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Can Social Media Aid Journalism?

This research proposal explores how social media and journalism interact and whether social media can benefit journalism. Unlike much existing research that focuses on the negatives, the author aims to identify positive aspects of the relationship between social media and journalism. The author plans to examine how reputable news sources like the New York Times use social media and whether it helps or hurts them. The proposal also aims to look at personal social media use to see how often trustworthy news sources are encountered. The goal is to move beyond criticisms and instead propose solutions to improve how social media and journalism work together.

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136 views2 pages

Can Social Media Aid Journalism?

This research proposal explores how social media and journalism interact and whether social media can benefit journalism. Unlike much existing research that focuses on the negatives, the author aims to identify positive aspects of the relationship between social media and journalism. The author plans to examine how reputable news sources like the New York Times use social media and whether it helps or hurts them. The proposal also aims to look at personal social media use to see how often trustworthy news sources are encountered. The goal is to move beyond criticisms and instead propose solutions to improve how social media and journalism work together.

Uploaded by

ecauthor5
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd

Emily Chang

S. Wodzak

Interp and Argument

26 October 2018

Research Proposal: Can Social Media Benefit Journalism?

Introduction:

To fully grasp the conversation on journalism and fake news, one could consider another side to

the multi-faced coin: social media. Prior research highlights how the presence of those communication

platforms has especially blown up since the 2016 Presidential election, in which more and more people

were exposed to and began to notice fake news and the struggles within the journalism industry. Scholars

agree that social media is an instigator for new ways of publishing/distributing news, however the

research often overlooks potential positives of the relationship. Could the journalism industry actually use

social media to their benefit in order to re-route from a path of deception and miscommunication? Unlike

existing approaches to the social media/journalism relationship, this paper attempts to propose a new

outlook by helping identify where the relationship is going wrong and offer solutions to have the two

platforms working together.

Synthetic Review:

Object of Study:

The articles discussed in the group and in class center mostly on the election, democracy, and

how social media and journalism is affecting politics. I challenge people to go beyond pointing out issues

and wagging fingers at them to proposing new, positive solutions instead of working against social media.

It’s not an either or - social media has helped with the wide spreading of news and the easy
communication aspect. The thing that is going wrong is that the news that is spreading is crafted to

deceive and create drama. I would like to explore the positive aspect because with all that social media is

advancing in society, perhaps it can work with the journalism industry rather than “instead of.”

*ADD MORE*

Plan of Work:

I want to look into different news sources like the New York Times who are still producing

quality work and understand how they’re using social media. Are they active? How do they use it, and is

it helping or hurting them? I will also look on my own social media to notice how often I see news,

especially from sources that I have previous experience with knowing that they are trustworthy. It will be

interesting to personalize the research and really get a sense for how the journalism industry is interacting

with social media, maybe in a positive way. There are ways that social media can actually benefit

journalism, but a big bias about fake news and what people are susceptible to must be overcome first.

However, this research proposal aims to put the idea in people's’ heads so perhaps it is a step forward we

could take in the future. *I’m going to add more to this*

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