scholarly journals LIKES, SARCASM AND POLITICS: YOUTH RESPONSES TO A PLATFORM-INITIATED MEDIA LITERACY CAMPAIGN ON SOCIAL MEDIA

Author(s):  
Ioana Literat ◽  
Abubakr Abdelbagi ◽  
Nicola YL Law ◽  
Marcus Y-Y Cheung ◽  
Rongwei Tang

When it comes to youth and media literacy, the focus of both research and practice has been on the integration of media literacy instruction into young people’s various educational experiences, rather than studying, implementing and evaluating such initiatives in situ, on social media—which is known to be youths’ central news source. Furthermore, existing studies focus on older platforms like Facebook or Twitter, and we lack a nuanced understanding of these dynamics on the platforms most popular with youth today. The present study aims to fill this gap, by analyzing how users responded to a media literacy education campaign on the popular youth-oriented social media app TikTok, with a focus on the lessons that we might draw in terms of targeted media literacy education initiatives for youth. Our large-scale qualitative content analysis—which included 11,449 public comments posted on 5 educational TikTok videos about media literacy—facilitated a naturalistic study of young people’s attitudes towards such initiatives. We found that reactions to the campaign were mixed, and highly political in nature. While many users appreciated the media literacy campaign and TikTok’s role in implementing it, there was also resistance to the campaign, due to factors related to video content, dissemination approach, and the very identity of TikTok as a platform. Across the board, comments were highly political, illustrating the politicized nature of media literacy education today. These reactions serve as rich feedback that can usefully inform future media literacy campaigns on social media, and especially those targeting youth audiences.

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ioana Literat ◽  
Abubakr Abdelbagi ◽  
Nicola YL Law ◽  
Marcus Y-Y Cheung ◽  
Rongwei Tang

To better understand youth attitudes towards media literacy education on social media, and the opportunities and challenges inherent in such initiatives, we conducted a large-scale analysis of user responses to a recent media literacy campaign on TikTok. We found that reactions to the cam-paign were mixed, and highly political in nature. While young people appreciated the urgency of media literacy education and understood its relevance to their social media participation, many displayed a sarcastic attitude, criticizing both the content and the dissemination of the campaign. Based on these responses, we identify key takeaways and recommendations that can valuably in-form future media literacy campaigns on social media.


2018 ◽  
Vol 41 (5) ◽  
pp. 689-707
Author(s):  
Tanya Notley ◽  
Michael Dezuanni

Social media use has redefined the production, experience and consumption of news media. These changes have made verifying and trusting news content more complicated and this has led to a number of recent flashpoints for claims and counter-claims of ‘fake news’ at critical moments during elections, natural disasters and acts of terrorism. Concerns regarding the actual and potential social impact of fake news led us to carry out the first nationally representative survey of young Australians’ news practices and experiences. Our analysis finds that while social media is one of young people’s preferred sources of news, they are not confident about spotting fake news online and many rarely or never check the source of news stories. Our findings raise important questions regarding the need for news media literacy education – both in schools and in the home. Therefore, we consider the historical development of news media literacy education and critique the relevance of dominant frameworks and pedagogies currently in use. We find that news media has become neglected in media literacy education in Australia over the past three decades, and we propose that current media literacy frameworks and pedagogies in use need to be rethought for the digital age.


2020 ◽  
Vol 101 (6) ◽  
pp. 70-70

In a recent survey, 36% of college admissions officers said they viewed applicants’ social media profiles. As of the end of 2019, 14 U.S. states have begun requiring some form of media literacy education.


Author(s):  
Samir Ljajić

Media reporting requires ethical prudence. Journalistic ethics must set norms, guidelines, rules, and codes that will provide for truthfulness and accuracy; impartiality and honesty; respect for personality and privacy; independence from individual interests; accountability to society and social goods; respect for the law; moral, competence and good taste.. New media offer quick contact, promotion, exchange of thought, and freedom of expression. New technologies, such as the Internet, do not change the necessity of posing basic ethical issues of privacy violations, intellectual property or identity theft, dissemination of fake information, but only give them a greater dimension. The current body of research provides ample evidence of the growing need for media literacy instruction in all schooling levels in order to educate and protect the young from unethical social media contents. Therefore, this paper will deal with the problem of media, ethical norms and media literacy education comprising teaching moral reasoning and critical thinking skills. Media literacy must be incorporated in all schooling levels, from the lowest and progressing towards the highest. Even the youngest ones nowadays know how to stream, how to twitch and use social media but they are not fully aware of possible negative effects. Media and the Internet especially should be seen as an instrument of change and progress but they can be manipulative as well. However, the role of the responsible society is to educate the young how to use media to their advantage and successfully differentiate ethical from the unethical in the media of the contemporary networking world. 


2018 ◽  
Vol 21 (2) ◽  
pp. 438-463 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cuihua Shen ◽  
Mona Kasra ◽  
Wenjing Pan ◽  
Grace A Bassett ◽  
Yining Malloch ◽  
...  

Fake or manipulated images propagated through the Web and social media have the capacity to deceive, emotionally distress, and influence public opinions and actions. Yet few studies have examined how individuals evaluate the authenticity of images that accompany online stories. This article details a 6-batch large-scale online experiment using Amazon Mechanical Turk that probes how people evaluate image credibility across online platforms. In each batch, participants were randomly assigned to 1 of 28 news-source mockups featuring a forged image, and they evaluated the credibility of the images based on several features. We found that participants’ Internet skills, photo-editing experience, and social media use were significant predictors of image credibility evaluation, while most social and heuristic cues of online credibility (e.g. source trustworthiness, bandwagon, intermediary trustworthiness) had no significant impact. Viewers’ attitude toward a depicted issue also positively influenced their credibility evaluation.


Kybernetes ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Miftachul Huda ◽  
Azmil Hashim

PurposeMedia literacy education is knowingly contributed to give insights in facilitating the interaction and communication, and thus enabling to understand the way we look at the world around us. However, the challenging issues emerged around need to take serious consent towards engaging the professional and ethical balance in the context of application strategy on media literacy education. This paper attempts to examine in addressing the ability with substantial foundation to recognize and understand between its benefit and its impacts assigned with analysing and evaluating the media engagement.Design/methodology/approachThis paper proposes the theoretical framework guideline with particular emphasis on empowering both professional and ethical dimensions relating to the media literacy and education to be keenly adhered to as a golden rule in media literacy, education and practice.FindingsThe findings reveal that such a marriage between the ethical dimensions and professional skills would promote the good of individuals, groups and broader society by addressing the inherent negative effects of media technology and practice. Consequently, the model would contribute to broader societal goodness and peaceful coexistence.Originality/valueThe professional and ethical balance being proposed here is necessary to reconsider the way and manner along with media technology tools utilized across different cultures with expressing the purpose of promoting appropriate and wise usage for the sustainable positive benefit of mankind at all times.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document