دانلود رایگان مقاله انگلیسی پیام های طرفدار اجتماعی و اعتلا: واکنش فیس بوک به وعده کمک مالی مارک زاکربرگ - الزویر 2019

Abstract

This quantitative content analysis of over 4,000 Facebook posts explores the connections between transcendence-related character strengths and emotions expressed on social media in response to Mark Zuckerberg’s pledge to give away 99% of his Facebook shares to charity. We found that (a) other-oriented hope was found in over half of the posts expressing hopeful thinking; (b) appreciation of moral beauty and excellence was the most prevalent moral emotion or character strength expressed in response to this prosocial act on Facebook; and (c) the presence of appreciation of moral beauty and excellence was positively correlated with the presence of hope, other-oriented hope, and spirituality. Implications of the study are discussed.

Conclusion

Social media has great potential to serve as not only a channel for positive change, but also a venue to express and experience positivity. Emotions are contagious. Positive emotions may spread on social media just like they do in the physical world, albeit through different mechanisms such as status update, sharing, “liking,” and commenting. Prosocial messages on social media sites may elicit self-transcendent positive emotions such as elevation, hope, spirituality, and awe, which can lead to users’ written expressions of these emotions on social media. Reasonably, the most prevalent response on Facebook to the prosocial act examined in this study was the appreciation of beauty and excellence, followed by spirituality, other-oriented hope, and gratitude. This provides some implications for campaign and message designers in terms of which kind of positive responses to expect on social media when the message is about a generous act of social interest. Because each emotion is tied to a set of action tendencies, campaign designers can use this knowledge to develop targeted campaigns for prosocial goals. For example, feelings of elevation may lead one to emulate the person who showed moral beauty, to behave more virtuously, and to perform charitable acts (Algoe & Haidt, 2009). The action tendency most closely connected to gratitude is to thank or repay the benefactor (Smith, Tong, & Ellsworth, 2014; Watkins, Scheer, Ovnicek, & Kolts, 2006). The results regarding Facebook users’ expressions of self-transcendent emotions in response to Zuckerberg’s prosocial announcement allow us to better understand the kinds of emotions social media posts may inspire among individuals, bringing us one step closer to understanding the overall effects of exposure to these kinds of prosocial posts.