Digital visibility and the role of mutual interaction expectations: Reframing the journalist–audience relationship through the lens of interpersonal communication

Abstract

In the light of a new level of reciprocal visibility in the digital age, the journalist–audience relationship has fundamentally changed. Mutual expectations become visible or evolve anew. The question arises as to how these expectations and their (non-)fulfillment influence the journalist–audience relationship. Taking an interpersonal communication perspective by following expectancy violations theory, we focus on the level of interactions and propose a theoretical framework explaining how the interplay of journalists’ and audience’s mutual expectations affects their relationship. Our aim is to contribute to a better understanding of the journalist–audience relationship in digital media environments—and to provide indications for its functioning or failure.

Perkembangan aplikasi teori pelanggaran harapan dalam berbagai konteks komunikasi: tinjauan pustaka sistematis

“…Lee et al, 2018;Piercy & Underhill, 2021; Gustia, 2022 Perkembangan aplikasi teori pelanggaran harapan dalam berbagai konteks komunikasi: tinjauan pustaka sistematis Tao, 2018) dan hubungan romantis (DelGreco & Denes, 2020;Kelly et al, 2017;Niehuis et al, 2019Niehuis et al, , 2020. Konteks lain yang cukup banyak ditemukan adalah jurnalisme (Waddell, 2018(Waddell, , 2019Wilhelm et al, 2021), media baru (Carr et al, 2018;Hong et al, 2021;Kalman et al, 2021), komunikasi politik (Bullock & Hubner, 2020;Cassese & Holman, 2018;E.-J. Lee et al, 2018), media sosial (Brody, 2021;Grant et al, 2018;J.…”

The paradox of knowing more and less: Audience metrics and the erosion of epistemic standards on the internet

“…Over the last years, these changes have gradually highlighted at least three arenas in which the relationship between journalism and audiences has also affected how journalism and audiences negotiate the premises on which their discourse is increasingly built. Driven by mutual expectations (Wilhelm et al, 2021), this negotiation has thus yielded a rebalancing of expectations between journalism and its surroundings in the arenas of the journalistic profession, the media market, and the public sphere as a whole.…”

“…In other words, job titles and task responsibilities calling for audience engagement or analytics optimization have journalism revisiting norms within the journalistic profession -weighting clicks against importance or balancing anticipated engagement with expected political impact (Haim, 2019). In addition, journalistic verification practices online are increasingly geared to strengthen the visibility (transparency) of the editorial process to the audience (Koliska & Chadha, 2018) and the audience's participation in it (Aitamurto, 2016), thereby more closely aligning expectations between both sides (Karlsson, 2011;Wilhelm et al, 2021).…”

“…To audiences, gaining knowledge about audiences previously meant to draw conclusions from common knowledge about ratings or circulation metrics whereas algorithms and big data strongly contribute to more transparency in the form of popularity cues and engagement metrics, ranking mechanisms and socialmedia recommendations, open-ended user feedback and public outlet reputation (e.g., Chen & Pain, 2019;Craft et al, 2016;Haim et al, 2018;Lee & Tandoc, 2017). Users are also better informed about journalism through greater transparency of editorial processes and expanded possibilities of audience participation in such processes (Karlsson, 2011;Wilhelm et al, 2021). As such, in today's online media environment, both audiences and journalism are increasingly capable of accumulating both more and more differentiated knowledge about the respective other side.…”

Visibility in the digital age: Introduction

“…It is also evident, for example, when studies look at whether and how actors (e. g., journalists, scientists, politicians, teachers, media outlets, corporations, political institutions, etc.) seek -intentionally or unintentionally -visibility or invisibility or become potentially recognizable (e.g., Bock & Probst, 2018;Cruz, 2017;Flyverbom, Leonardi, Stohl, & Stohl, 2016;Karlsson, 2011;Wilhelm, Stehle, & Detel, 2021). Stohl, Stohl, and Leonardi (2016, p. 125) shed light on actors' (strategic) handling of visibility by analyzing it as "(1) the availability of information, (2) approval to share information, and (3) the accessibility of information to third parties".…”