دانلود رایگان مقاله نظریه نوآوری و نگرش نسبت به شرکت ها در رسانه های اجتماعی

abstract

Social media is one of the most contextually based media ever created. As such, the effects anticipated by priming theory would be expected to be especially strong. Using an online experiment, this study assessed the effects of linguistic tone and message relatedness present in the context of social media on publics’ attitudes towards organizations. It was expected that positive and negative tone would have positive and negative effects, respectively, and that the relatedness of the contextual prime would enhance those effects. About 100 participants in the study were randomly assigned to an experimental group to see a prime in the format of the popular social media site, Twitter. An analysis of the results showed that only negative primes had a significant effect on publics’ attitudes towards organizations, possibly reflecting an expectancy violation effect. Public relations professionals are called to engage in broader environmental monitoring to ensure their messages will be most effective.

5. Discussion

The results of this research demonstrate that the priming effect of contextual tone is at play in social media as it is in other forms of media, like television. The lack of support for the first hypothesis is somewhat surprising, given the results of Goldberg and Gorn’s (1987) research, which supported this kind of effect with television advertising. There was significant support, however, for the second hypothesis that negative contexts would result in more negative attitudes towards organizations.