Higher Education Institutions on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter: Comparing Swiss Universities’ Social Media Communication

Abstract

Public communication has become more important to higher education institutions (HEIs), with many HEIs using social media to communicate with stakeholders. However, scholarship on the subject is scarce and mainly based on single-platform studies and small datasets. Therefore, we conducted a cross-platform study to examine the communication of all Swiss HEIs on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. The results were based on two datasets: an automated analysis on data for all Swiss HEIs (<em>n</em> = 42) and their social media accounts from 2004 to 2021 (337,232 posts from 207 accounts), and a manual content analysis on 1,500 posts per platform. By including all HEIs in one country, this study allowed for a comparison of the results by HEI type: universities of applied sciences, universities of teacher education, and research universities. Results show that, in recent years, HEI communication increased on Instagram, but not on Facebook or Twitter. Twitter was used the most by research universities, while most Instagram and Facebook posts were from universities of applied sciences. Universities of teacher education were least active across all platforms. The content of communication across all HEI types was primarily self-referential. Our analysis of how well HEIs used the affordances of social media communication relative to hypertextuality and multimodality revealed a generally high level of adaption. Moreover, our data showed no substantial impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on posting activities and engagement with social media posts by HEIs for the two first years of the pandemic.

From Research to Retweets—Exploring the Role of Educational Twitter (X) Communities in Promoting Science Communication and Evidence-Based Teaching

“…In this context, interaction refers to preferences such as direct engagement with others under tweets or linked content that directs interaction to other websites. This highlights a significant need for action in science communication, since teachers desire interaction with universities, yet university tweets are seldom dialogue-oriented, mostly being self-referential [5,6]. There are already several models on how researcher-teacher relationships can be formed to encourage teachers' adoption and implementation of research findings [96], which this study builds upon and contributes to.…”

“…While teachers' activity on Instagram has been previously examined, the focus was mainly on its use for professional development and networking [80]. Unlike Twitter, Instagram is increasingly favored by educational institutions and teachers [6,81]. This indicates a need for further research and the identification of suitable channels for science communication with teachers.…”

“…The term "Twitter" is used in the following, as during the data collection period, the social network was known by that name and the analysis is based on its functionalities at that time, rather than the limited functionality of X. Twitter has gained significant popularity as a platform for science communication. Much research exists on how scientists or universities utilize Twitter to disseminate their research findings [1][2][3][4] and engage with audiences [5][6][7]. Simultaneously, Twitter has also become a prevalent platform among teachers.…”

“…Dialogical communication structures appear to be of significant importance in this regard, evident in university science communication. University Twitter feeds target a broad audience but rarely utilize dialogic loop features [5,6]. Although research universities are notably active on Twitter, teacher education institutions are the least active [6].…”

“…University Twitter feeds target a broad audience but rarely utilize dialogic loop features [5,6]. Although research universities are notably active on Twitter, teacher education institutions are the least active [6]. Therefore, it is crucial to consider both the activity in educational research and educational practice to bridge the gap between theory and practice and to promote knowledge transfer [20].…”