social media crisis thesis

• Awards Season
• Big Stories
• Pop Culture
• Video Games
• Celebrities

Can Social Media Balance Free Speech With Accountability?

From dawn until dusk, many of us sneak moments here and there checking our socials. Refreshing our feeds on social media platforms may be the first thing we do in the morning and the last thing we do at night. And it all adds up: On average, according to data from Statista , most people in the United States spend over two hours a day scrolling, liking and perusing. Those two (or more) hours open all of us up to a lot of fun content, sure, but they also expose us to out-of-control amounts of viral headlines, “fake news” and other questionable content that can be surprisingly — and dangerously — influential.

The growing prevalence of fake news on various social media platforms is no secret — nearly a quarter of people in the United States rarely trust the news and other information they read on social media, another Statista survey reveals. But what about the other three-quarters who may put themselves and others at risk by trusting everything they read? This proliferation of harmful fake news is raising the question of how social media platforms can tackle the balance between free speech and false information — and whether those platforms are obligated to do so at all.

The nation is more divided than ever, and it’s largely up to the media to find a way to regulate disinformation. But does doing so run contrary to our free speech rights? To better assess this dilemma, it’s essential to look at how fake news really spreads and affects people, along with whether governments and platforms should mitigate the escalation.

How Does Fake News Actually Spread?

“Spreading like wildfire” is a term that perfectly describes the sharing of fake news once it goes viral. But first it has to gain steam among everyday social media users. Typically, fake news stories start out as deliberate misinformation or as accidentally inaccurate information that someone didn’t fact-check before reposting.

The first type often involves information that purposefully promotes a certain point of view or a person and omits any negative facts, similar to propaganda meant to change the way people think about a subject. The second is often a result of misinterpreted satire or even a snippet of a parody or a joke that people unintentionally take seriously. The difference lies in intent, too: The first type is meant to deceive, and the second is meant to entertain. But both can have similar effects.

Normally, the sharing of fake news starts among smaller groups before reaching increasingly wider audiences on social media. The news first spreads among groups of people with similar interests or among close friends. They repost something on their social media feeds when they find it interesting or shocking or when it reinforces their points of view. Then, curious people and friends of friends may start to repost it to their circles, the members of which then share the news further. Soon, the inaccurate piece of information has reached the masses before it’s been properly fact-checked (or questioned at all).

At this stage, the fake news might go viral. According to Oxford University and the Reuters Institute , social media personalities with large followings are often the culprits. They’re considered “super-spreaders” who can very easily share inaccurate information with their impressionable followers (whom they tend to have a lot of). If you have an extremely active network, you might also frequently come across false information shared between your own friends and family.

How Serious Is the Fake News Problem on Social Media?

To evaluate how powerful fake news is, it helps to look at some examples of incidents when viral news turned out to be complete misinformation. The majority of many of these recent “facts” tend to focus on the coronavirus pandemic and the 2020 election; however, fake news can encompass just about any topic. Below are two examples of viral news that turned out to be factually false.

The Original Claim: An NPR study revealed that 25 million votes cast for Hillary Clinton in 2016 were fake.

The Breakdown: These claims originally came from a website called YourNewsWire, which stated that the report was made by the Pew Research Center — an organization that’s generally regarded as one of the most credible, unbiased polling centers in the United States — with statements cited from an InfoWars article. The source of this information was twisted to fit a narrative trying to invalidate Clinton’s popular-vote victory. It turned out that the original report the fake news was based on was actually made in 2012 and stated that 24 million voter registrations were no longer valid due to deaths or were inaccurate due to voters moving to other states, not that they had voted fraudulently. It had nothing to do with the results of the 2016 election.

The Original Claim: Page 132 of a mysterious Pfizer “vaccine report” stated the vaccine could cause birth defects via genetic manipulation.

The Breakdown: A viral photo shared on social media stated that page 132 of Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine safety instructions revealed that the vaccine may lead to birth defects. It was accompanied by a link that took users to the alleged instructions. However, this link only led to documentation from a publicly available Pfizer clinical trial rather than the official government document. Furthermore, page 132 outlined abbreviations, not fertility impact information. Another page contained a brief mention that trial patients should avoid getting pregnant for 28 days after receiving the last dose of the vaccine — common pharmaceutical advice for all vaccines in relation to pregnancies.

There are costs to this type of fake news; when people believe it and spread it, it can put others in danger. For example, in the case of COVID-19 vaccine misinformation — and fake news about the virus itself — consequences can be dire. BBC reports that, in addition to an unchecked increase in the spread of the novel coronavirus because fake news led people to believe the virus was a hoax, people put their own and others’ lives at risk in various ways as a result of “facts” they learned about COVID-19 on social media. Arson, assaults, attacks and other notable acts of violence occurred, all of which pose “potential health threat[s]” both to believers of the fake news and those who speak out against those who believe it.

What Role Does Freedom of Speech Play?

Fake news clearly has the potential to cause harm. But does that mean the social media platforms where it spreads are obligated to take steps to reduce users’ exposure to potentially harmful information? Many people cite the First Amendment in justifying the argument that social media sites shouldn’t be held accountable for the damaging fake news that proliferates on them.

The First Amendment is a section of the Constitution’s Bill of Rights that protects, among other things, freedom of speech — our right to express ourselves, our ideas and our opinions without being punished for doing so. This makes content regulation a much harder task online. Unless misinformation presents serious harm, the content of fake news is generally protected by the First Amendment. And some people argue it should remain protected because censorship would be a form of oppression and a violation of human rights.

In contrast, those who argue freedom of expression doesn’t fully apply to fake news note that the First Amendment doesn’t necessarily protect an individual’s right to lie or to “intentionally mislead an audience and sway public opinion for political gain,” according to the Center on Human Rights Education . In addition, according to Dr. John L. Vile, the dean of political science at Middle Tennessee State University, “the First Amendment is designed to further the pursuit of truth, [but] it may not protect individuals who…display actual malice by knowingly publishing false information or publishing information ‘with reckless disregard for the truth.'”

While it’s valid to point out the dangers of government censorship, it’s equally important to acknowledge the dangers of spreading false information and to demand change.

What Can Be Done to Regulate Fake News?

It’s clear that fake news can spread quickly — so quickly that it may appear nearly impossible to contain. So what can be done to balance free speech with accountability and potentially stem the flow of all the fakeness? It’s relatively easy, at least on a personal level, to create new consumption habits by making a concerted effort to seek out fact-checking websites — two reliable choices are Snopes and FactCheck.org — and verify a claim’s veracity. But that alone doesn’t stop fake news from spreading.

While social media platforms may not be legally obligated to protect users from fake news, they may be morally compelled to do so. If they can recognize that their platforms, by design, are contributing to the dissemination of harmful media, they should take it upon themselves to place limits on that information. It may not be possible for governments to step in and levy restrictions without compromising or violating freedom of speech — and it may not be their place to do so. “In that case,” states the Center on Human Rights Education , “the onus to address this issue should not rest solely on the government. Corporations such as Facebook and Google should ensure that the entities responsible for creating inaccurate content are regulated appropriately.”

Fortunately, it appears that some sites are working towards this. NBC News reported that, during the second quarter of 2020, Facebook removed 22.5 million posts containing hate speech and 7 million posts “sharing false information about the novel coronavirus, including content that promoted fake preventative measures and exaggerated cures.” This is a step in the right direction, to be sure, but Facebook, other platforms and even media outlets will need to increase these efforts if real change is to be achieved.

MORE FROM ASK.COM

Social Media and Crisis Communication: Theories and Best Practices

Downloadable content.

• Ford, Tegan Nicole

Communication experts have argued that crises are no longer a matter of “if” but “when” in corporate life. Corporations must be ready to respond to a crisis with the greatest proficiency, for it can easily damage an organization’s image, identity, and reputation. It is for this reason that the field of crisis communications has developed theories and strategies to guide organizations through periods of crisis. However, most of these theories are based on traditional models of communications that emphasize a one-way flow of information from a single communicator to a mass audience. Social media has destabilized established frameworks for crisis communication. This thesis explores how experts in crisis communication conceptualize the disruptive effects of social media on crisis communication. The study presents findings that will contribute to both scholarship and professional practice.

• COMMUNICATIONS AND THE ARTS Mass Communications
• Carleton University
• Master's
• Master of Arts (M.A.)
• Communication
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.22215/etd/2013-09942

Copyright © 2013 the author(s). Theses may be used for non-commercial research, educational, or related academic purposes only. Such uses include personal study, research, scholarship, and teaching. Theses may only be shared by linking to Carleton University Institutional Repository and no part may be used without proper attribution to the author. No part may be used for commercial purposes directly or indirectly via a for-profit platform; no adaptation or derivative works are permitted without consent from the copyright owner.

• Theses and Dissertations

Academia.edu no longer supports Internet Explorer.

To browse Academia.edu and the wider internet faster and more securely, please take a few seconds to  upgrade your browser .

Enter the email address you signed up with and we'll email you a reset link.

• We're Hiring!
• Help Center

Crisis management in social media

by Vahan Bounazian

• Access 47 million research papers for free
• Keep up-to-date with the latest research
• Share your research and grow your audience
•   We're Hiring!
•   Help Center
• Find new research papers in:
• Health Sciences
• Earth Sciences
• Cognitive Science
• Mathematics
• Computer Science
• Academia ©2023

Free Related PDFs

Cristiane D Pedron

2014, Atas da 14ª Conferência da Associação Portuguesa de Sistemas de Informação

Mustafa Emre Civelek , Necati Erdem Eralp

Social media and social media tools have improved rapidly and started to influence society especially in recent years. This influence has forced businesses to revolutionize their communication with the external environment. The fact that Web 2.0 has an influence on consumer behavior, and that it makes the consumers stronger; requires faster, more flexible and more sensitive communication processes in businesses. Especially during a time of crisis, a business’ communication with the external environment is quite critical. For this reason, the way how the crisis communication is managed through social media is vital for businesses. In this article, the perceptions of how to manage businesses during a time of crisis so that they make minimum loss, is shared.

Abstract: Social media has become the most used and active way of communication; however, studies that look at social media use in crisis management are in their growing stage. Thus, this study analyses these growing body of knowledge that researched into social media and crisis management. A review was undertaken between October 2017 to January 2018 which entails sourcing and retrieving materials from an electronic database. The findings of this review confirmed that the growth of social media has transformed crisis communication landscape because it allows more interactivity . Still, a crisis could also be catalysed by social media because of its nature. This signifies that the crisis can be created in social media, as well as distributed by social media, respectively. Yet, the potential of social media as a crisis resolution tool is indisputable. It has the potential to prove a statement, to dispel untrue rumours or just to show the fact . Hence, practitioners are encouraged to ...

Ian Gillespie

James Leflar, DM, CPP, MBCP

The purpose of this paper is to investigate social media usage in crisis management planning, response, and recovery activities. Social media usage during an emergency event to gather immediate information has been demonstrated as an alternative when traditional forms of communication have been less effective. Most of the messages transmitted using (or through) social media are from non-traditional media sources, and the medium has become an expected source for traditional news agencies, as every cellular smart device user in the world has the potential to be an information broadcaster. This research survey explores the role social media is having on crisis management for security professionals. Survey participants consisted primarily of ASIS International members.

Andrew Pearson

Edgard Barki

2017, Journal of Contingencies and Crisis Management

Kateryna Cherniavska

Saud Alsulaiman

Isabel Gambura

2018, Two Sides of a Coin: Explicating The Place of Social Media in Crisis Management Two Sides of a Coin: Explicating The Place of Social Media in Crisis Management

Social media has become the most used and most active mode of communication; however, studies on the use of social media and crisis management are in its embryonic stage. Therefore, this research contributes and extends to the body of knowledge by looking at the place of social media in crisis management. This study adopts a narrative review method. The narrative review was undertaken between October 2017 to January 2018 which entails sourcing and retrieving materials from an electronic database. This study found that the emergence of social media has changed the crisis communication landscape because it allows more interactivity. However, some crisis is catalysed by social media because of its nature. This means that crisis can be created in social media, distributed by social media, or both. Nevertheless, the potency of social media as a crisis resolution tool is undisputable.

farid qawasmeh

International Journal of Academic Research in Business and Social Sciences

kalthom husain

2014, Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences

Melissa Thomas-Hunt

2015, Business Horizons

This study focuses on the communication process during crisis communication, and how public relations practitioners and crisis managers value and utilize social media as an outreach and informational platform. By comparing business-to-business and business-to-consumer companies, the results from 18, in-depth interviews show the differences in use of social media when confronting and handling a crisis. Through qualitative research, my study examines which practices are the most useful when faced with an unexpected crisis, and how social media plays a role in communication.

Gohar Hakhnazaryan

Jose Antony

Atna - Journal of Tourism Studies

The tourism industry is highly susceptible to various forms of risks operating in the industry that occur and go unattended over a period of time. Social media could be effectively used to address the risks. Studies, however, on social media and its role in crisis management are few in spite of a consistent e mphasis on the importance of social media in the tourism industry, specifically, its role in crisis management. This paper provides a review of the current state of affairs and provides a framework to involve social media research in crisis management in tourism.

Christian Reuter

International Journal of Human–Computer Interaction

Communication efforts has been transforming into digital manner since the new media tools and social media platforms have appeared on the stage. As a consequence of this process, crisis management and crisis communication techniques have been adapted to fore-mentioned digital context. This paper primarily aims to develop an understanding on phases of the moment of crisis on social media and then reveal the characteristic and sentiment of the posts. In terms of the study, detailed literature on transforming paradigms of the communication, social media and crisis communication has been reviewed. Soon after, tweets and Facebook posts about the electronic festival were fetched in order to analyze. In next step, the collected data were analyzed in order to reveal sentiment and characteristics of the posts and categorize the phases of the moment of crisis. Under the light of analyzed data fire model, which illustrates the moment of crisis on social media, has been proposed.

Marianna Sigala

Serge Banyongen

2023, Crisis Management. Principle, Roles and Applications

Social media, also called Web 2.0, is a generic term used to talk about applications that allow users to create, manipulate, and disseminate content as much as possible in real time. These applications allow for several possibilities that range from involvement to participation, communication, and collaboration of users. They allow everyone with minimal access to the Internet to publish, share, review, comment, and post items, such as mentions, comments, information, videos, and photos. In a crisis, social media becomes a double-edged sword. It can play an essential role during the prodromal, acute, chronic, and resolution phases of natural disasters and human-made crises. Social media can also be at the origin of the crisis or the reason for its amplification. Social media facilitates an increase of interactions between main actors at the center of a crisis. This chapter combines social media content analysis (opinion detection and sentiment analysis) with network analysis (ego network analysis) and nodes centrality assessment to critically evaluate how social media affects the crisis management process.

Narayana Mahendra Prastya

When crisis occurs organization should respond the crisis quickly, open, and consistent. The emergence of new media makes the crisis more complex. New media, with its nature such as fast, interactive, many to many, could assist the organization in crisis communication. But on the other side, new media could also make the crisis more complex. The new media could make the pace of information, the uncertainty, and the rumors increasing. This paper discusses about how Malaysia Airlines using corporate website in communicating about the lost of flight MH 370. The first part of this paper describes the importance of using new media in crisis communication. The second part is literature review of the conceptual framework of crisis communication and new media (and social media) usage in crisis communication. The third part is findings and analysis about how Malaysia Airlines using their corporate website in crisis communication. The data of this part using Malaysia Airlines??? statements about the lost of MH-370 that posted in their corporate website: www.malaysiaairlines.com. The posting date is between 8th March 2014 and 25th May 2014. The analysis used Coombs??? (2006) crisis communication concept that consist of form and content. Form is what organization should do, and content is what organization should say in crisis. The last part is discussion and conclusion and several recommendations for further research. Keywords: corporate website, crisis communication, Malaysia Airlines, new media, public relations

Jiani Liu , Leung Yue Wai , Wang Wenqi

2015, International Academic Research Journal of Business and Technology

Keywords Tactical preparedness; Each organization is vulnerable to any crises. A proper method to handle such event is important as it reflects organizations' reputation. However, limited studies were conducted on crisis communication preparedness in the hotel industry even though there are many inevitable events that make the industry vulnerable. Social media is commonly used to spread information on these events. However, the emphasis on its usage by the organizations is not widely discovered. In addition, capability of understanding and applying the knowledge to deal with any potential crisis situation would require further investigation on the firm. This research examined the relationship between social media usage and absorptive capacity in enhancing crisis communication preparedness. A total of 169 of questionnaires were distributed in the hotel industry, West Malaysia. The findings revealed different dimensions on the crisis communication preparedness and indicated the significant relationship between these variables. The findings help practitioners to engage in effective communication in dealing with crises.

Social media have had a huge impact on public relations practice by shifting the power away from organisations to social media users and promoting two-way communication (Pavlik, 2007; SNCR, 2008; Wright & Hinson, 2009). Existing literature focuses largely on the influence of the Internet upon crisis management and crisis communication (DiNardo, 2002; Gonzalez-Herrero & Smith, 2008; Taylor & Kent, 2006) but has only recently begun to explore the impact of social media and, in particular, the 140-character Twitter messaging service (Fearn-Banks, 2011; Smith, 2010). This study explores the role and value of Twitter as a crisis communications tactic through the qualitative analysis of two recent high-profile European mass transport crisis case studies. These were (a) the Eurostar crisis of late 2009 when five London-Paris high speed trains were trapped beneath the English Channel by snow-related problems and (b) the performance of Eurocontrol (Europe's air traffic coordination syste...

miftha pratiwi

2021, Jurnal Komunikasi Ikatan Sarjana Komunikasi Indonesia

luca scaroni

Hamish Mclean

2014, SSRN Electronic Journal

Erick Asangwa

This project, 'Crisis Management in a Digital Age: Case of University Organizations' has a contemporary significance as digitalization is constantly evolving and as such affecting the ways in which crises especially in universities can be managed. The project's main objective is to demonstrate how digital social media has changed the flow of information and how its platforms are used in the management of crises in universities. In order to arrive at this, the researcher consulted a great number of available literatures and either directly or indirectly linked to the topic.

Ashwin Malshe

There is an ongoing discussion about the effectiveness of social media usage on the ability of people to recover from the crisis. However, the existing social media crisis communication models could not address the dynamic feature of social media users and the crisis, respectively. Therefore, the objective of this study is to conduct a preliminary investigation of the social media crisis communication model for building public resilience. Thus, 34 items were generated from the literature concerning the crisis, crisis response, social interaction, and resilience. The items were validated by three experts via content validity index and modified kappa statistics. After passing the validation test, the instruments were pre-tested by 32 participants. The reliability of the items was analyzed using Cronbach’s alpha. Also, the model fits and mediation were examined by the regression model, and the hypotheses were independently assessed in process macro models. Based on the result obtained,...

Anton Michael Pillay

EUREKA: Social and Humanities

This study investigates the impact of social media as a strategic approach to corporate communication when handling crises at Bank X in the Gauteng province of South Africa. The study had three over-arching objectives; to determine the challenges that are encountered when handling crises about communication at Bank X, to determine if the leadership has the willingness to change their approach when formulating the strategy; to determine if social media has an impact on strategy formulation of crisis communication at Bank X; and lastly to make recommendations to Bank X’s leadership on how to incorporate the social media component as a communication approach to effectively handle crises. This research followed a qualitative research approach through one-on-one Microsoft Teams in-depth interviews with 10 participants. The study, through the analysis of the primary data, secondary data, and literature reviews, underpins and supports that there is an opportunity for Bank X to incorporate ...

IOSR Journals

Britt Johansen , Winni Johansen

2016, Corporate Communications: An International Journal

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine the Telenor customer complaints crisis triggered on the company Facebook site in August 2012. More specifically, the paper focusses on how friends and enemies of a company interact, and how faith-holders serve as crisis communicators in a rhetorical sub-arena that opens up on Facebook. Design/methodology/approach – The study is based on a textual analysis of 4,368 posts from the Telenor Facebook site, and an interview with the senior digital manager of Telenor. Findings – Not only current and previous customers but also those from rival telephone companies were active in the Facebook sub-arena. The customers complaining about the company services were met not only with the response of Telenor, but also with counter-attacks from faith-holders acting in defense of Telenor. However, these faith-holders were using defensive response strategies, while Telenor used accommodative strategies. Research limitations/implications – Organizational crises need to be seen as a complex set of communication processes, including the many voices that start communicating from different positions, and taking into account not only the response strategies of the organization but also the response strategies applied by supportive emotional stakeholders. In practice, faith-holders need to be monitored, as they may prove useful as “crisis communicators.” Originality/value – The paper provides insights into an under-investigated area of crisis communication: the strategies of faith-holders acting as “crisis communicators” defending a company and themselves against attacks from negative voices on social media. Keywords Social media, Crisis communication, Customer complaints, Rhetorical arena theory, Emotional stakeholder, Response strategy Paper type Research paper

Jesper Tække

2017, Systems Research and Behavioral Science

Tuong-Minh Ly-Le

2019, Asian Journal of Applied Communication

Social media has grown in importance among Vietnamese people in the past five years, and as a result it has become common for stakeholders to use it to connect to companies. As a consequence of this new paradigm, various business crises have arisen on social media platforms. Some companies have even begun using social media as their primary crisis response method, but research has yet to explore how social media has changed crisis communication in Vietnam, particularly from the point-of-view of stakeholders. Most stakeholders expressed a preference for well-considered responses in traditional media to quick responses on social media, although many stakeholders want a response in social media, too. As the message matters more than the channel, Vietnamese practitioners should consider the message more thoroughly.

Jumoke Akinwa

Mohsen Alafranji

2019, Research Gate

Social media made radical changes and qualitative effects by its various tools and platforms, which enabled it to change the features of the crisis management media scene How can these social platforms be used effectively in times of crises and be integrated with crisis management communication strategy? What is the nature of this use? What are the consequent benefits to users of the various official and popular levels?

2018, Proceedings of the Fifth International Conference on Business, Management and Accounting (IBSM 2018)

With the growing importance of social media for the Vietnamese people, in the past five years, Vietnam has seen many company or brand crises that started on social media, and some organizations have started to use social media for crisis response. However, little research has explored the use of social media in PR or in crisis communication in a Vietnamese setting, and even fewer studies were dedicated to exploring the stakeholders’ viewpoint. Therefore, this research examines the use of social media for crisis communication in Vietnamese organizations from a stakeholder’s viewpoint. By using the networked crisis communication theory (NCCT) and through a survey with 370 people in Vietnam, this research aims to understand how Vietnamese stakeholders perceive the organizations’ effort of using social media in crisis response and what they think the organizations should have done with social media during crises.

Karin Rainer

Ayşen AKYÜZ

2019, Handbook of Research on Global Issues in Financial Communication and Investment Decision Making

The importance of public relations and crisis communication is undeniable for companies. In a corporate scandal or crisis situation, the right messages have to be conveyed to the relevant audiences including shareholders at the right time and in the right way. Today, social media is one of the most popular tools of crisis communication. Including Turkey, the number of social media users all over the world is quite high and continues to increase every day. In recent years, we observe that companies use social media as an effective communication tool during their crisis periods. The aim of this chapter is to make an in-depth review of the literature on crisis management and the use of social media and to reveal the position of social media in communication efforts carried out during the company crises through various cases that took place in Turkey.

Chiara Valentini

2013, Corporate Communications: An International Journal, 19(1), 2014

Purpose - Purpose. The aim of this paper is to develop and test a theoretical framework, grounded in managerial and organizational theories of dialogue, through which organizations can take decisions in relation to the most appropriate crisis response strategies for handling social media stakeholders . Design/methodology/approach - Design/Methodology/Approach. The theoretical framework is developed through a conceptual analysis of literature on dialogue, social media and crisis communication. The theoretical framework is then tested in eight different international organizations experiencing a crisis. For each case, different web contents, such as organizations’ status updates/posts, links, videos published in Facebook, Twitter and YouTube were analyzed using a rhetorical research approach. Findings - Findings. The analyzed organizations apply different online dialogue strategies according to crisis types and in combination with specific crisis response strategies. Most of the organizations investigated carry on those dialogue strategies suitable to develop consensus (concertative), guide conversations on specific topics or issues (framing), find solutions to the crisis collectively (transformative). Concertative strategies were often associated with informative crisis response strategies, framing strategies with denial and justification crisis response strategies and transformative strategies with corrective actions. Research limitations/implications - Research implications. By using a dialogic perspective in setting up online conversations with their external stakeholders, the paper proposes a theoretical model to explain companies’ decisions in carrying on online dialogues during critical situations and thus contribute to the body of knowledge on online crisis communications. Practical implications - Practical implications. The proposed model can support crisis communicators to manage dialogue’s aims and dimensions differently by taking into account both contextual and situational conditions. Originality/value - Originality/Value. By integrating management studies on dialogue into crisis communication and social media literature, the authors intend to offer an alternative thinking of organizations’ decision-making in relation to crisis response strategies and social media stakeholders.

2017, Proceedings of the Sixth International Conference on Entrepreneurship and Business Management (ICEBM 2017)

In Vietnam, social media has become one of the most popular communication platforms. With the growing importance of social media for the Vietnamese people, in the past five years, Vietnam has seen a number of organizational or brand crises that started on social media. A single post online could be shared virally and attract enough attention to become a full crisis. However, while social media has been widely used in marketing and promotional activities, Vietnamese organizations have often ignored or underutilized these channels in their crisis communication efforts. Organizations focus their crisis communication through traditional media outlets and paid little to no attention to social media outlets, even if the crisis had started on social media channels. Little research has dedicated to exploring this topic, on the use of social media in PR or in crisis communication in a Vietnamese setting. To address this gap, this research aims to identify what facilitates and hinders the use of social media in crisis communication in Vietnamese organizations.

ahmed kaabi

مجلة البحوث الإعلامیة

KKprop Eric

The role of the social media in crisis communication has increased in the last couple of years and some organizations have positively mainstreamed social media in crisis communication, but there are some organizations especially in the public sector that are still reluctant to incorporate social media in communication during disasters and instead view social media as a threat to disaster management. Therefore the objective of the study was to examine the role of the social media in crisis communication in public organizations in Kenya with specific reference to Kenya Pipeline Corporation and Mukuru- Sinai Fire Disaster. The specific objectives of the study included the effect of influence of rapid information sharing, reinforcing disaster response strategy and provision of platform for participation and contribution on crisis communication in public organizations in Kenya. The research study used descriptive research design in collecting the data from respondents. The target population was drawn was drawn from Kenya Pipeline Corporation and composed of management, communication staff and crisis management committee all totaling to sixty nine (69) respondents. The research study undertook survey of the total population as a sample. The primary data for the study was collected using the questionnaires and analyzed using descriptive and regression statistics with the aid of Statistical Package for Social Sciences. The study established that there is a significant relationship between rapid information sharing, reinforcing disaster response strategy and provision of platform for participation and contribution on crisis communication in public organizations

2017, International Journal of Strategic Communication

The prescriptive approach to crisis communication strategy (CCS) selection has long been criticized for lack of flexibility and adaptability. To address this issue, this study proposes an emergent approach to strategy formulation by focusing on contextual impacts on social media crises and their implications for CCS. An online discussion on Sina Weibo, a Chinese microblogging platform, about a high-profile homicide in aMcDonald’s restaurant, is taken as the case. Based on a multidisciplinary theoretical framework that consists of the theory of rhetorical arena and framing theory, an inductive framing analysis of 100 top forwarded posts indicates a complex negotiation process among multiple crisis communicators through various crisis frames. The results suggest that selection of CCS should be from contextually based behavior through investigating interaction amongmultiple crisis communicators and examining the contexts inwhich crises are situated. This study also contributes to advancing the CCS selectionmodel of Situational Crisis Communication Theory by integrating contextual factors.