"Was It Something I Said?" "No, It Was Something You Posted!" A Study of the Spiral of Silence Theory in Social Media Contexts
"Was It Something I Said?" "No, It Was Something You Posted!" A Study of the Spiral of Silence Theory in Social Media Contexts
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DOI：
10.1089/cyber.2014.0443
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发表时间：
2015-04-01
影响因子：
6.6
通讯作者：
Zhang, Weiwu
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Gearhart, Sherice;Zhang, Weiwu
新媒体技术的发展使学者们有必要重新审视在传统媒体中发展起来的大众传播理论。其中一个理论是诺埃尔-诺伊曼（Noelle-Neumann）在20世纪70年代最初提出的沉默螺旋理论。媒体内容的多样性、选择性、社交网站（SNS）的互动性以及匿名性的潜力对其理论假设提出了各种挑战。虽然沉默的螺旋在SNS语境中的应用已经理论化，但其实证检验却很少。为了填补这一空白，皮尤2012年的搜索，社交网络和政治调查被用来测试理论。结果表明，遇到令人愉快的政治内容预测说出来，而遇到不愉快的帖子扼杀意见表达，支持在SNS环境中的沉默理论的螺旋。然而，某些使用的SNS和心理因素表现出对意见表达的解放作用。
New media technologies make it necessary for scholars to reassess mass communication theories developed among legacy media. One such theory is the spiral of silence theory originally proposed by Noelle-Neumann in the 1970s. Increasing diversity of media content, selectivity, social networking site (SNS) interactivity, and the potential for anonymity have posed various challenges to its theoretical assumptions. While application of the spiral of silence in SNS contexts has been theorized, its empirical testing is scarce. To fill this void, the Pew 2012 Search, Social Networks, and Politics survey is used to test the theory. Results reveal that encountering agreeable political content predicts speaking out, while encountering disagreeable postings stifles opinion expression, supporting the spiral of silence theory in the SNS environment. However, certain uses of SNSs and psychological factors demonstrate a liberating effect on opinion expression.