NEW MEDIA CHALLENGES
Lecture 1: Introduction
In the course we will define, describe, and discuss important new challenges in the media, the
public and the individual.
Take a theory- and evidence-based approach to address these issues.
Focus on normative and ethical aspects of new developments/technological possibilities.
Trends in media and media-use
• From push to pull: consumers choosing from large offering of media content
(YouTube, on demand).
• Dissolving media boundaries: browsing internet on phone, listen radio on laptop.
• Increasing interactivity: online multiplayer games, chat functions on webpages.
• Content creation by ‘consumers’: social media (writing reviews, blogs, vlogs,
Instagram, Facebook).
Utopian/dystopian perspectives
Utopia: a community or society that possesses highly desirable or nearly perfect qualities for
its citizen.
Dystopia: a community or society that is undesirable or frightening.
Functions of utopian worldview
n Optimism about the future
n Strong belief in technological development
n Push to invest in technological developments
n Cultural change toward individuation and individual empowerment
Industrial revolution: a rapid major change in an economy.
A revolution can be utopian or dystopian.
New revolution right now; is the relationship with (media) technology a positive or a negative
one?
Lecture 2: An introduction to privacy
Privacy is defined by cultures.
à uncertainty avoidance: the extent to which a society, or group relies on social norms,
rules, and procedures to minimize the unpredictability of future events.
Privacy is defined by times and individuals.
Three theoretical perspectives
1) Political-scientific approach (Westin, 1967): privacy in interaction with others.
Privacy is a basic need which helps to adjust to day-to-day interpersonal interaction.
Privacy is a dynamic process (we regulate privacy so as to serve momentary needs and role
requirements).
Privacy is non-monotonic (you can have such a thing as too little, just enough, or not enough
privacy).
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,Privacy: the claim of individuals, groups, or institutions to determine for themselves when,
how, and to what extent information about them is communicated to others.
Privacy has 4 purposes:
n Personal autonomy – not being manipulated. Realization of individual choices,
personal development, and stable relationships.
n Self-evaluation – freedom to think, process information and make plans. Process and
evaluate information, make/change plans, and be creative.
n Emotional release – freedom from roles and outside expectations. Opportunities to
relax, to escape from stress, to ‘be oneself’, to feel anger or grief, etc.
n Limited and protected boundaries – ability to limit who has access to what
information. You are in control with what to share with whom and when.
Privacy also has 4 states:
Observation
n Solitude – no observation from others.
n Intimacy – small group of people with a strong bond.
Identification
n Reserve – the right not to share some information, respected by others.
n Anonymity – the right not to be identified.
2) Psychological approach (Altman, 1975): privacy for the self (wellbeing and identity
regulation).
Privacy regulation theory aimed at understanding why individuals alternate between states of
sociality and solitude. Privacy: a selective control of access to the self or to one’s group.
5 elements of privacy:
n Dynamic process – individuals regulate what they (do or not) want to share privacy
differently from that of their community/family.
n Individual vs. group levels of privacy – individuals perceive their own privacy
differently from that of their community/family.
n Desired vs. actual privacy – desired level of privacy might be lower/higher than the
other individuals have in the given context.
n Non-monotonic – there is such a thing as both too much and not sufficient privacy
(stranger on the train phenomenon; telling your private stories to a stranger & the
sauna principle; easy to talk to a stranger. Hard to talk someone you know quite well,
easy to talk to someone you are really close to).
n By-directional (inward and outwards) – individuals might have different sensitivities
for their actions towards others’ privacy and others’ actions towards them.
3) Communication approach (Petronio, 2002): privacy as information ownership and
sharing.
Privacy: the selective control of access to the self. We need to regulate boundaries we put
between ourselves and others.
Big shift in how we understand and measure privacy – less of physical privacy (shared things,
spaced) and more about information privacy, and about what we do ‘online’. Who are our
audiences online? Who is listening?
Context collapse: flattening out of multiple distinct audiences in one’s social network, such
that people from different contexts become part of a singular group of message recipients.
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,à while audiences online are diverse and complex, the information users share tends to
present a single, individual identity.
Research experience
In 2013, an experiment carried out by Facebook over 30 million viewers compared their
perceived audience with their actual audience. Results indicated that the vast majority of users
vastly underestimates their post and general audience.
Article Self-Disclosure in social media: Extending the Functional Approach to Disclosure
Motivations and Characteristics on Social Network Sites
Hypotheses:
n H1: People pursue different disclosure goals in Facebook status updates, wall posts,
and private messages.
n H2: Disclosures directed at a familiar other, as via Facebook wall posts and private
messaging, are associated with relational development goals more than disclosures
directed at general others, as via Facebook status updates.
n H3a: People pursue greater social validation goals in nondirected status updates
compared needs to stay to directed wall posts and private messages.
n H3b: Social validation goals are more salient in public wall posts compared to private
messages.
n H4: SNS users can adapt to different affordances by choosing to reveal less intimate
and private information via public status updates and wall posts than via private
messaging on Facebook.
n H5: Disclosure goals are expected to affect disclosure intimacy.
n H6: Less intimate disclosures are associated with social validation goals compared to
other self-disclosure goals, especially the more personally involving relational
development goals.
n H7: Disclosure goals are predicted to mediate between Facebook communication
forms and disclosure intimacy.
EXAM QUESTION; you need to have a general idea of what the predictions of the
researchers were. What did they expect to find?
Make sure you have a rough idea of the type of study (combination of content analysis and
survey), and understand the concepts (what are the disclosure goals, development goals,
validation goals, disclosure intimacy, etc). Also make sure to understand the outcomes; what
are the direct effects and what are the mediation effects?
Lecture 3: Personalization, privacy, and surveillance
n Privacy as a commodity (product than can be exchanged). Privacy as a right à
privacy as a commodity. While privacy stays a basic human right, we are progressively
more likely to consider it a commodity, like time or money.
n Privacy as a trade-off (delivering a service in return for information).
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, Research experience
4 strategies that people can use in how they deal with their personal information.
From trade-off to calculus
Especially in the context of online communication, privacy has been studied
in economic terms. This leads to the idea that before disclosing personal
information, users might carefully evaluate benefits and risks.
Privacy calculus: individuals are assumed to behave in ways that they
believe will result in the most favorable net level of outcomes.
Benefits:
1) Financial rewards: e.g., discounts, earnings, time saved.
2) Social benefits: e.g., gaining access to specific groups you like, are important, or are
beneficial to you.
3) Personalization: e.g., personalized offers, validation.
Risks (the potential for loss associated with the release of private information to a firm). You
need to distinguish between:
n The likelihood of the risk: the chance that information is misused.
n The severity of the risk: the consequences of this misuse.
Limits:
The privacy calculus presumes that users make rational economic choices at all time.
However, this is not true at all times. Behavior is quite often guided by ‘heuristics’
n Social proof
n Persuasive techniques by platforms
o Foot in the door
o Door in the face
n Affect heuristics
n ‘Framing effects’
n Privacy fatigue
Privacy paradox
When assessing users’ perception of privacy vs. their privacy-protecting behavior scholars
have often found the results paradoxical.
à users express concerns about their data online, but this has no relation to their amount of
information sharing.
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