Continuity, change and possibility in older age: Identity and ageing-as-discovery

2018 ◽  
Vol 54 (2) ◽  
pp. 178-190 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peta S. Cook

Traditionally, sociology has framed older age as a time of disengagement, withdrawal and reduced social integration. While now largely dismissed in contemporary sociological understandings of ageing, narratives of decline still feature heavily across social, media, and medical discourses. This negativity towards ageing could be at odds with how older people experience their age and identity. In this article, I will explore how 16 older people construct their self-identity. Drawing on participant-generated imagery and interview data, this article exposes that they experience older age as a time of continuity, discovery, possibility and change, where identity is multiple and fluid, and emerges through the links they make between the past, present and future. Thus, while ageing is not without its difficulties, the research participants challenge the social myths that reductively and negatively frame older age by constructing an identity that builds on their past through an active exploration of new possibilities and experiences.

2010 ◽  
Vol 30 (6) ◽  
pp. 1055-1072 ◽  
Author(s):  
SHANNON MCDERMOTT

ABSTRACTOver the past 50 years, self-neglect among older people has been conceptualised in both social policy and the academy as a social problem which is defined in relation to medical illness and requires professional intervention. Few authors, however, have analysed the concept of self-neglect in relation to critical sociological theory. This is problematic because professional judgements, which provide the impetus for intervention, are inherently influenced by the social and cultural context. The purpose of this article is to use critical theory as a framework for interpreting the findings from a qualitative study which explored judgements in relation to older people in situations of self-neglect made by professionals. Two types of data were collected. There were 125 hours of observations at meetings and home assessments conducted by professionals associated with the Community Options Programme in Sydney, Australia, and 18 professionals who worked with self-neglecting older people in the community gave in-depth qualitative interviews. The findings show that professional judgements of self-neglect focus on risk and capacity, and that these perceptions influence when and how interventions occur. The assumptions upon which professional judgements are based are then further analysed in relation to critical theory.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elizabeth Riddle ◽  
Jill R D MacKay

The rapid rise of social media in the past decade represents a new space where animals are represented in human society, and this may influence human perceptions. In this study, 211 participants (49% female) between the ages of 18 to 44 were recruited to an online survey where they viewed mock-up pages from a social media site. All participants saw the same image of an animal, but were randomly assigned to a positive or negative narrative condition. When participants were presented with the critical narrative they perceived the animal to be more stressed (χ2=13.99, p<0.001). Participants expressed reservations in face of a narrative they disagreed with in free text comments. Overall, this study found evidence to suggest that people moderate their discussions on human-animal interactions based on the social network they are in, but these relationships are complex and require further research.


Author(s):  
Ahmet Sarıtaş ◽  
Elif Esra Aydın

Today, using of the internet extended social media by individuals habitually enables both the business firms and politicians to reach their target mass at any time. In this context, internet has become a popular place recently where political communication and campaigns are realized by ensuring a new dimension to political campaigns. When we examine the posts and discussions in the social media, we can say that they are converted into open political sessions. As there are no censorship in such channels, individuals have a freedom to reach to any partial/impartial information and obtain transparent and fast feedback, and with this regard, political parties, leaders and candidates have a chance to be closer to electors. In this study, it is aimed to give information about the social media, present what medium has been used for election campaigns from the past until today and besides, by considering the effects of effective and efficient use of social media and new trends related to the internet by politicians, together with their applications in the world, to make suggestions about its situation and application in Turkey.


2012 ◽  
Vol 89 (2) ◽  
pp. 279-298 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hyoungkoo Khang ◽  
Eyun-Jung Ki ◽  
Lan Ye

Drawing upon the social media phenomena in both practical and academic arenas, this study explored patterns and trends of social media research over the past fourteen years across four disciplines. Findings exhibit a definite increasing number of social-media-related studies. This indicates that social media have gained incremental attention among scholars, and who have, in turn, been responding and keeping pace with the increased usage and impact of this new medium. The authors suggest that future scholarly endeavors emphasize prospective aspects of social media, foreseeing applications and technological progress and elaborating theory.


2021 ◽  
Vol 4 ◽  
pp. 12-30
Author(s):  
Simona Stano

The vegan population has risen significantly over the past decade, and is expected to continue increasing. Social media are believed to have played a major role in such a rise. According to a Google study (2018), veganism started to spread markedly in 2012, the same year that Instagram became popular, and has then grown in correlation with the expansion of the social network (with over 88 million #vegan posts out of a billion monthly active users and more than 500 million people using the platform daily today). Since 2016 conversations around veganism have increased also on Twitter, reaching nearly 20 million Tweets in 2018 and registering a further growth of 70% in 2019. Moreover, the number of Google searches for veganism has spiked from a popularity rating of just 17 out of 100 in 2008 to 88 in 2018. Functioning both as platforms for sharing and commenting on information and as effective channels for proselytizing, these and other social media have evidently extended the boundaries of the vegan movement, making it become one of the biggest contemporary food trends. This paper aims at identifying and describing the main cultural transformations and forms of life promoted by “veganism 2.0”, based on a semiotic approach particularly attentive to the analysis of the narrative level and the patemic dimension. To this purpose, the intersections between the so-called “gastromania” and other trends characterising contemporary foodspheres, such as “gastro-anomy” and the “ideology of nutritionism” are taken into account, paying particular attention to the gastronomic discourse in present-day digital mediascapes and the complex dynamics characterising them.


Healthcare ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (11) ◽  
pp. 1403
Author(s):  
Yiming Ma ◽  
Changyong Liang ◽  
Xuejie Yang ◽  
Haitao Zhang ◽  
Shuping Zhao ◽  
...  

Older people with hearing impairment are more likely to develop depressive symptoms due to physical disability and loss of social communication. This study investigated the effects of social media on social relations, subjective aging, and depressive symptoms in these older adults based on the stimulus-organism-response (S-O-R) framework. It provides new empirical evidence to support improving the mental health and rebuilding the social relations of older people. A formal questionnaire was designed using the Wenjuanxing platform and distributed online through WeChat; 643 valid questionnaires were received from older people with self-reported hearing impairments, and SmartPLS 3.28 was used to analyze the data. The results show that (1) social media significantly impacts the social relations of older people with hearing impairment (social networks, β = 0.132, T = 3.444; social support, β = 0.129, T = 2.95; social isolation, β = 0.107, T = 2.505). (2) For these older people, social isolation has the biggest impact on their psychosocial loss (β = 0.456, T = 10.458), followed by the impact of social support (β = 0.103, T = 2.014); a hypothesis about social network size was not confirmed (β = 0.007, T = 0.182). Both social media (β = 0.096, T = 2.249) and social support (β = 0.174, T = 4.434) significantly affect the self-efficacy of hearing-impaired older people. (3) Both subjective aging (psychosocial loss, β = 0.260, T = 6.036; self-efficacy, β = 0.106, T = 3.15) and social isolation (β = 0.268, T = 6.307) significantly affect depressive symptoms in older people with hearing impairment. This study expands the theories of social media aging cognition, social support, and social networks and can provide practical contributions to the social media use and mental health of special persons 60 years and older.


2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 74
Author(s):  
Joko Sutarso

Abstrak. Penggunaan media sosial semakin meningkat dari tahun ke tahun, namun demikian tidak semua konten media sosial memiliki sisi positif. Beberapa dampak negatif penggunaan media sosial seperti penyebaran berita bohong (hoax), ujaran kebencian (hate speech), perundungan (cyberbullying) dan konten negatiflainnya merupakan bentuk-bentuk penyalahgunaan media sosial menjadi keprihatinan masyarakat karena telah memasuki  ranah sosial, politik, ekonomi dan bahkan keagamaan. Hal ini tidak terlepas dari kapitalisasi koorporasi media sosial yang terus berkembang dengan terpaan yang semakin meluas melintasi batas negara dan bangsa, masuk dalam kehidupan berbagai generasi, strata sosial ekonomi, tingkat pendidikan dan latar belakang pendidikan serta pengalaman. Metode yang digunakan dalam tulisan ini adalah teoritis kualitatif yang didasarkan pada pengamatan terhadap isi media sosial dan kajian teoritis yang berusaha menjelaskan pengaruh isi media terhadap perilaku masyarakat dalam bermedia sebagai bahan pengayaan  (enrichment) bagi kegiatan literasi media sosial di kalangan masyarakat bagi para pegiat literasi. Penjelasan teoritis yang dipakai meliputi aspek positif dan negatif dilihat dari aspek sosial, politik, psikologi, pendidikan dan kebudayaan. Hasilnya konten budaya lokal memiliki peluang mengisi konten dalam ruang media sosial dan konten budaya lokal yang selektif, kreatif, edukatif, dan sekaligus menghibur  dapat digunakan untuk meminimalkan dampak negatif globalisasi dan kapitalisme media sosial. Manfaat lain dari sosialisasi dari promosi budaya lokal di media sosial adalah untuk meningkatkan integrasi masyarakat karena didalamnya terdapat nilai-nilai kearifan lokal yang memiliki nilai bersifat nasional bahkan universal.Abstract. Social media uses have been increasing from year to year. However, not all social media content has a positive side. Some negative effects of social media from hoaxes, hate speech, cyberbullying to other negative content are the forms of abuse of social media. It is concern to the public because these have entered the social, political, economic and religious spheres. It is definitely inseparable from the capitalization of a social media corporation. It has been developing with increasingly widespread exposure across national borders, and it has been entering into the lives of various generations, socio-economic strata, education levels and educational backgrounds and experiences as well. The research method used in this research was a qualitative theoretical approach based on observations of social media content and theoretical studies. It aims at seeking to explain the influence of media content on people's behavior in their media use as the enrichment material for social media literacy activities in society for literacy activists. The theoretical explanations used in this research include positive and negative aspects. In this matter the social, political, psychological, educational and cultural perspectives will see the aspects. Moreover, the research results show that local cultural content has the opportunity to fill content in the social media space. Selective, creative, educative, and entertaining local cultural content can be used to minimize the negative effects of globalization and social media capitalism. Another benefit of socialization of local culture promotion on social media is to increase social integration because in the local culture there are local wisdom values and national or universal values as well.


2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Nan Zakiah Megat Ibrahim ◽  
◽  
Mohammad Shamsul Ibrahim ◽  

Based on the past research, there are still limited studies in proving content used on social media, time spent on social media, cyberbullying contributes to the social skills that are deemed unimportant and irrelevant in Malaysia. Therefore, this study is intended to show the variables do have a relationship with one another, determining each of the objectives in this research is proven right. This study applied the Theory of Planned Behaviour as the main theory to fortify and take the relationships at a greater distance between each variable. Quantitative methods were applied in this study and data were collected through the distribution of questionnaires to 181 respondents who were students at Kolej Universiti Poly-Tech MARA pursuing a Diploma in Corporate Communication. Besides, the findings showed a significant relationship between content used on social media, time spent on social media, cyberbullying to behaviour, and the reaction of an individual. Established evidence between variables that are, content used on social media, time spent on social media and cyberbullying is affecting behaviour and reaction of an individual. Hence, this study assisted the field of communication through the establishment of a more comprehensive variable related to the behaviour and reaction of an individual and supported to Planned Behavior Theory.


Author(s):  
Marko Selaković ◽  
Anna Tarabasz ◽  
Monica Gallant

Internet and social media, as highly interactive platforms, enable two way-communication and content generation which was unprecedented in history. In the past, the media were decisive about content that should be presented, and what public impact it might have (Giessen, 2015). User-generated content provided an opportunity for single Internet users to reach large audiences in the same way as content originating from the traditional mass-media. Web 3.0 and Meta Web introduced a new myriad of available solutions and opportunities (Tarabasz, 2013). Smart technologies and integration networks of Web 4.0, with an ability to detect intentions and goals of the users and offer solutions based on users` preferences and habits (Benhaddi, 2017) are opening an entirely new dimension of the social media: digital identity becomes part of the identity of the Internet users. Keywords: Fake News; Crisis Communications; Online Communications; Management Research; Marketing Research


2019 ◽  
Vol 13 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 196-222 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arijus Pleska ◽  
Andrew Hoskins ◽  
Karen Renaud

The visual image has long been central to how war is seen, contested and legitimised, remembered and forgotten. Archives are pivotal to these ends as is their ownership and access, from state and other official repositories through to the countless photographs scattered and hidden from a collective understanding of what war looks like in individual collections and dusty attics. With the advent and rapid development of social media, however, the amateur and the professional, the illicit and the sanctioned, the personal and the official, and the past and the present, all seem to inhabit the same connected and chaotic space. However, to even begin to render intelligible the complexity, scale and volume of what war looks like in social media archives is a considerable task, given the limitations of any traditional human-based method of collection and analysis. We thus propose the production of a series of ‘snapshots’, using computer-aided extraction and identification techniques to try to offer an experimental way in to conceiving a new imaginary of war. We were particularly interested in testing to see if twentieth century wars, obviously initially captured via pre-digital means, had become more ‘settled’ over time in terms of their remediated presence today through their visual representations and connections on social media, compared with wars fought in digital media ecologies (i.e. those fought and initially represented amidst the volume and pervasiveness of social media images). To this end, we developed a framework for automatically extracting and analysing war images that appear in social media, using both the features of the images themselves, and the text and metadata associated with each image. The framework utilises a workflow comprising four core stages: (1) information retrieval, (2) data pre-processing, (3) feature extraction, and (4) machine learning. Our corpus was drawn from the social media platforms Facebook and Flickr.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document