With creative designs, this book contains important contributions to our understanding of social media news’s effects on political engagement, political knowledge, willingness to engage in self-censorship, and political disaffection.
In recent years, social media has emerged as a major source of news and other information. The unique nature of social media and the variety of platforms available to individuals present challenges for those who want to study and understand its psychological impact. Fortunately, many innovative studies on this subject have appeared in publications in the last few years. This edited volume features a collection of recently published studies focusing on the effects of social media news as well as the framing of social issues on these platforms. The authors of these studies used surveys, experiments, and content analysis to explore their research questions. Each chapter provides valuable insights on the growing influence of social media news.
The chapters in this book were originally published in the journal Mass Communication and Society.
Introduction: Social Media as a News Source
Fuyuan Shen
1. The Role of Engagement in Learning From Active and Incidental News Exposure on Social Media
Anne Oeldorf- Hirsch
2. Examining News Engagement on Facebook: Effects of News Content and Social Networks on News Engagement
Victoria Y. Chen
3. Probing the Mechanisms Through Which Social Media Erodes Political Knowledge: The Role of the News-Finds-Me Perception
Sangwon Lee
4. Social Media News Use and Political Cynicism: Differential Pathways Through “News Finds Me” Perception
Hyunjin Song, Homero Gil de Zúñiga, and Hajo G. Boomgaarden
5. What’s This? Incidental Exposure to News on Social Media,N ews- Finds- Me Perception, News Efficacy, and News Consumption
Chang Sup Park and Barbara K. Kaye
6. From #Ferguson to #Ayotzinapa: Analyzing Differences in Domestic and Foreign Protest News Shared on Social Media
Danielle K. Kilgo, Summer Harlow, Victor García- Perdomo, and Ramón Salaverría
7. Fear of Isolation and Perceived Affordances: The Spiral of Silence on Social Networking Sites Regarding Police Discrimination
Jesse Fox and Lanier Frush Holt
8. Reluctance to Talk About Politics in Face- to- Face and Facebook Settings: Examining the Impact of Fear of Isolation, Willingness to Self- Censor, and Peer Network Characteristics
Michael Chan
9. Social Media and Political Disengagement Among Young Adults: A Moderated Mediation Model of Cynicism, Efficacy, and Social Media Use on Apathy
Masahiro Yamamoto, Matthew James Kushin, and Francis Dalisay
10. When Social Media Become Hostile Media: An Experimental Examination of News Sharing, Partisanship, and Follower Count
Tae Kyoung Lee, Youngju Kim, and Kevin Coe
Biography
Fuyuan Shen is Professor of Communications in the Donald P. Bellisario College of Communications, Pennsylvania State University, USA. His research focuses on understanding the psychological effects of media messages. He has served as the editor in chief of Mass Communication and Society.
