The use of social media and social networking sites (SNS) has greatly increased in the past few years. According to Alexa (2017), an Amazon company that collects data on online traffic that websites receive, the social networking sites Facebook, Twitter and Instagram are in the top 20 of websites that receive the most web traffic in the world. With Facebook being the third most heavily trafficked site behind YouTube and Google. These statistics indicate that social networking sites have become extremely popular and widely used by the public every day. With such prevalent use, research has been conducted to answer why people use social networking sites, what they use them for, and the effects they may have on users. One use of social media and SNSs that has been noted is for political expression (Zúñiga, Molyneux, & Zheng, 2014). In keeping with the theme of this website, this page will examine why individuals use SNS as a means of political expression, and whether this use can promote political participation online as well as offline.
To properly understand the effects that political expression on SNSs can have on its users, it is necessary to first understand why these individuals use SNSs as a means for political expression. Again, using the uses and gratifications theory (UGT) can help to explain this occurrence with its assertion that individuals use media to satisfy social and informational needs (Phua, Jin, & Kim, 2017). Therefore, these needs can be fulfilled by individuals who use social media as a means to gain information on politics and to express political views with others. In conjunction with utilizing UGT, social capital theory can also be used to explain why individuals use SNSs for political expression. Social capital theory is based on the principle that individuals strive to accumulate social capital through human relationships (Phua et al., 2017). Social capital itself has been defined in a multitude of ways by many different individuals without a concrete definition being agreed upon. However, most definitions include social capital as being the resources that are made available to an individual through their relationships with others and the social networks they are a part of. Previous research has determined that social capital can be effectively gained through the use of SNSs (Phua et al., 2017).
A recent study by Zúñiga, Jung and Valenzuela (2012) was conducted in order to examine the relationship between using social media for news and information, social capital, and political participation. The main focus of the study was to determine if using SNSs as a source for news increases an individual’s offline political participation. In the case of the study, political participation included such activities as attending political rallies, contacting elected public officials, and voting in elections (Zúñiga, Jung, & Valenzuela, 2012). The study was conducted using survey data which was acquired by having 475 participants fill out a self-report survey. The survey was designed to assess many factors of the participant including their social capital gained from working towards shared goals in their community, their online and offline political participation, their use of SNSs for as news sources, their general SNS use, and their political knowledge (Zúñiga et al., 2012).
The study yielded many results that shed light on the topic. The study found that using SNSs as a means for monitoring the news was effective at creating social capital for participants. The study also produced results which indicate that using SNSs for news and political expression is a positive and strong predictor of political participation online as well as offline (Zúñiga et al., 2012). Participants in the study who used SNSs as a source for news and information were much more likely to engage in both forms of political participation. While more research is needed to better explain the causal relationship between SNSs use and political participation, other research has yielded similar findings to this study. A meta-analysis by Boulianne (2014) examined the results of many different studies aimed at determining a relationship between social media use and political participation. The results of this meta-analysis indicated that there is a positive relationship between social media use and political participation (Boulianne, 2014). Future research will hopefully give the answer as to whether this relationship is causal or not.
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