FCRP - Emergent Media

Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://localhost:4000/handle/123456789/96

Browse

Now showing 1 - 20 of 24

A Roadmap for the Design of a Public-participation Geographic-Information System to Support Urban Ageing
(AGH University Press, 2025) Aslanoğlu, Rengin; Chrobak, Grzegorz; Van Hoof, Joost; Perek-Białas, Jolanta M.; Ivan, Loredana; Tavy , Zsuzsu K.C.T; Maj, Milena; Kazak, Jan K.
Geospatial technologies have the potential to transform the lives of older adults by providing them with necessary tools to navigate their local communities, access services, connect with others, and access valuable information. However, the usability and accessibility of such technologies often fall short of the needs of older adults. Many existing geospatial tools are not designed with the needs and preferences of older adults in mind; this can lead to usability challenges and limit their usage. This paper explores a participatory approach in developing an inclusive geodata-collection tool that is specifically tailored to older users’ needs. The paper also highlights the importance of incorporating user-centered design principles, participatory design methods, and accessibility guidelines throughout the entire geodata-tool-development process. It also emphasizes the need for ongoing user engagement and feedback in order to ensure that the tool remains relevant and usable in the evolving digital landscape. This participatory approach has resulted in a tool that is easy to use and accessible for older adults; it is available in various languages, thus ensuring that the elderly can actively participate in the prototype’s creation and contribute to the collection of the geospatial information that reflects their lived experiences and needs.
Asking ChatGPT How to Fight Visual Ageism on Websites: Pitfall or Opportunity?
(Springer, 2024) Loos, Eugène; Ivan, Loredana; Sourbati, Maria
This paper explores the extent to which ChatGPT can be used to combat visual ageism, i.e., “the social practice of visually underrepresenting older people or misrepresenting them in a prejudiced way” [1, p.164] on websites. First, insights from earlier empirical studies on visual ageism are presented to illustrate how ageist pictures can be injurious to older people and howto combat this. Then, a chat session with ChatGPT will be used to discover whether the tool can generate reliable advice on how to counter visual ageism on websites. Finally, ChatGPT’s advice will be evaluated from a scientific point of view.
Beyond Self-Presentation. An Analysis of the Romanian Governmental Communications on Facebook
(Babes-Bolyai University, Faculty of Political, Administrative and Communication Sciences, Public Administration Department, 2023) Zeru, Florin; Balaban, Delia Cristina; Bârgăoanu, Alina
The present study is one of the few studies that examine the social media communication of the Romanian governmental institutions from a systematic perspective accounting for three categories of messages that enhance the goals of pen governance, transparency, participation, and collaboration. Our research contributes to developing the research methodology in the field, given the methodological tool we used based on previous literature on social media communication of public institutions with relevant elements added from political communication. The research focuses on the official Facebook pages of the following Romanian governmental institutions: the Romanian Government, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Ministry of National Defense, the Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure, the Ministry of Education, and the Ministry of Health. Moreover, based on content analysis of N = 2,484 Facebook posts, we examined how different social media content generates differences in citizen engagement. Findings showed that the Romanian governmental institutions we analyzed frequently used Facebook posts. However, we observed significant differences between the institutions regarding message types. Our results align with previous research conducted in other Western countries showing that public institutions mostly used social media for impression management and transparent communication and less for participation and collaboration.
Can AI-Attributed News Challenge Partisan News Selection? Evidence from a Conjoint Experiment
(SAGE Publications, 2025) Zoizner, Alon; Matthes, Jörg; Corbu, Nicoleta; De Vreese, Claes; Esser, Frank; Koc-Michalska, Karolina; Schemer, Christian; Theocharis, Yannis; Zilinsky, Jan
With artificial intelligence (AI) increasingly shaping newsroom practices, scholars debate how citizens perceive news attributed to algorithms versus human journalists. Yet, little is known about these preferences in today’s polarized media environment, where partisan news consumption has surged. The current study explores this issue by providing a comprehensive and systematic examination of how citizens evaluate AI-attributed news compared to human-based news from like-minded and cross-cutting partisan sources. Using a preregistered conjoint experiment in the United States (N = 2,011) that mimics a high-choice media environment, we find that citizens evaluate AI-attributed news as negatively as cross-cutting news sources, both in terms of attitudes (perceived trustworthiness) and behavior (willingness to read the news story), while strongly preferring like-minded sources. These patterns remain stable across polarizing and non-polarizing issues and persist regardless of citizens’ preexisting attitudes toward AI, political extremity, and media trust. Our findings thus challenge more optimistic views about AI’s potential to facilitate exposure to diverse viewpoints. Moreover, they suggest that increased automation of news production faces both public mistrust and substantial reader resistance, raising concerns about the future viability of AI in journalism.
Critical, connected and caring: older adults’ agency during the COVID-19 pandemic
(Policy Press, 2024) Mandache, Luminița-Anda; Ivan, Loredana
Considering (1) the current context of social and economic polarisation in Eastern Europe, which represents older people as experiencing ‘red nostalgia’ and presents them as passive citizens, and (2) the increased vulnerabilities of older people during the COVID-19 pandemic as a main target of restrictive policies, we explored the experiences of older people during the COVID-19 lockdown period in Romania in 2020. We carried out 12 semi-structured interviews with older people from rural and urban areas to understand how they experienced the lockdown period and made sense of the pandemic. We perceived the pandemic as a holistic experience that affected different aspects of social life. We learned that older people manifested their agency in multiple forms. First, they were critical of lockdown measures imposed on them while at the same time understanding the need to control the spread of the COVID-19 virus, signalling a more complex political subjectivity among this group than popular narratives suggest. Second, older people made heavy independent use of information and communications technology. Lastly, all interviewees shared a sense of care for people they considered to be more vulnerable than themselves, illustrating that older people are not only the target of care and empathy by others in society but also the source of care and empathy for others in society. These aspects situate older people as active citizens, critical of the state, engaged in the use of technology and caring for people other than those in their immediate circle – all signs that they are actively part of the flow of society.
Developing a Digital and Traditional Political Participation (DTPP) Scale for Youth: A Validity and Reliability Study
(College of Communication and Public Relations, NUPSPA, 2023) Kuș, Zafer; Bertani, Michele; Ivan, Loredana; Mert, Hilal
The purpose of this study is to develop and validate a political participation scale for youth, considering both traditional and digital political participation (DTPP). The research was conducted using 458 participants from Turkey, Italy, and Romania, aged between 15 and 29 years. Explanatory Factor Analysis (EFA) and Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) were performed to test the structural validity of the scale. EFA results illustrated that scale consisted of three factors and the total variance was 61.23%. These factors were labeled as “digital political support”, “traditional political support” and “digital political following”. During confirmatory factor analysis, the three-factor structure was tested, and the resulting model produced an acceptable goodness of fit The scale consists of 39 items and the reliability coefficients for each subscale vary from .92 and .95. The results show that the scale is valid and reliable to measure traditional and digital political participation of young people.
From digital skills to digital repertoires: towards conceptualisation of technology use
(UCL Press, 2025) Ivan, Loredana
"Current literature on digital society often refers to digital skills as key in creating advantages and opportunities – or, conversely, disadvantages and inequalities (Hüsing et al. 2015; Kiss 2017). The concept of a ‘digital divide’ has been built on the idea that there are differences in usage and skills between certain groups of people, with those more affected by related vulnerability being women, older people and those with lower levels of education and/or lower incomes (van eursen & van Dijk 2010; 2011). In such rhetoric, older people are normally portrayed as lacking digital skills or access to the latest communication technologies (see Ivan and Loos 2023). To offer a deeper analysis of the ‘digital skills’ concept in the context of digitalisation today, this chapter argues instead for use of the term ‘digital repertoire’. This concept, which describes the everyday practices of technology use, is more inclusive and brings nuance to the understanding of the way in which different social groups form part of the technological ecology (Edgerly et al. 2018; Peters et al. 2022). This in turn expands on the analysis offered by the dominant ‘digital skills’ concept by describing the relation between people and technology, predominant in today’s global context of competition, fluid labour markets and digital transformations. The Covid-19 pandemic has also accentuated the prominence of the concept of ‘digital skills’ and blocked. Subsequently, the chapter draws attention to how the concept of digital skills has been measured. Traditionally self-assessment and performance tests, a metric that evaluates people’s readiness for the future labour market, have been used. In this way, the term raises serious concerns about the normativity and linearity of the ‘digital skills’ concept, as well as its potential to reinforce a range of prejudices, including ageism, in describing the digital competencies of older adults. Furthermore, the concept of twenty-first-century digital skills is presented in the chapter as a non-linear and less reductionist way of measuring people’s digital skills. It includes a broader perspective of the role of digital transformations in people’s lives. Finally, this chapter departs from a behaviourist approach (‘more is better’) to a functionalist perspective (based on the role played by different technologies in people’s lives) by discussing the value of using ‘digital repertoires’. As noted above, this concept serves to reveal the ways in which people navigate digital realities today, including the norms and conventions of digital interactions. The concept of digital repertoires allows not only for the investigation of individual digital use, but also for the co-use, supported use, non-use and discontinued use of digital technologies. Investigating digital repertoires through ethnographic and narrative research (Hänninen et al. 2021a), as well as the use of longitudinal and cross-cultural data (see Ivan and Nimrod 2021), offers a focus on digital practices. This chapter also puts forward the argument that repertoires evolve through time, place and available technologies. It concludes by considering the role of digital repertoires for policy-making, providing an in-depth exploration of current digital realities"
Hate Speech in Social Media and Its Effects on the LGBT Community: A Review of the Current Research
(College of Communication and Public Relations, NUPSPA, 2021) Ștefăniță, Oana; Buf, Diana Maria
Hate speech on social media is a real problem with real consequences. Despite the constant efforts of social media platforms to moderate, flag, and ban hate posts, there is still a vast amount of hateful content flooding them. Hate speech, in general, and offensive material online, in particular, are not easy to define and may include a wide spectre of expression. To thoroughly account for the nature and intensity of the effects of hate speech in social media requires to distinguish between various shades of hate speech targeting different groups and their subsequent effects. This paper seeks to review the literature on the psychological effects of online hate speech on the LGBT community and to highlight the strong negative impact of this phenomenon. The paper aims to contribute to the field by examining the propagation and the effects of derogatory language and hate speech based on sexual orientation.
Hate speech in the Romanian online media and its impact on peoplețs civic engagement with the Roma minority
(Publishing House of the Romanian Academy, 2023) Negrea-Busuioc, Elena; Buturoiu, Raluca; Oprea, Denisa Adriana; Boțan, Mădălina
In addition to their potential to stimulate conversation and participation in the (online) public sphere, social media have also become a springboard for hate speech (KhosraviNik & Esposito, 2018). Ethnic minorities are among the preferred targets of online hateful content. In this paper, we report findings from an experiment that measured the extent to which exposure to various degrees of hate speech on Facebook, accompanied by positive or negative comments, might influence Romanians’ willingness to engage civically with the Roma minority. The results show that the level of civic engagement is negatively impacted by exposure to hateful content, ranging from derogatory to extreme hate speech. People’s willingness to support the Roma minority is reduced by exposure to hateful Facebook posts accompanied by negative comments. Furthermore, negative comments are associated with lower levels of civic engagement, which may suggest that reactions to hate speech could play a more significant role than the post itself.
Involving Older People in Participatory Action Research: An Example of Participatory Action Design
(College of Communication and Public Relations, NUPSPA, 2018) Schiau, Ioana; Ivan, Loredana; Bîră, Monica
Participatory Action Research (PAR) has as a main goal the collaborative construction and production of meanings between the researchers and the participants. PAR has been largely used in the area of technology creation and appropriation involving end-users in different stages of technology designing process. However, research studies concerning older people and their use of technology employ PAR to a lesser extent. In the current paper we provide arguments for the value of different participative action approaches when studying technology appropriation by older people, and present an example of a participatory action design that we have implemented in three Romanian cities, with people 60+, to reveal the way older adults depict their experience in using Facebook. We used a five-step collaborative research design – (1) initial evaluation; (2) training session; (3) immediate evaluation; (4) group co-creation; (5) final evaluation – to reflect on the participants’ experience through groups techniques and participant observation notes. Results reveal the fact that one trainer per each participant, adapting the interaction to the participant’s individual needs, intergenerational trainer-trainee communication and patience, as well as proper timing of the organized sessions are key factors to foster participant engagement with social media. In addition, the proposed participatory action design proved to have some potential to empower older people in long time engagement with social media.
Media Construction of Sport Celebrities as National Heroes
(College of Communication and Public Relations, NUPSPA, 2018) Dumitriu, Diana Luiza
Within the broader media-sport nexus framework, sport is known for providing not only engaging performances for the entertainment market, but also important symbolic capital in terms of national identity and public diplomacy. The present paper looks at how these dimensions overlap, focusing on the centrality of the media logic within the dynamics of the social field of sport and its corollary celebrization imagery. The aim of the paper is, thus, to identify the contextual aspects and the legitimation strategies mobilized through media discourses in the overlap of the star status and the national hero image of a sport actor. When and how does media crown an athlete with the national hero aura? What does this national hero status involve in terms of identity and identification mechanisms? Focusing on a corpus of 310 online articles and 12 Facebook highlights published by two main Romanian sport newspapers during the 2014 Roland Garros Tournament, the study discusses the media construction of the raising sport star, Simona Halep (i.e. first Romanian tennis player to enter Top 3 WTA), as national hero. The analysis examines not only the symbolic power of the sport performances as national identity resources and celebrity input, but also the engaging deliberative spaces that emerge along with the national hero frame and the hybrid form of civic celebrity practices involved in legitimizing it.
Mobile phone use before and during the COVID-19 pandemic – a panel study of older adults in seven countries
(SAGE Publications, 2024) Taipale, Sakari; Oinas. Tomi; Ivan, Loredana; Rosenberg, Dennis
The aim of this study was to investigate the changes in older adults’ mobile phone use from before to during the COVID-19 pandemic. The media displacement and digital divide approaches served as the theoretical frameworks of the study. The data were drawn from the 2018 and 2020 waves of the Aging + Communication + Technology cross-national longitudinal panel study. The sample consisted of older Internet users, aged 62 to 96 (in 2018), from Austria, Canada, Finland, Israel, the Netherlands, Romania, and Spain, who participated in both waves (N = 4,398). Latent class analysis and latent transition analysis with multinomial regression models were the main methods applied to the data. With regard to the findings, three mobile phone function use profiles—Narrow Use, Medium Use, and Broad Use—were identified from the data. Lower age, being married, higher income, and place of residence (in 2018) predicted belonging to the three profiles, while country differences in the prevalence of the profiles were substantial. Between 2018 and 2020, transition from one profile to another was relatively rare but typically toward the “Broad Use” category. Profile transitions were most common in Romania, while stability was highest in Finland, Israel, and Canada. In addition, gender, age, marital status, and place of residence predicted the likelihood of changing from one profile to another between 2018 and 2020. The results suggest that older adults’ mobile phone function use is relatively stable over a two-year time span. While new mobile phone functions are adopted, they seem to augment the spectrum of mobile usage rather than displace older similar functionalities. In addition, demographic, socioeconomic, and country-level digital divides, although slightly modified over time, remain significant among older adults.
Not only people are getting old, the new media are too: Technology generations and the changes in new media use
(SAGE Publications, 2022) Loos, Eugène; Ivan, Loredana
This article investigates the changes in the use of traditional and new media by different technology generations. Focusing on the changes in the use of Email, Chat and Social Network Sites by older people, it explores the process by which new media become ‘old’ and reach a saturation point. Collected survey data suggest differences in media use between the three technology generations distinguished in this study: the ‘mechanical’ generation (born in 1938 or before), the ‘household revolution’ generation (born between 1939 and 1948), and the ‘technology spread’ generation (born between 1949 and 1963). This longitudinal and transnational study provides evidence of media saturation, showing that an increase in both the availability of and access to media does not lead to an increase in use, even in older adults who are behind in the adoption of the new media. Finally, the article discusses the findings, arguing for an interplay between individual and structural lag in later life.
Older Adults and the Digital Divide in Romania: Implications for the Covid-19 Pandemic
(2021-10-31) Ivan, Loredana; Cutler, Stephen
At the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, Romania invoked the 15th Amendment of the European Convention of Human Rights for emergency situations and issued an Emergency State Presidential Decree (first put into effect on March 16 and extended until May 15, 2020). This amendment allowed for exemptions from broad categories of human rights (e.g., the right to privacy and intimacy). Older people became the main target of the Romanian government’s plans for isolation. Using data from the Romanian National Institute of Statistics and data gathered prior to the COVID-19 pandemic from a longitudinal study on communication technologies used by older people in Romania (Loos, Nimrod, & Fernández-Ardèvol, 2018; 2020), we examine the digital inequalities faced by Romanian elders. The current study addresses the following specific research questions: (1) what digital opportunities and limitations were faced by the older population of Romania: e.g., online shopping, asking for help from various organizations using online platforms, using online medical assistance, etc., and (2) how did digital inequalities shape the lives of older people in Romania? Although the data do not reflect the situation of older Internet users during pandemics, we used the most recent and detailed data regarding Internet behavior of older adults in Romania. The current article discusses the opportunities faced by those who already had access and Internet skills when the pandemic started, and the limitations faced by older people who were less digitally skilled. With many of the daily activities moving online during this period, older adults with poor digital skills or no Internet access risked social isolation. Also, we consider policy recommendations to reduce digital inequalities that affect elders. Although we focus on Romania, the current study typifies vulnerabilities older people face in emergent economies during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Patterns of Digital Behavior on Instant Messiging Platforms. WhatsApp Uses among Young People from Romania
(2020-12) Corbu, Nicoleta; Boțan, Mădălina; Buturoiu, Raluca; Dumitrache, Alexandru Cristian
This paper examines the digital behaviour on one widely used instant messaging (IM) platform, namely WhatsApp, of young people in Romania, with a focus on the reasons for sharing information on the platform and dependency of using it. Within the broad framework of the digital single market, little is known about the motivations and behavioural patterns of young Europeans while using the increasingly popular IM platforms, nor is it clear whether country characteristics are relevant or not when evaluating the impact of such technological platforms on the life of young audiences. Rooted in the uses and gratifications perspective, this study uses media diaries (N = 229), filled in by young people in an ordinary day of the week and self-administered questionnaires in order to assess what might be the main gratifications that lead young and educated people to share information on WhatsApp and what makes them spend more time and be dependent on the platform on a daily basis. Main results show that the most frequent reasons why young Romanians use WhatsApp are social, professional, and instrumental. Moreover, the tendency to share content on the platform is higher for people who use it for instrumental and informative purposes. Dependency on the platform is significantly higher for young people who use it to fulfil affective needs (i.e., to express or receive affection or emotional support and avoid loneliness).
Risk and Crisis Communication Research in Romania
(John Wiley & Sons, 2025) Buzoianu, Corina; Bîră, Monica; Bârgăoanu, Alina
The chapter looks into the theories, methods, and means of crisis communication in Romania by examining the evolution of research and practices since the fall of communism. As a result of the transition period that followed the events of 1989, the field of communication, and, consequently, crisis communication-related topics, have been shaped by the adoption of theories, practices, and guidelines from US and Western European literature. When discussing the development of risk and crisis communication in Romania, we must consider the various context-dependent challenges and constraints that have impacted both scholars and practitioners. For this, the chapter delves into the institutional, media, and audience perspectives of crisis communication in Romania.
Romanian Older Adults’ Views of the Age-Friendliness of their City: The Importance of Digital Technologies
(Springer Nature, 2025) Rădulescu, Cristina; Ivan, Loredana; Loos, Eugène
Regions around the world have undergone different patterns of urbanization, with North America and Europe currently being the most urbanized areas: over 75% of the people live in urban communities [1, 2]. Eventually, people will grow old in cities and experience all aspects of the urban environment later in life. The World Health Organization [3] launched the age-friendly city and communities’ movement that proposes solutions for older people to age actively by improving their welfare and social participation. In Europe, numerous urban communities are following the age-friendly city agenda and have become members of the Global Age-Friendly Cities Network. The concept of an age-friendly city comprised eight dimensions: (1) outdoor spaces and buildings; (2) transportation; (3) housing; (4) social participation; (5) respect and social inclusion; (6) civic participation and employment; (7) communication and information; and (8) community support and health services. Using a qualitative explorative approach, we conducted a series of interviews with older adults (60 years and more) in Bucharest (N = 20) from December 2023 to June 2024 to understand their meaning of an “age-friendly” community and the perceived role of digital technology in the process of making urban communities more livable. The results are analyzed by contrasting the views of more vulnerable older adults (over 76 years) with poor health conditions with the younger and more active respondents (aged 60 to 65 with a good health situation). People over 76 with poor health conditions are not able to enjoy the quality of life in the city, compared to the more active seniors, usually below 65 years, who are looking for cultural and social opportunities to live in the urban community. The results reveal the role of digital familiarity in enjoying city opportunities and the importance of communication and information in the way older adults envisage the “age-friendliness” of their community.
Social Support Mediated by Technology. A Netnographic Study of an Online Community for Mothers
(2020) Bîră, Monica; Daba-Buzoianu, Corina; Tudorie, George
New mothers experience social isolation, and they sometimes lack experience in interacting withtheir babies. Social support accessed via information and communication technologies (ICTs) can helpmitigate such difficulties. Social media groups, in particular, offer opportunities for interacting with oth-er mothers, thus locating an alternative and potentially powerful source of support. In this study, wedescribe such an online community of mothers in Romania, aiming at capturing the mechanisms of so-cial support in the group, and also, schematically, the changing norms of motherhood they are relatedto. The paper expands on a four-dimensional analysis of social support – informational, emotional, af-firmational, and instrumental components (Langfort et al., 1997; Leger & LeTourneau, 2015). It thenintroduces the results of the netnography we conducted in the context of a three-week data gatheringperiod in the observed community. We suggest that the physiognomy of support we observed is relat-ed to changing normative models of motherhood in this Eastern-European nation. In helping each oth-er, the mothers we observed also expressed their difference from older generations, and their personaland professional aspirations.
The Articulation of Public Problems within a Communicative Figuration Approach
(College of Communication and Public Relations, NUPSPA, 2019) Ciocea, Mălina; Cârlan, Alexandru; Cheregi, Bianca Florentina
This article proposes an analytical shift in the theorization of public problems, from the standard (institutional) constructionist view which has informed the tradition of conceptualising social problems since Spector and Kitsuse’s classic work, to a communicative constructionist view, stemming from the mediatization paradigm. The rationale behind this shift is based on the conceptualization of the relation between various types of actors as claim makers and the logic of visibility governing processes of publicization in a media ecology marked by accelerated development. If, in the new communicational landscape, claim-making activities can turn any new-media user into a potential constructor of public problems, then we need to explain how developments in media technology reconfigure the practices of claim-making. In our understanding, such reconfigurations are just a particular case of the socio-cultural processes of transformation which are the focus of the mediatization paradigm. On the other hand, in a Foucaultian tradition, a shift from problems to problematizations is required in order to account for the processual dynamic through which certain phenomena are analysed under specific circumstances and at certain times, while others are ignored. This shift leads to an understanding of communicative figurations as a meta-theoretical framework for the construction of public problems, accounting for the interdependencies between articulations of public problems and the dynamics of the public sphere. With this aim in view, we first identity and evaluate the theoretical directions that are symptomatic for the transition from social problems to public ones and from problems to problematizations. In the second part, we present the heuristic potential of the concept of communicative figurations for our topic and articulate some methodological implications for a research agenda.
The Game of Reflection and the Power Over People. A Semiotic Approach to Communication
(Springer, 2019) Borțun, Dumitru
Ogden and Richards emphasized that in an act of communication the message does not exist before being coded; in addition, coding is a process of creation: the message self-generates in the communication process itself. As such, the term “receptor” should be replaced by the term “reader”—in other words, the “universal receptor” breaks into a multitude of readers, whose readings are culturally pre-determined. The significance of a sign is not given beforehand, it is born following the encounter between the message and the cultural loading with which the reader welcomes the message. As homo significans, we relate not to objects, but to “interpretants” (Peirce). For man, the world is a universe of interpretants. But this renders manipulation possible through partial truths or even fake news, i.e. through the plausible denaturation of reality. The acceptance of a phrase as true is not related to its relation with reality, but rather to its relation with the reader’s cultural loading. This paper describes the mechanism of semiosis that makes possible the exercise of power to have people over other people, through the management of their cultural loading.

Browse

Browsing FCRP - Emergent Media by Title