Communications & Media Research Proposal. THE EFFECT OF SOCIAL MEDIA.

THE EFFECT OF SOCIAL MEDIA
ON MASS COMMUNICATION, COMMUNICATION BEHAVIOR,
AND COMMUNICATION IN POLITICS
Abstract
Social media has become an all-important, omnipotent aspect of everyday life. Over the years, its development is blatantly rapid—as a platform for communication and expression, it has managed to gain a crucial foothold in most societies at a rate like no other form of media has done before. This paper acknowledges that social media makes available new ways to share ideas, concepts, thoughts, advocacies, as it is just effective in fragmenting, disassociating, and disillusioning its users and audience. The paper asks the question: what is the effect of social media on mass communication—particularly information and news-sharing, and gauging, forming, and creation of public opinion in social media platforms?
Introduction
With the advent of social media, phrases and quips such as “add me on Facebook,” “slide into my DMs,” and “follow me on Instagram” have become indispensable parts of interpersonal communication and the overall getting-to-know-you ritual that people slog through to build relations with each other. We live in a day and age where a person’s most important life events, and even perhaps their whole life experience—can be distilled into a 280-character tweet on Twitter, on a few pictures on Instagram, or on a hefty post in their Facebook accounts. If your person isn’t virtual, if you don’t have an avatar, or a carefully curated “feed” somewhere up there in the internet, you aren’t in. You aren’t hip. In some contexts, you are an other. You won’t—you can’t, fit in. Such is the weight and effect of social media.
It is quite possible that no other industry has so easily and so rapidly permeated the daily routines and functions of people as social media has done. In some countries, if not most, it has become quasi-essential for people to have a Facebook account. Popular social media sites such as Twitter and Instagram have not only become channels for interpersonal communication, but they have also become platforms for advocacy and even work and business. Advertising, conducting business, communication, and just general showing off of one’s accomplishments has never been so easy. In some sense, the world can indeed be accessed with the tip of one’s fingertips scrolling and tapping on a luminescent screen.
With such a formidable industry and platform for communication, one cannot help but ask the question how social media has impacted, reformed, and changes the processes of mass communication since its inception. Whether it has been for the better or for the worse, whether it has been used or abused by its users—what exactly are the tangible and most immediate impacts that sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram have wrought on mass communication?
This paper seeks to delve into different discourses and bodies of knowledge in relation to social media: its directions of development as well as any definitions scholars may have afforded it, or the lack thereof; collective communication behavior and how it has changed with the advent and growth of social media; and finally, the effect of social media in the relations and communications in politics—specifically, social media and communications between politicians, persons vying for office, and their constituents.
Review of related literature
Many a researcher and scholar has been enticed by the topic of social media and its effects on mass communication. The current body of knowledge on the subject is alive, growing, and vibrant.
Cappella states that social media communication is paving four vectors or directions of development in communication research: developments in network analysis, recommendation systems, modeling social and interpersonal influence, and the blurring and loss of differences and distinctions between interpersonal communication and mass audiences through broadcasting and narrowcasting. In the fields of advertising, communication, market research and public relations, there is also a rapidly growing wealth of knowledge regarding the equally rising significant impact of social media.[Joseph Cappella, "Vectors into the Future of Mass and Interpersonal Communication Research: Big Data, Social Media, and Computational Social Science," Human Communication Research (2017), 43.] [Hyoungkoo Khang, Eyun-Jung Ki & Lan Ye. "Social Media Research in Advertising, Communication, Marketing, and Public Relations, 1997–2010," Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly 20, no. 10 (2012), 4.]
Along with its growth and embeddedness in today’s society, collective communication behavior is beginning, if not already, solidified and heavily in play in the realm of social media. Some studies have focused on the application of key social communication theories, such as the application of the spiral of silence theory in electronic opinion communities, and even trust factors which come into play in relation to the digital presence and perceived credibility based on online representations of a person. Other theories such as the use and gratification theory in mass communication was applied in examining social media in relation with communication in a particular focus group of students in Nigeria.[Sherice Gearheart & Weiwu Zhang, "Was It Something I Said?’’ ‘‘No, It Was Something You Posted!’’ A Study of the Spiral of Silence Theory in Social Media Contexts," Cyberpsychology, behavior and social networking 18, no. 4 (2015), 209.] [Xusen Cheng, Shixuan Fu, & Gert-Jan de Vreede, "Understanding trust influencing factors in social mediacommunication: A qualitative study," International Journal of Information Management 37 (2017), 32.] [Aisar Musa, Mohd Nazri Latiff Azmi & Nur Salina Ismail, "Exploring the Uses and Gratifications Theory in the Use of Social Media among the Students of Mass Communication in Nigeria," Malaysian Journal of Distance Education 17, no. 2 (2015), 83-84.]
There has also been some discussion on the benefits wrought by social media as a more independent form of journalism and self-expression, free from restrictions of management or authority, except very broad and general online community rules.[Kiran Bala, "Social Media and Changing Communication Patterns" Global Media Journal, Indian Edition 5, no. 1 (2014), 3-4.]
Perhaps one of the most interesting, engaging, and controversial aspects of social media is what it has to do with politics. Especially nowadays where most politicians do not shy away from online presence and dauntless, shoot-from-the-hip expression, whether it be for better or worse, social media and those who manage and regulate it are playing increasingly important roles in the organization of not only governments, but social realities. It is quite interesting to take note that bodies of research from previous times glaringly show the rapidity of social media’s taking of a foothold in the realm of politics, from the 2008 elections, when social media was still in its nascent, to 2018 and present times.[Matthew James Kushin & Masahiro Yamamoto, "Did Social Media Really Matter? College Students' Use of Online Media and Political Decision Making in the 2008 Election" Mass Communication and Society 13, no. 5 (2010), 644-645.] [Sebastian Stier, Arnim Bleier, Haiko Letz, & Markus Storhmaier, "Election Campaigning on Social Media: Politicians, Audiences, and the Mediation of Political Communication on Fac...