scholarly journals Likes, comments, and shares of marine organism imagery on Facebook

PeerJ ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 7 ◽  
pp. e6795 ◽  
Author(s):  
Craig R. McClain

Several calls to action urge scientists and science communicators to engage more with online communities. While these calls have been answered by a high percentage of scientists and science communicators online, it often remains unclear what are the best models for effective communication. Best practices and methods for online science communication can benefit from experimental and quantitative research addressing how and when users engage with online content. This study addresses with quantitative and predictive models a key question for the popular, but often-ignored in science communication, social media platform Facebook. Specifically, this study examines the impact of imagery through quantification of likes, comments, and shares on Facebook posts. Here, I show that a basic quantitative model can be useful in predicting response to marine organism imagery on Facebook. The results of this online experiment suggest image type, novelty, and aesthetics impact the number of likes, shares, and comments on a post. In addition, the likes, shares, and comments on images did not follow traditional definitions of “charismatic megafauna”, with cephalopods and bony fishes receiving more interactions than cartilaginous fishes and marine mammals. Length and quality of caption did not significantly impact likes, comments, or shares. This study provides one of the first quantitative analysis of virality of scientific images via social media. The results challenge previously held conceptions of social media scientific outreach including increasing emphasis on imagery selection and curation, notions of which taxa the public connect with, and role of captions for imagery.

2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 205630512093041
Author(s):  
Julian M. Mueller-Herbst ◽  
Michael A. Xenos ◽  
Dietram A. Scheufele ◽  
Dominique Brossard

Spreading issue awareness about increasingly interdisciplinary scientific discoveries faces progressively larger communication challenges due to the complexity, innovation pace, and broad applicability of these innovations. Traditionally, the public relies on legacy media for information and discussion of science topics. In face of a changing information landscape, however, legacy media struggle with decreasing funding for their science desks, and science journalists turn to more specialized outlets, often online. Given these developments, it is important to understand which platforms besides legacy media serve as facilitators of science issue awareness. In this study, we analyzed the impact of social media on the awareness of gene editing. We used a representative survey administered by professional survey firm YouGov between December 2016 and January 2017, yielding a final sample of 1,600 US adults with a 41.7% response rate. The regression analysis findings suggest that social media is a significant avenue through which awareness of gene editing, and subsequently other scientific issues, is spread. Using the example of Facebook, we were able to demonstrate that how, rather than if, one uses social media is the determining factor in spreading issue awareness. Awareness was positively predicted by the length of social media sessions and network heterogeneity, while pure amount of sessions actually negatively predicted awareness. Legacy media remain an important predictor of gene editing awareness. These results demonstrate that social media functions as an important information space for science issues and should receive individual attention along with legacy media outlets when examining science communication.


Author(s):  
Mhd Anas Al Kabbane

This study aimed to identify the impact of social media advertising on making a buying decision Internet of university students. In these days, social media is one of the strongest approaches to promote, sell or buy products or services. It is preferred by all businesses regardless of the size and capability of the companies to reach out millions of protentional customers over the world. People are browsing the internet and social media daily on the public transportation and during their leisure time. Thug, This is a great opportunity to create business possibilities due to the potential of this market which has been continuously growing in the past decade. Therefore, this research focuses on finding out the key factors of social media that affect the purchase behaviour of university. For this reason, it is cantered on the elements of the extent of satisfaction, the spent time on social media, the strength of social media compared to mass media, and reviews are written by customers who have bought. Based on these factors, four hypotheses of the study were developed as a part of the research model. The conducted method was quantitative research, and data was collected from Istanbul university students. Data was analysed with SPSS.


Author(s):  
EVA MOEHLECKE DE BASEGGIO ◽  
OLIVIA SCHNEIDER ◽  
TIBOR SZVIRCSEV TRESCH

The Swiss Armed Forces (SAF), as part of a democratic system, depends on legitimacy. Democracy, legitimacy and the public are closely connected. In the public sphere the SAF need to be visible; it is where they are controlled and legitimated by the citizens, as part of a deliberative discussion in which political decisions are communicatively negotiated. Considering this, the meaning of political communication, including the SAF’s communication, becomes obvious as it forms the most important basis for political legitimation processes. Social media provide a new way for the SAF to communicate and interact directly with the population. The SAF’s social media communication potentially brings it closer to the people and engages them in a dialogue. The SAF can become more transparent and social media communication may increase its reputation and legitimacy. To measure the effects of social media communication, a survey of the Swiss internet population was conducted. Based on this data, a structural equation model was defined, the effects of which substantiate the assumption that the SAF benefits from being on social media in terms of broadening its reach and increasing legitimacy values.


2020 ◽  
Vol 2 ◽  
pp. 1-18
Author(s):  
Tuncay Şur ◽  
Betül Yarar

This paper seeks to understand why there has been an increase in photographic images exposing military violence or displaying bodies killed by military forces and how they can freely circulate in the public without being censored or kept hidden. In other words, it aims to analyze this particular issue as a symptom of the emergence of new wars and a new regime of their visual representation. Within this framework, it attempts to relate two kinds of literature that are namely the history of war and war photography with the bridge of theoretical discussions on the real, its photographic representation, power, and violence.  Rather than systematic empirical analysis, the paper is based on a theoretical attempt which is reflected on some socio-political observations in the Middle East where there has been ongoing wars or new wars. The core discussion of the paper is supported by a brief analysis of some illustrative photographic images that are served through the social media under the circumstances of war for instance in Turkey between Turkish military troops and the Kurdish militants. The paper concludes that in line with the process of dissolution/transformation of the old nation-state formations and globalization, the mechanism and mode of power have also transformed to the extent that it resulted in the emergence of new wars. This is one dynamic that we need to recognize in relation to the above-mentioned question, the other is the impact of social media in not only delivering but also receiving war photographies. Today these changes have led the emergence of new machinery of power in which the old modern visual/photographic techniques of representing wars without human beings, torture, and violence through censorship began to be employed alongside medieval power techniques of a visual exhibition of tortures and violence.


2021 ◽  
pp. 146144482110348
Author(s):  
Kaiping Chen ◽  
June Jeon ◽  
Yanxi Zhou

Diversity in knowledge production is a core challenge facing science communication. Despite extensive works showing how diversity has been undermined in science communication, little is known about to what extent social media augments or hinders diversity for science communication. This article addresses this gap by examining the profile and network diversities of knowledge producers on a popular social media platform—YouTube. We revealed the pattern of the juxtaposition of inclusiveness and segregation in this digital platform, which we define as “segregated inclusion.” We found that diverse profiles are presented in digital knowledge production. However, the network among these knowledge producers reveals the rich-get-richer effect. At the intersection of profile and network diversities, we found a decrease in the overall profile diversity when we moved toward the center of the core producers. This segregated inclusion phenomenon questions how inequalities in science communication are replicated and amplified in relation to digital platforms.


2020 ◽  
pp. 107554702098137
Author(s):  
Leticia Bode ◽  
Emily K. Vraga ◽  
Melissa Tully

We experimentally test whether expert organizations on social media can correct misperceptions of the scientific consensus on the safety of genetically modified (GM) food for human consumption, as well as what role social media cues, in the form of “likes,” play in that process. We find expert organizations highlighting scientific consensus on GM food safety reduces consensus misperceptions among the public, leading to lower GM misperceptions and boosting related consumption behaviors in line with the gateway belief model. Expert organizations’ credibility may increase as a result of correction, but popularity cues do not seem to affect misperceptions or credibility.


2016 ◽  
Vol 28 (3) ◽  
pp. 82-103 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mohd Hisham Mohd Sharif ◽  
Indrit Troshani ◽  
Robyn Davidson

Limited attention has been directed towards understanding the impact of social media in the public sector, particularly in local government organisations. Although social media offer substantial benefits and opportunities to local government, research into the impact of social media remains scant. To address this gap, the authors draw on the technology, organisation, and environment (TOE) framework and propose a model of the determinants of social media impact in local government. The model is tested with data collected via a survey with 173 Australian local government organisations using social media. Data were analysed using the partial least squares-structural equation modelling (PLS-SEM) technique. The results indicate that TOE factors including perceived benefits, perceived security risks, compatibility, and degree of formalisation are important predictors of social media impact in local government.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Aasif Ahmad Mir ◽  
Sevukan Rathinam ◽  
Sumeer Gul

PurposeTwitter is gaining popularity as a microblogging and social networking service to discuss various social issues. Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has become a global pandemic and is discussed worldwide. Social media is an instant platform to deliberate various dimensions of COVID-19. The purpose of the study is to explore and analyze the public sentiments related to COVID-19 vaccines across the Twitter messages (positive, neutral, and negative) and the impact tweets make across digital social circles.Design/methodology/approachTo fetch the vaccine-related posts, a manual examination of randomly selected 500 tweets was carried out to identify the popular hashtags relevant to the vaccine conversation. It was found that the hashtags “covid19vaccine” and “coronavirusvaccine” were the two popular hashtags used to discuss the communications related to COVID-19 vaccines. 23,575 global tweets available in public domain were retrieved through “Twitter Application Programming Interface” (API), using “Orange Software”, an open-source machine learning, data visualization and data mining toolkit. The study was confined to the tweets posted in English language only. The default data cleaning and preprocessing techniques available in the “Orange Software” were applied to the dataset, which include “transformation”, “tokenization” and “filtering”. The “Valence Aware Dictionary for sEntiment Reasoning” (VADER) tool was used for classification of tweets to determine the tweet sentiments (positive, neutral and negative) as well as the degree of sentiments (compound score also known as sentiment score). To assess the influence/impact of tweets account wise (verified and unverified) and sentiment wise (positive, neutral, and negative), the retweets and likes, which offer a sort of reward or acknowledgment of tweets, were used.FindingsA gradual decline in the number of tweets over the time is observed. Majority (11,205; 47.52%) of tweets express positive sentiments, followed by neutral (7,948; 33.71%) and negative sentiments (4,422; 18.75%), respectively. The study also signifies a substantial difference between the impact of tweets tweeted by verified and unverified users. The tweets related to verified users have a higher impact both in terms of retweets (65.91%) and likes (84.62%) compared to the tweets tweeted by unverified users. Tweets expressing positive sentiments have the highest impact both in terms of likes (mean = 10.48) and retweets (mean = 3.07) compared to those that express neutral or negative sentiments.Research limitations/implicationsThe main limitation of the study is that the sentiments of the people expressed over one single social platform, that is, Twitter have been studied which cannot generalize the global public perceptions. There can be a variation in the results when the datasets from other social media platforms will be studied.Practical implicationsThe study will help to know the people's sentiments and beliefs toward the COVID-19 vaccines. Sentiments that people hold about the COVID-19 vaccines are studied, which will help health policymakers understand the polarity (positive, negative, and neutral) of the tweets and thus see the public reaction and reflect the types of information people are exposed to about vaccines. The study can aid the health sectors to intensify positive messages and eliminate negative messages for an enhanced vaccination uptake. The research can also help design more operative vaccine-advocating communication by customizing messages using the obtained knowledge from the sentiments and opinions about the vaccines.Originality/valueThe paper focuses on an essential aspect of COVID-19 vaccines and how people express themselves (positively, neutrally and negatively) on Twitter.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Kathy R. Fitzpatrick ◽  
Paula L. Weissman

PurposeThe aim of this study was to understand how public relations leaders view and use social media analytics (SMA) and the impact of SMA on the public relations function.Design/methodology/approachThe research involved in-depth interviews with chief communication officers (CCOs) from leading multinational corporate brands.FindingsThe findings revealed that although CCOs perceive social media analytics as strategically important to the advancement of public relations, the use of social media data is slowed by challenges associated with building SMA capacity.Theoretical and practical implications – The research extends public relations theory on public relations as a strategic management function and provides practical insights for building SMA capabilities.Originality/valueThe study is among the first to provide empirical evidence of how companies are using social media analytics to enhance public relations efforts.


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