Toby Hopp

Tapping Into a New Stream of (Personal) Data Assessing Journalists’ Different Use of Social Media

This research seeks to quantify social media’s value as a reporting tool for journalists by understanding it as an instrument for accessing personal data. A national survey of reporters at all large and midsize U.S. newspapers shows that journalists place more value on Twitter than Facebook as it relates to professional practice. Evaluation of the various practice-based functions relative to individual journalists’ value perceptions suggests that Facebook’s value is tied to its use for querying friends and conducting research. Twitter’s value was significantly tied to the platform’s use for querying followers, performing research, and activities associated with contacting sources.

Socioeconomic Status, Social Capital, and Partisan Polarity as Predictors of Political Incivility on Twitter

Using 414,322 tweets drawn from 143,404 individual Twitter users located in all 435 U.S. congressional districts, this study employed big data and automated content analysis techniques to explore the degree to which socioeconomic status (SES), social capital potential (the degree to which a congressional district has the potential for interconnected citizen networks), and in-district partisan polarization were associated with incivility on Twitter during the 2012 presidential election. Broadly speaking, and with some exceptions, the results indicated that election oriented incivility on Twitter was highest in districts that had low SES indicators, low levels of social capital potential, and low levels of partisan polarity. In its sum, this study shows how large social data sets (i.e., the Census) can be combined with big data to explain social phenomena.

Novelty Effects in Augmented Reality Advertising Environments: The Influence of Exposure Time and Self-Efficacy

ABSTRACT While the popularity of augmented reality advertising (ARA) continues to grow, little is known about how users engage with the technology. To better understand ARAs uses and limitations, this study assessed the relationships between ARA exposure time, novelty effects, technological self-efficacy, and brand-based outcomes. The stimulus used in the current study was an ARA application designed by BMW. Using a quasi-experimental design, this studys findings indicated that exposure time was negatively related to participant attitude toward the ARA application. Furthermore, the data indicated that those with high levels of technological self-efficacy transferred these negative evaluations to the brand.

Subjective Norms as a Driver of Mass Communication Students’ Intentions to Adopt New Media Production Technologies

In this study, the impact of subjective norms on mass communication students’ intentions to adopt new media production technologies was explored. The results indicated that subjective norms play an instrumental role in explaining behavioral intentions to adopt new media technologies. Moreover, the data indicated that public relations students scored slightly lower on the behavioral intentions scale than their advertising and journalism colleagues. However, no evidence was found that the relationship between subjective norms and behavioral intentions differs on the basis of major classification. This study concludes by discussing practical implications for educators tasked with providing instruction on new media production tools.

Development and test of a multidimensional scale of blog engagement

ABSTRACT One of the most important areas of social media measurement is engagement; however, industry measures that equate engagement with social media interactions are often inadequate. This study contributes to the ongoing discussion about how to conceptualize engagement and introduces a valid, reliable scale for measuring blog engagement that is grounded in qualitative research. The qualitative research resulted in four dimensions; however, one of the dimensions did not make it through the data analysis process. The resulting blog engagement scale consists of presence, virality, and utility dimensions.

Investigating the influence of age, social capital affinity, and flow on positive outcomes reported by e-commerce site users

ABSTRACT This study investigated the role of social capital affinity (the sense of community and likeness felt for people online) and the experience of flow (concentrated engagement in/enjoyment of an activity) as antecedents to a variety of positive outcomes associated with the use of e-commerce sites. Also, based on socio-emotional selectivity theory, the current study assessed the influence of age on social capital affinity and flow. As a subset of data from a telephone sample of Internet users in the USA, 282 e-commerce users responded to questions about site satisfaction, perceived focused and incidental knowledge-gains, and affirmation, in addition to flow and social capital affinity. As predicted by socio-emotional selectivity theory, there was a negative relationship between age and social capital affinity and flow. Flow, for its part, mediated the effects of age and social capital affinity on perceived focused and incidental knowledge-gain, satisfaction and affirmation among participants reporting e-commerce use. Finally, the current results indicated that satisfaction and perceived incidental learning predicted participant affirmation for their chosen e-commerce site.

Examination of the Relationship Between Gender, Performance, and Enjoyment of a First-Person Shooter Game:

Purpose. The purpose of this work was to explore the relationship between gender, game performance factors, and player enjoyment of a first-person shooter (FPS) video game. Drawing upon the notion that FPS games are gendered spaces in which men are both the intended and ideal participants, we predicted that women’s game enjoyment, in contrast to men’s, would rest on their ability to positively violate negative expectancies associated with FPS games by performing at a high level. Method. Two inter-related studies were employed. The first (preliminary) study used an online survey to assess gender-based expectancy differences. The second (main) study was lab-based. Here, participants played the FPS game COUNTER-STRIKE: GLOBAL OFFENSIVE and provided data on perceived game performance and session enjoyment. Results. The data indicated that men’s enjoyment of a FPS game was not influenced by game performance while women’s enjoyment was, in fact, significantly influenced by both subjective self-relative and objective performance dimensions. Conclusions. The present findings may provide a partial explanation for the persistence of the gender gap relative to FPS preference. Moreover, the current work extends the current scholarly understanding of expectancy value theory (EVT) by investigating the effect of expectancy violations associated with one’s own behavior.

Does negative campaign advertising stimulate uncivil communication on social media? Measuring audience response using big data

Abstract Using the 2012 presidential election as a case study, this work set out to understand the relationship between negative political advertising and political incivility on Twitter. Drawing on the stimulation hypothesis and the notion that communication with dissimilar others can encourage incivility, it was predicted that (1) heightened levels of negative campaign advertising would be associated with increased citizen activity on Twitter, (2) increased citizen activity would predict online incivility, and (3) that increases in citizen activity would facilitate a positive indirect relationship between negative advertising volume and citizen incivility. This theoretical model was tested using data collected from over 140,000 individual Twitter users located in 206 Designated Market Areas. The results supported the proposed model. Additional analyses further suggested that the relationship between negative political advertising and citizen incivility was conditioned by contextual levels of economic status. These results are discussed in the context of political advertising and democratic deliberation.

The Effect of Numeracy on the Relationship Between State Reactance and Message Evaluations

ABSTRACT This study explored the relationship between message reactance potential and individual levels of numeracy in the context of persuasive antiviolence messaging. It was specifically suggested that high levels of numeracy would exacerbate the negative effects of state reactance. The results indicated that high and moderate levels of numeracy strengthened the negative relationship between state reactance and message evaluation. Taken as a whole, the results of this study suggest that for persuasive messages that possess reactance potential and contain statistical/numerical information, individual levels of numeracy exert a nonignorable influence on how the message is evaluated.

Use of military-themed first-person shooter games and militarism: An investigation of two potential facilitating mechanisms

Abstract This study explored the link between use of military-themed first-person shooter games and militaristic attitudes. Using cultivation theory as a backdrop, the present work suggested that moral disengagement and hostile attribution bias facilitate a positive relationship between military-themed first-person shooter game use and militaristic attitudes. Results of a path model indicated that moral disengagement did, in fact, serve as an intermediary in the relationship between military-themed first-person shooter game use and participant militarism. However, this study did not show any evidence that use of military-themed first-person games was statistically related to hostile attribution bias or that hostile attribution bias was associated with militaristic attitudes.