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Sharing Fear via Facebook: A Lesson in Political Public Relations


Affiliations
1 University of Miami, Florida, United States
2 University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, United States
     

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Our study compared the use of fear messages on Facebook by Barack Obama and Mitt Romney during the 2012 U.S. presidential elections. Results show that written fear messages embedded in photographs posted on Facebook by both candidates affected the degree to which those photographs were shared. More specifically, photographs containing written fear messages were shared more often than photographs not containing written fear messages. Furthermore, while the challenging candidate, Mitt Romney, used more photographs containing fear messages, the increase in shares was consistent across candidates. Implications regarding information distribution within communities, public relations practitioners specializing in political campaigning and society as a whole are discussed.

Keywords

Content analysis, social media, 2012 election, Protection, Motivation theory
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  • Sharing Fear via Facebook: A Lesson in Political Public Relations

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Authors

Jan Boehmer
University of Miami, Florida, United States
Michael B. Friedman
University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, United States

Abstract


Our study compared the use of fear messages on Facebook by Barack Obama and Mitt Romney during the 2012 U.S. presidential elections. Results show that written fear messages embedded in photographs posted on Facebook by both candidates affected the degree to which those photographs were shared. More specifically, photographs containing written fear messages were shared more often than photographs not containing written fear messages. Furthermore, while the challenging candidate, Mitt Romney, used more photographs containing fear messages, the increase in shares was consistent across candidates. Implications regarding information distribution within communities, public relations practitioners specializing in political campaigning and society as a whole are discussed.

Keywords


Content analysis, social media, 2012 election, Protection, Motivation theory

References





DOI: https://doi.org/10.15655/mw%2F2015%2Fv6i1%2F55371