Media Theories and the Facebook Influence Model

Social media are immensely popular among, and influential upon today's youth. Previous media theories including Uses and Gratifications, Cultivation Analysis, and Media Ecology Theory have proposed ways in which media are used and can be influential. The rise of social media presents new challenges to existing behavioral and media theories. Recently, a new concept map called the Facebook Influence Model was developed to provide a conceptual approach to Facebook using primary data. This mixed methods study applied concept mapping methodology, a validated five step method to visually represent complex topics. The five steps include preparation, brainstorming, sort and rank, analysis, and interpretation. College student participants were identified using purposeful sampling. A total of 169 statements were generated during brainstorming and sorted into between 6 and 22 groups. The final concept map included 13 clusters. Interpretation of the data led to grouping of clusters into four final domains including: connection, comparison, identification, and Facebook as an experience. The Facebook Influence Concept Map illustrates key constructs that contribute to influence, incorporating perspectives of older adolescent Facebook users. While Facebook provides a novel lens through which to consider behavioral influence, it can best be considered in the context of existing behavioral theory. The concept map may be used towards development of potential future intervention efforts. 11.1 Media Theories and the Facebook Influence Model Over the past decade, media has undergone a fundamental shift. Traditional media such as television and radio provided content in a one directional manner, disseminating content created by a company or corporation to be consumed by passive viewers. Alternatively, new media often called social media or interactive media provide endless opportunities for users to act as both consumers and creators of media. Examples of interactivity on social media may include posting a new photo to Instagram, commenting on a YouTube video, or "downvoting" content on Reddit. New media are digital, and often have the characteristics of being manipulatable, networkable, dense, compressible, and interactive (Flew Smith, 2011) The emergence of new, digital technologies "signals a potentially radical shift of who is in control of information, experience and resources" (Shapiro, 1999) In this setting of dramatic change and rapid advancement, this chapter will consider social media and health behavior theory.  In order to understand the dynamics of online participation today, we must conceptualize areas where traditional media theory aligns with new media practices. The ability to apply traditional media theory to the new media landscape is best understood by the observation that there is an "underlying consistency of the content of the messages we consume and the nature of the symbolic environment in which we live" even if the delivery technology of the media chances (Shanahan Morgan, 1999) This idea suggests that even though the media we consume may change, the inherent content and intentions behind our media use are somewhat consistent over time and through different media. This occurred historically as films took message content from literature and again when television did the same by repackaging radio programming. Previous scholars have suggested that a change in media is merely "new bottles for old wine" (McLuhan, 1964) 11.2.1 Uses and Gratifications Uses and Gratifications Theory (UGT) discusses how people actively seek out specific media content for particular purposes and intentional goals (Katz, Blumler, Gurevitch, 1974) UGT establishes an active, rather than passive, audience member who has the ability to consciously examine and evaluate media in order to accomplish specific outcomes (Wang, Fine, Cai, 2008) UGT embodied a functional shift of communications scholarship, from examining not what media did to people, but to what people could do with media. UGT initially grew out of the needs and motivation theory, which suggests that people act in line with a specific personal hierarchy of needs (Maslow, 1970) Communications scholars quickly caught on to this notion and sought to determine typologies of needs for media consumption. Many versions of these typologies exist, Unauthenticated Download Date 9/14/19 4:48 AM 132 Media Theories and the Facebook Influence Model and suggest a variety of categories of purposeful media consumption that people may engage in. UGT "provides a framework for understanding when and how individual media consumers become more or less active and the consequences of that increased or decreased involvement" (West Turner, 2007) The theory has five main assumptions: (1) an audience is active and goal oriented in their media consumption, (2) media are used for gratifications, (3) media are in competition with other means of need satisfaction, (4) people understand their personal media use, interests, and motives enough to communicate with researchers about their choices, (5) the audience members are the only people who can make judgments regarding the value of the media content. The first assumption says that people bring both their own activity and goals to media. Four goals involved have been defined as diversion, or an escape from daily routines or problems, personal relationships, or when media acts as a substitute for friendship, surveillance, or information seeking for media to assist in an end goal, and personal identity, or the ways one can reinforce his or her individual values (McQuail, Blumler, Brown, 1972) The second assumption points to the agency of the audience in making a media choice. As UGT views audience members as active, they take initiative in seeking out media. The third assumption is the idea that media must compete with other sources to fulfill an audience's needs, which indicates that the audience and media do not exist in isolation but as a part of a larger society. This society influences both media, and audiences, in different ways. A fourth assumption, that people are self aware of their media use, discusses one of the perceived limitations of the theory. Some researchers feel that self report data are insufficient for understanding media use and that individuals may be unable to communicate their thought processes or habits for purposes of research. However, this thought is rooted in scholarship that views audience members as inactive. Another concern is that media use is not always active so accidental exposure and influence can occur. The fifth and final assumption of UGT requests that researchers make a concerted effort to remove their personal value judgments from the study of media content. As UGT discusses how an audience member fills his or her needs through the use of media, only an audience member should be able to evaluate the value of the given media content. 11.2.2 Cultivation Analysis Cultivation Analysis grew as a response to the pervasive television culture that was already well established in the 1970s. As a part of a larger study, regular examinations of television programming and the "conceptions of social reality that viewing cultivates Unauthenticated Download Date 9/14/19 4:48 AM Previous Media Theory 133 in audiences" were assessed (Gerbner Gross, 1976) Their initial idea was that mass communication cultivates certain beliefs about reality that are shared and held in common among mass communication viewers. Later, the same investigator noted, "most of what we know, or think we know, we have never personally experienced," suggesting that we "know" things due to the stories seen and heard in the media (Gerbner, 1998) Cultivation research in the internet era requires the consideration of cable and satellite networks, the use of digital video recording devices, and the internet. While the packaging of the content may change, the fundamental frameworks around television consumption remain. Cultivation Analysis sees media as a transmissional process in which media are sending messages across time and space, with a ritual perspective media are seen as representative of society's shared beliefs. This process is further understood through the assumptions of Cultivation Analysis.  Analysis says that the mediated reality depicted in mass communication functions as a foundation from which consumers cultivate their own social reality. All assumptions of this theory were developed with television specifically in mind, highlighting it as a unique medium. Due to the ubiquity of the technology, a lack of literacy necessary for consumption (unlike