measured by both changes in median degree and overall network density. We also considered networks formed by aggregating countries into United Nations (UN) continent and region categories as well as network communities identified through tightness of degree interconnection weighted by bandwidth. While relative connectedness as measured by percentage of bandwidth staying within UN geographic regions is decreasing, the percentage remaining within the continent has been fairly constant over the period. All of this must, of course, be understood in the context of enormous total international bandwidth growth between 2002 and 2011 at all levels of analysis.

Network Approach to Regime Type and Global Internet Connectedness

We explore the relationship between regime type and country access to the Internet at both domestic and global levels by conducting longitudinal analyses of economic, population, and Internet data between 2002 and 2011. In particular, we investigate how a countrys position in the global Internet network is associated with the countrys type of political institution while attempting to take into account its economic growth and population (so-called scale effects). Our analysis shows that liberal democracies dominated the global Internet network both in 2002 and in 2011, followed by polyarchies and electoral democracies. Finally, our panel regression and network analyses suggest that it is important to consider network characteristics in investigating whether and how a countrys regime type influences the countrys Internet adoption. We discuss implications of these and other findings for idea flows and economic developments.