The tweet goes on: Interconnection of Twitter opinion leadership, network size, and civic engagement

Park, Chang Sup; Kaye, Barbara K.

doi:10.1016/j.chb.2016.12.021

Cited by 70 publications

(55 citation statements)

References 34 publications

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“…Only about 15.02% (1377/9165) of tweets received by ordinary users are directly from traditional mass media sources (eg, Cable News Network); most are filtered through opinion leaders who selectively retweet information from mass media sources [11]. Twitter opinion leaders—people who occupy central positions in their social networks, have numerous well-connected followers, have social status and credibility, and are emulated by their followers—are important members of Web-based communities as they control which information diffuses through social networks [12].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Tobacco Use Behaviors, Attitudes, and Demographic Characteristics of Tobacco Opinion Leaders and Their Followers: Twitter Analysis

Chu¹,

Majmundar²,

Allem³

et al. 2019

J Med Internet Res

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BackgroundTobacco-related content on social media is generated and propagated by opinion leaders on the Web who disseminate messages to others in their network, including followers, who then continue to spread the information. Opinion leaders can exert powerful influences on their followers’ knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors; yet, little is known about the demographic characteristics and tobacco use behavior of tobacco opinion leaders on the Web and their followers, compared with general Twitter users.ObjectiveIn this study, we hypothesized that opinion leaders use more tobacco products and have higher nicotine dependence than the other 2 groups (eg, followers and general Twitter users) and that followers—those who spread messages by opinion leaders—would more likely be in demographic groups that are vulnerable to tobacco marketing influence (eg, young adults and lower educational attainment).MethodsWe constructed the social networks of people who tweet about tobacco and categorized them using a combination of social network and Twitter metrics. To understand the characteristics of tobacco opinion leaders and their followers, we conducted a survey of tobacco opinion leaders, their followers, and general Twitter users. The sample included 347 opinion leaders, 567 followers, and 519 general users. The opinion leaders had a median of 1000 followers, whereas followers and general users had fewer than 600 followers.ResultsOpinion leaders were more likely than their followers to report past month use of tobacco products; followers, in turn, were more likely to report past month use of these products than general Twitter users. The followers appeared to be an especially vulnerable group; they tended to be younger (mean age 22.4 years) and have lower education compared with the opinion leaders and general users.ConclusionsFollowers of Twitter tobacco opinion leaders are a vulnerable group that might benefit from antitobacco education to counter the protobacco communications they see on social media.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Tobacco Use Behaviors, Attitudes, and Demographic Characteristics of Tobacco Opinion Leaders and Their Followers: Twitter Analysis

Chu¹,

Majmundar²,

Allem³

et al. 2019

J Med Internet Res

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“…Furthermore, we identify opinion leaders by their hashtag usage and structural positions, since networks, more than demographics, can characterize Twitter opinion leaders [30].…”

Section: Network Analysismentioning

confidence: 99%

The Refugee/Migrant Crisis Dichotomy on Twitter

Nerghes¹,

Lee

2018

Proceedings of the 10th ACM Conference on Web Science

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Media reports, political statements, and social media debates on the refugee/migrant crisis shape the ways in which people and societies respond to those displaced people arriving at their borders world wide. These current events are framed and experienced as a crisis, entering the media, capturing worldwide political attention, and producing diverse and contradictory discourses and responses. The labels "migrant" and "refugee" are frequently distinguished and conflated in traditional as well as social media when describing the same groups of people. In this paper, we focus on the simultaneous struggle over meaning, legitimization, and power in representations of the refugee crisis, through the specific lens of Twitter. The 369,485 tweets analyzed in this paper cover two days after a picture of Alan Kurdi -a three-year-old Syrian boy who drowned in the Mediterranean Sea while trying to reach Europe with his familymade global headlines and sparked wide media engagement. More specifically, we investigate the existence of the dichotomy between the "deserving" refugee versus the "undeserving" migrant, as well as the relationship between sentiment expressed in tweets, their influence, and the popularity of Twitter users involved in this dichotomous characterization of the crisis. Our results show that the Twitter debate was predominantly focused on refugee related hashtags and that those tweets containing such hashtags were more positive in tone. Furthermore, we find that popular Twitter users as well as popular tweets are characterized by less emotional intensity and slightly less positivity in the debate, contrary to prior expectations. Co-occurrence networks expose the structure underlying hashtag usage and reveal a refugee-centric core of meaning, yet divergent goals of some prominent users. As social media become increasingly prominent venues for debate over a crisis, how and why people express their opinions offer valuable insights into the nature and direction of these debates.

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“…By directing public attention toward a particular brand, product, or issue, opinion leaders are able to drive trends for the vast majority of ordinary social group members (Schuster et al, 2006). Additionally, opinion leaders are capable of influencing the attitudes and behaviors of their followers (Hogg, Hains & Mason, 1998;Park & Kaye, 2017). Therefore, conventional opinion leaders are commonly conceptualized in terms of their ability to influence, reflect, and uphold social group norms in social interactions (Dalrymple et al, 2013;Katz & Lazarsfeld, 1955).…”

Section: 1opinion Leadershipmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Although opinion leaders are capable of influencing the attitudes of their social group members, they do not necessarily occupy formal positions of power (Dalrymple et al, 2013;Katz & Lazarsfeld, 1955;Nisbet & Kotcher, 2009). Instead, opinion leaders can be found in various social, economic, or political standings (Katz, 1957;Park & Kaye, 2017;Shah & Scheufele, 2006). More importantly, opinion leaders actively exert their attitudinal influence by emphasizing their prototypicality and social attraction (Hogg, 2001;Hogg et al, 1998), which are described below.…”

Section: Characteristics Of Opinion Leadersmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Furthermore, many studies have focused on analyzing the textual elements of microblogging SNS, such as Twitter (Park & Kaye, 2017, Xu et al, 2014 and Weibo (Zhang et al, 2016). This fails to account for the visual elements (e.g., images, gifs, and videos) that distinguish SNS from earlier digital media platforms (e.g., online forums).…”

Section: Chapter 1: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Spokespersons for science : examining the attitudinal and behavioral influences of opinion leaders on YouTube

Looi¹

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The ease of content creation and distribution on social networking sites (SNS) has necessitated modifications to the conventional perspective of opinion leadership and spurred ordinary users to become opinion leaders, also known as social media influencers (SMIs). SMIs serve as independent endorsers that create and distribute content to an extensive network of followers on SNS. Due to the burgeoning social prominence and widespread popularity of SMIs in today's media environment, there is a resurgence of scholarly interest in opinion leadership on SNS. This study serves as the first empirical assessment of SMIs on YouTube. Guided by the social identity theory of leadership and using the contentious issue of nuclear energy development, this study examines how SMIs influence the attitudes and behaviors of their social group members. This 3 (Attitude similarity: Similar vs. mixed vs. dissimilar) x 2 (Social group status: Ordinary YouTube user vs. SMI) between-subjects factorial experiment was conducted with 251 Singapore citizens and permanent residents from an online survey panel. Attitude similarity significantly predicted participants' attitudes toward the YouTube video, their attitude strength toward nuclear energy development, and their willingness to share the YouTube video. Attitude similarity also interacted with social group status to influence participants' willingness to share the YouTube video. Theoretical and practical implications, as well as directions for future research were discussed.

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The tweet goes on: Interconnection of Twitter opinion leadership, network size, and civic engagement

Cited by 70 publications

References 34 publications

Tobacco Use Behaviors, Attitudes, and Demographic Characteristics of Tobacco Opinion Leaders and Their Followers: Twitter Analysis

Tobacco Use Behaviors, Attitudes, and Demographic Characteristics of Tobacco Opinion Leaders and Their Followers: Twitter Analysis

The Refugee/Migrant Crisis Dichotomy on Twitter

Spokespersons for science : examining the attitudinal and behavioral influences of opinion leaders on YouTube

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