Introduction to Social Media
COMM 305
Fall 2015
Instructor:
Dr. Katherine Ognyanova
Email:
comm305@ognyanova.net
Twitter:
@ognyanova
Office:
CI 205 (SC&I Building, 4 Huntington Street)
Office Hours:
Monday and Thursday, 1:30pm-2:30pm (best by appointment)
Course Time:
Monday and Thursday, 11:30am-12:50pm
Course Room:
CI 103 (SC&I Building, 4 Huntington Street)
Course Website:
sakai.rutgers.edu
Course Hashtag:
#SCI305
Course Description
Social media services such as Facebook and Twitter represent a new class of communication
platforms that have become quickly interwoven into the everyday lives of millions of people
around the world. In this course we will draw on competing communication perspectives to
explore the reasons behind the widespread popularity of these platforms. In doing so we will
consider the role of individual choice, social influence, technological influence, and how these
three perspectives can be combined. We will further explore the implications of social media for
personal relationships, youth culture, organizations, social research, and personal privacy.
Learning Objectives
Upon the successful completion of this course, students should be able to:
•
•
•
•
•
Apply multiple communication perspectives to make sense of social media adoption
and use, through class discussion, the theory paper and the final projects.
Understand the various methodological approaches that can be used to study social
media by applying class discussion to reading material.
Discuss social media intelligently using appropriate language and terminology derived
from scholarly papers and class discussion.
Understand the implications of social media for a variety of social issues through the
course readings and class discussion.
Think abstractly about the role of social media in personal and organizational contexts
during class discussion and while writing the theory paper and final project.
COMM 305, Fall 2015
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Required Readings
There is no required textbook for this class. All readings will be posted on the course’s Sakai
website (sakai.rutgers.edu). Log in using your Rutgers NetID, navigate to the SC&I 305 site, and
browse the Course Reading page. The required and recommended materials for each week of class
are also listed in the Course Outline section of this syllabus.
Contact Information
Do not hesitate to contact me if you have questions, ideas, problems, or concerns related to this
course. The most reliable way to reach me is by sending an email to comm305@ognyanova.net.
Using that address ensures that I can identify your message as related to this class and give it
appropriate attention. I will typically respond within 3-5 days of receiving your email.
My office hours are held in CI 205, 1:30-2:30pm on Monday and Thursday. Email or come talk to
me after class if you would like to schedule an appointment.
Use Twitter and the hashtag #SCI305 to share relevant news and readings with the class.
Social Media Policy
While you are in this class, I will not connect with you (follow, befriend, etc.) on any social media
platform. I will not evaluate your online presence or posts, except the ones that you specifically
ask me to look at, share in class, or tag with the course hashtag (#SCI305). We will discuss this
policy during the weeks when we talk about privacy and anonymity, self-presentation, and
imagined audiences online.
Course Attendance
Students are expected to attend all classes. If you need to miss a class, use the Rutgers University
absence reporting website (sims.rutgers.edu/ssra) to indicate the date and reason for your
absence. The system will automatically send me an email. If you are unable to attend classes for
longer than one week, you should contact a dean of students who can help verify your
circumstances. University policy excuses absences due to religious observance or participation,
and permits students to make up work missed for that reason. Do notify me at least two weeks
in advance if you are unable to come to class or take an exam due to religious observance.
On occasion, the university may have to cancel classes due to inclement weather. To check if
classes are canceled, visit campusstatus.rutgers.edu or call 732-932-7799.
Course Requirements and Evaluation
Class Participation (15%)
All students are expected to be active participants in the conversations we will have around social
media topics. You should read all the required materials carefully and thoroughly, identify their
key points, think about their strengths and weaknesses, and be prepared to discuss them in class.
Not only the frequency, but also the quality of your contributions will be considered. Also note
that in this class, asking good questions will be just as important as giving good answers.
In addition to your participation in class, you are also encouraged to contribute to an online
discussion. You can publish your comments and questions about the readings in the Sakai forum
COMM 305, Fall 2015
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for this course. Contributing to the online discussion is not mandatory, but it can help increase
your participation grade. Keep in mind that your grade will be based on your contributions
throughout the semester. This means you cannot compensate for earlier lack of participation with
high activity in the last few weeks of the class.
Reading Discussion (15%)
Once during the semester, each student will take the role of a discussion leader. When it is your
turn, you will do the recommended readings for that week (optional for the rest of the class) and
prepare a brief written summary of their key points. That summary should be uploaded to the
Sakai website before the start of the class (in the course site, go to Resources → Reading summaries,
and select Upload Files from the Add drop-down menu).
Your main task will be to lead a 15-minute discussion on the issues that the readings bring up. It
is your responsibility to make the discussion both relevant and engaging. If we have not already
covered the main points of the recommended articles in class at the time, you may also have to
give a brief 5-minute overview of the readings. Be sure to mention the questions they address, as
well as their major findings.
Discussion leaders will typically work in groups of three, and will cover selected topics from the
course outline. The list of topics that students can sign up for will be distributed in the second
week of class.
Midterm Exam (30%)
The midterm exam, scheduled for October 19th, will include multiple-choice and open-ended
questions about the material covered from day 1 through day 12 of the course. The exam will
focus on key points from the lectures and the required readings. You can expect questions dealing
with major principles and concepts explained in class, as well as their application to specific
contexts, cases, or online platforms. For example, if social capital was included in the material for
the exam (it is not), you could be asked to briefly explain how that construct may be defined and
measured on a platform like Twitter.
If you have a verifiable excuse that prevents you from taking the exam on its original date, you
can request a make-up exam at a later date. That request needs to be made as early as possible,
before the day of the exam. Note that the make-up is likely to differ from the original exam in
content and form, and may include additional material. If you miss the exam without prior
notification or without a verifiable excuse, you can still request a make-up date, but 5 points (out
of 30) will be deducted from your score.
Final Paper & Presentation (30% & 10%)
The final paper will examine one or more aspects of the social media topics addressed in this
course. Students will work on the paper in groups of three or four people. You can form your
own group and notify me via e-mail by September 24. Feel free to post on the class Sakai forum
if you are looking for classmates with similar interests to join your group. Students who have not
contacted me before the deadline will be randomly assigned to groups and notified about their
assignment by September 28.
Your final paper may involve empirical data collection (e.g. a survey of social media users,
interviews with social media developers, analysis of social media content, an online experiment,
etc.). The project may also be theoretical: extending existing frameworks and concepts, or
COMM 305, Fall 2015
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applying them to new platforms and contexts (e.g. adapting current or proposing new models
for the way individuals or organizations behave online).
The paper should be 12-15 pages long, double-spaced, using a 12-point font with a 1-inch margin
on all sides. It should have the following structure:
(1) Introduction and background, including an overview of previous research in the area;
(2) Research questions or hypotheses, along with an appropriate justification of the
hypotheses, or an explanation of the importance and originality of the research questions;
(3) A description of methods, analysis, and results for empirical papers, or a development
of your argument or model for theoretical papers;
(4) A discussion section where you describe what you have learned from your study, and
examine how it compares with previous findings in the literature;
(5) A bibliography containing the list of references cited in the paper.
You need to include at least 10 citations to academic works in empirical papers, and at least 15 in
theoretical papers. Some of those references should be for studies you found on your own (as
opposed to readings assigned in this class). The citations and bibliography should be formatted
in APA style (one place where you can learn more about it is the Purdue Online Writing Lab).
All members of the group need to proofread the final draft of the paper before submitting it. You
should confirm that it has the required formatting, and make sure that the text is clear,
grammatically correct, and free of spelling errors.
Your group will have the following tasks:
October 8th: Submit a one-page proposal describing your research question and the way you
intend to approach it (send it in an e-mail with subject “Paper proposal”). You will receive
feedback suggesting that you proceed with the paper, or advising you to change your topic.
November 2nd: Submit a 3-4 page detailed outline of the paper that sketches the background,
relevant literature, research questions, the data collection and analytical procedures (for
empirical papers), the concepts or theoretical frameworks that you are developing or
contributing to, and how (for theoretical papers). E-mail it with subject “Paper outline”.
December 7th & 10th: Groups will do a short presentation of their final paper in class.
December 12th: Submit the final paper via the Sakai course site (go to Assignments → Final paper).
Each group member needs to turn in the same paper separately. This will confirm that everyone
agrees on and approves of the final version that is submitted. The paper should be added as a
single-file attachment in PDF or Word format. Each group member should also write a brief
description of their contributions to the final paper and paste it in the text submission window
for the assignment on Sakai. In most cases, all group members will receive identical grades.
Late papers will be accepted until December 15. However, each day of delay past the December
12 deadline will reduce your score by 5 points (out of the maximum possible 30 for the paper).
Extra Credit Opportunities
Two times during the semester you will have the opportunity to earn extra credit by answering
a 10-minute quiz/short-answer question, or doing an activity in class. There will be no advance
warning as to when those opportunities will be available. There will also be no make-up extra
credit options available for students who are absent from class on that day. Each of the activities
will be worth 1 point, and can add 1% to your final grade.
COMM 305, Fall 2015
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Another way to get extra credit is through social media participation. You are encouraged to
tweet relevant observations, links to news, scholarly papers, and other materials pertinent to the
topics discussed in class. The tweets should use the hashtag #SCI305. Students who post 12 or
more thoughtful tweets related to the course material using that hashtag will get an additional 1
point and increase their final grade by 1%. Keep in mind that in order to get extra credit, you also
need to tweet throughout the semester, and not just in the last few weeks of class.
Grade Breakdown & Scale
A and B grades in this class are reserved for outstanding work. To get a high grade, students need
to participate actively in class, be thorough and careful in exam answers and papers, and
demonstrate excellent understanding of the subject, critical thinking, and originality in their
work.
If you have concerns about your course grade, schedule an appointment with me as early as
possible during the semester to discuss it. Once the course grades are announced, they are final
and will only be changed in case of an error in the computation of the student’s score.
The grade breakdown will be as follows:
Class participation:
Reading discussion:
Midterm exam:
Final presentation:
Final paper:
Total:
15% (0-15 points)
15% (0-15 points)
30% (0-30 points)
10% (0-10 points)
30% (0-30 points)
100% (0-100 points)
Extra credit opportunities can contribute an additional 3% to your grade.
The final grade will be awarded according to the following scale:
A
B+
B
C+
C
D
F
90-100%
85-89%
80-84%
75-79%
70-74%
60-69%
below 60%
Academic Integrity
You are required to complete your own assignments and exams, and always acknowledge the
sources of contributions, materials, quotes, and ideas that you did not develop yourself. The
consequences of scholastic dishonesty in this class and at Rutgers University in general are very
serious. For more details, consult the University’s academic integrity policy. Any violation will
at a minimum result in no credit earned for the assignment in question. Serious violations of
academic integrity may prevent students from completing the course or their academic program.
If you have questions about issues related to plagiarism or academic integrity, do not hesitate to
contact me.
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Accommodation
This course will accommodate any student in need of assistance. Students with documented
disabilities who need accommodations should contact the Rutgers Disabilities Services Office (see
disabilityservices.rutgers.edu for details). You can also speak with a SC&I adviser by visiting the
Office of Student Services in the SC&I Building, Room 214 or calling them at 848-932-7500 (dial 2
as your menu choice). Please contact me with information about the requested assistance and
present your Letter of Accommodation as early in the semester as possible.
Additional Resources
Note that the university offers a number of useful resources that you have access to and may take
advantage of while in this course:
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For additional tutoring, training, or writing help, visit the Rutgers Learning Center
(online at lrc.rutgers.edu) and the Writing Center (plangere.rutgers.edu).
If you need a consultation on research materials and ways to find them, you can contact
the Rutgers University subject specialist librarian for communication.
If you need help with class schedule or registration, visit the Student Services Office
located in CI 214, and online at comminfo.rutgers.edu/student-services.
The SC&I IT Services can help you with various technological problems. You can find
them in CI 120, by phone at 848-932-5555, or by email at help@comminfo.rutgers.edu.
Course Outline
The course schedule is subject to change: materials may be added or replaced during the semester
based on relevant current events, new research, and student interests. If that happens, the changes
will be reflected on the Sakai website and announced in class/over email.
Day 1 – Thu, September 3
Course and syllabus review
Day 2 – Tue, September 8
Understanding social media I
Day 3 – Thu, September 10
Understanding social media II
Day 8 – Mon, September 28
Social relationships &
discussion ties II
Day 9 – Thu, October 1
Social networks
Day 10 – Mon, October 5
Social analytics I
Day 4 – Mon, September 14
Self-presentation &
identity management
Day 11 – Thu, October 8
Social analytics II
Day 5 – Thu, September 17
Credibility & deception
Day 12 – Mon, October 12
Social influence
Day 6 – Mon, September 21
Privacy & anonymity
Day 13 – Thu, October 15
Social capital
Day 7 – Thu, September 24
Social relationships &
discussion ties I
Day 14 – Mon, October 19
Midterm exam
COMM 305, Fall 2015
Day 15 – Thu, October 22
Virtual communities
Day 22 – Mon, November 16
Ethics of social media research
Day 16 – Mon, October 26
Civic engagement
Day 23 – Thu, November 19
No class: Group work day
Day 17 – Thu, October 29
Political participation
Day 24 – Mon, November 23
Social media in organizations
Day 18 – Mon, November 2
Social mobilization & protests
Day 25 – Mon, November 30
News & information diffusion
Day 19 – Thu, November 5
Algorithmic social reality
Day 26 – Thu, December 3
Traditional & social media
Day 20 – Mon, November 9
The filter bubble
Day 27 – Mon, December 7
Final presentations I
Day 21 – Thu, November 12
Social media users
Day 28 – Thu, December 10
Final presentations II
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______________________________
Day 1 – Thu, September 3
Course and syllabus review
______________________________
Day 2 – Tue, September 8
Understanding social media I
Required: Ellison, N. B., & boyd, d. (2013). Sociality through social network sites. In W. H.
Dutton (Ed.), Oxford Handbook of Internet Studies (pp. 151-172). Oxford, UK: Oxford
University Press.
Recommended: Carr, C. T., & Hayes, R. A. (2015). Social Media: Defining, Developing, and
Divining. Atlantic Journal of Communication, 23(1), 46-65.
Recommended: Hargittai, E., & Hsieh, Y.-l. P. (2011). From dabblers to omnivores: A typology
of social network site usage. In Z. Papacharissi (Ed.), A networked self: Identity,
community, and culture on social network sites (pp. 39-58). New York, NY: Routledge.
______________________________
Day 3 – Thu, September 10
Understanding social media II
Required: Baym, N. (2011). Social Networks 2.0. In M. Consalvo & C. Ess (Eds.), The handbook of
Internet studies (pp. 384-405). Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing.
Recommended: boyd, d. (2011). Social network sites as networked publics: Affordances,
dynamics, and implications. In Z. Papacharissi (Ed.), A networked self: Identity,
community, and culture on social network sites (pp. 39-58). New York, NY: Routledge.
Recommended: Baym, N. (2015). Personal connections in the digital age (2nd Ed.). Malden, MA:
Polity Press. Ch.2 Making new media make sense.
______________________________
Day 4 – Mon, September 14
Self-presentation and identity management
Required: Marwick, A. E., & boyd, d. (2011). I tweet honestly, I tweet passionately: Twitter
users, context collapse, and the imagined audience. New media & society,
13(1), 114-133.
Recommended: DeAndrea, D. C. (2014). Advancing Warranting Theory. Communication Theory,
24(2), 186-204
Recommended: Ellison, N., Heino, R., & Gibbs, J. (2006). Managing Impressions Online: SelfPresentation Processes in the Online Dating Environment. Journal of ComputerMediated Communication, 11(2), 415-441.
COMM 305, Fall 2015
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______________________________
Day 5 – Thu, September 17
Credibility and deception
Required: Hancock, J. T. (2009). Digital deception: Why, when and how people lie online. In A.
N. Joinson, K. Y. A. McKenna, T. Postmes & U.-D. Reips (Eds.), Oxford Handbook of
Internet Psychology (pp. 289-302). Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.
Recommended: Guillory, J., & Hancock, J. T. (2012). The effect of Linkedin on deception in
resumes. Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, 15(3), 135-140.
Recommended: Flanagin, A., & Metzger, M. (2008). Digital Media and Youth: Unparalleled
Opportunity and Unprecedented Responsibility. In A. Flanagin & M. Metzger (Eds.),
Digital Media, Youth, and Credibility. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.
______________________________
Day 6 – Mon, September 21
Privacy and anonymity
Required: boyd, d. (2014). It's complicated: The social lives of networked teens. New Haven, CT:
Yale University Press. Ch.2 Privacy: Why do youth share so publicly?
Required: Skim through this and this Pew report about American attitudes towards privacy.
Recommended: Ziegele, M., & Quiring, O. (2011). Privacy in Social Network Sites. In S. Trepte
& L. Reinecke (Eds.), Privacy online: Perspectives on privacy and self-disclosure in the social
web. New York, NY: Springer Science & Business Media.
Recommended: Litt, E., & Hargittai, E. (2014). A bumpy ride on the information superhighway:
Exploring turbulence online. Computers in human behavior, 36, 520-529.
______________________________
Day 7 – Thu, September 24
Social relationships & discussion ties I
Required: Wellman, B., & Rainie, L. (2012). Networked: The new social operating system.
Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, Ch.5 Networked Relationships.
Recommended: Turkle, S. (2012). Alone together: Why we expect more from technology and less from
each other. New York, NY: Basic Books., Ch. 8: Always on.
Recommended: Takhteyev, Y., Gruzd, A., & Wellman, B. (2011). Geography of Twitter
networks. Social Networks, 34(1), 73-81.
Assignment: Forming groups.
______________________________
COMM 305, Fall 2015
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Day 8 – Mon, September 28
Social relationships & discussion ties II
Required: Pew Research (2015) Teens, technology and friendships. Read p.2-12
Pew Research (2011) Social networking sites and our lives. Read p.22-31
Recommended: Hampton, K., Sessions, L. F., & Her, E. J. (2011). Core networks, social isolation,
and new media: How Internet and mobile phone use is related to network size and
diversity. Information, Communication & Society, 14(1)
Recommended: McPherson, M., Smith-Lovin, L., & Brashears, M. E. (2008). Social Isolation in
America: Changes in Core Discussion Networks over Two Decades. American
Sociological Review, 71(6), 353-375.
______________________________
Day 9 – Thu, October 1
Social networks
Required: Easley, D., & Kleinberg, J. (2010). Networks, Crowds, and Markets: Reasoning About a
Highly Connected World. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press. Ch.1 Overview.
Recommended: The Networks, Crowds, and Markets book is available online – you can browse
through it and read chapters that interest you.
Recommended: Marin, A., & Wellman, B. (2011). Social Network Analysis: An Introduction.
In P. Carrington & J. Scott (Eds.), Handbook of Social Network Analysis (pp. 11-26).
Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.
______________________________
Day 10 – Mon, October 5
Social analytics I
Required: Valente, T. W. (2010). Social Networks and Health: Models, Methods, and Applications.
New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
Ch.1 Introduction & skim through Ch.5 Centrality.
Recommended: Hansen, D., Shneiderman, B., & Smith, M. A. (2010). Analyzing Social Media
Networks with NodeXL: Insights from a Connected World: Morgan Kaufmann. – Ch. 1 & 2
______________________________
Day 11 – Thu, October 8
Social analytics II
Required: Check out the user guides for Twitter Analytics and Facebook page insights.
Recommended: Hogan, B. (2008). Analyzing social networks via the Internet. In Fielding, N.,
Lee, R., & Blank, G. (Eds.). The handbook of online research methods. New York, NY: Sage.
Assignment: Final paper topic proposal (1 page).
COMM 305, Fall 2015
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Day 12 – Mon, October 12
Social influence
Required: Dubois, E., & Gaffney, D. (2014). The Multiple Facets of Influence: Identifying
Political Influentials and Opinion Leaders on Twitter. American Behavioral Scientist,
58(10), 1260-1277.
Recommended: Bakshy, E., Hofman, J. M., Mason, W. A., & Watts, D. J. (2011). Everyone's an
influencer: quantifying influence on Twitter. Paper presented at the WSDM: 4th ACM
International Conference on Web search and data mining, Hong Kong, China.
______________________________
Day 13 – Thu, October 15
Social capital
Required: Ellison, N. B., Lampe, C., Steinfeld, C., & Vitak, J. (2011). With a Little Help From My
Friends: How Social Network Sites Affect Social Capital Processes. In Z. Papacharissi
(Ed.), A networked self: Identity, community, and culture on social network sites (pp. 124145). New York, NY: Routledge
Recommended: Ellison, N. B., Vitak, J., Gray, R., & Lampe, C. (2014). Cultivating Social
Resources on Social Network Sites: Facebook Relationship Maintenance Behaviors
and Their Role in Social Capital Processes. Journal of Computer-Mediated
Communication, 19(4), 855-870.
Recommended: Sajuria, J., vanHeerde-Hudson, J., Hudson, D., Dasandi, N., & Theocharis, Y.
(2015). Tweeting Alone? An Analysis of Bridging and Bonding Social Capital in
Online Networks. American Politics Quarterly, 43(4), 708-738.
______________________________
Day 14 – Mon, October 19
Midterm exam
______________________________
Day 15 – Thu, October 22
Virtual communities
Required: Parks, M. (2011). Social network sites as virtual communities. In Z. Papacharissi
(Ed.), A networked self: Identity, community, and culture on social network sites (pp. 39-58).
New York, NY: Routledge.
Recommended: Hampton, K. N. (2015). Persistent and Pervasive Community: New
Communication Technologies and the Future of Community. American Behavioral Scientist.
Recommended: Matei, S., & Ball-Rokeach, S. J. (2002). Belonging in geographic, ethnic, and
Internet spaces. In B. Wellman & C. A. Haythornthwaite (Eds.), The Internet in everyday
life (pp. 404-427). Oxford, UK: Wiley-Blackwell.
______________________________
COMM 305, Fall 2015
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Day 16 – Mon, October 26
Civic engagement
Required: Bennett, W. L. (2008). Changing citizenship in the digital age. In W. L. Bennett (Ed.),
Civic Life Online: Learning How Digital Media Can Engage Youth (pp. 1-24). Cambridge,
MA: The MIT Press.
Recommended: Xenos, M., Vromen, A., & Loader, B. D. (2014). The great equalizer? Patterns of
social media use and youth political engagement in three advanced democracies.
Information, Communication & Society, 17(2), 151-167.
Recommended: Boulianne, S. (2015). Social media use and participation: a meta-analysis of
current research. Information, Communication & Society, 18(5), 524-538
______________________________
Day 17 – Thu, October 29
Political participation
Required: Bond, R. M., Fariss, C. J., Jones, J. J., Kramer, A. D., Marlow, C., Settle, J. E., &
Fowler, J. H. (2012). A 61-million-person experiment in social influence and political
mobilization. Nature, 489(7415), 295-298.
Recommended: Bode, L., Vraga, E. K., Borah, P., & Shah, D. V. (2014). A New Space for
Political Behavior: Political Social Networking and its Democratic Consequences.
Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 19(3), 414-429.
Recommended: Thorson, K. (2013). Facing an uncertain reception: young citizens and political
interaction on Facebook. Information, Communication & Society, 17(2), 203-216.
______________________________
Day 18 – Mon, November 2
Social mobilization and protests
Required: Shirky, C. (2011). The political power of social media. Foreign affairs, 90(1), 28-41.
Morozov, E. (2010). The Digital Dictatorship. The Wall Street Journal.
Gladwell, M. (2010). Small change. The New Yorker, 4(2010), 42-49.
Recommended: Tufekci, Z., & Wilson, C. (2012). Social Media and the Decision to Participate
in Political Protest: Observations From Tahrir Square. Journal of Communication, 62(2),
363-379.
Recommended: Gonzalez-Bailon, S., Borge-Holthoefer, J., & Moreno, Y. (2013). Broadcasters
and Hidden Influentials in Online Protest Diffusion. American Behavioral Scientist,
57(7), 943-965.
Assignment: Final paper outline (3-4 pages).
______________________________
COMM 305, Fall 2015
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Day 19 – Thu, November 5
Algorithmic social reality
Required: Bogost, I. (2015). The cathedral of computation. The Atlantic.
Required: Lazer, D. (2015). The rise of the social algorithm. Science, 348(6239), 1090-1091.
Recommended: Epstein, R., & Robertson, R. E. (2015). The search engine manipulation effect
(SEME) and its possible impact on the outcomes of elections. PNAS, 112(33), E4512E4521.
______________________________
Day 20 – Mon, November 9
The filter bubble
Required: Pariser, E. (2011). The filter bubble: How the new personalized web is changing what we
read and how we think. New York, NY: Penguin Press. - Ch. 4 The you loop.
Recommended: Bakshy, E., Messing, S., & Adamic, L. (2015). Exposure to ideologically diverse
news and opinion on Facebook. Science, 348(6239), 1130-1132.
Recommended: Lee, J. K., Choi, J., Kim, C., & Kim, Y. (2014). Social Media, Network
Heterogeneity, and Opinion Polarization. Journal of Communication, 64(4), 702-722.
______________________________
Day 21 – Thu, November 12
Social media users
Required: Pew Research (2014) Social media update.
Recommended: Lewis, K., Kaufman, J., Gonzalez, M., Wimmer, A., & Christakis, N. (2008).
Tastes, ties, and time: A new social network dataset using Facebook.com. Social
Networks, 30(4), 330-342. doi: 10.1016/j.socnet.2008.07.002
Recommended: Hargittai, E. (2015). Is Bigger Always Better? Potential Biases of Big Data
Derived from Social Network Sites. The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political
and Social Science, 659(1), 63-76
______________________________
Day 22 – Mon, November 16
Ethics of social media research
Required: Puschmann, C., & Bozdag, E. (2014). Staking out the unclear ethical terrain of online
social experiments. Internet Policy Review, 3(4).
Recommended: Kramer, A. D. I., Guillory, J. E., & Hancock, J. T. (2014). Experimental evidence
of massive-scale emotional contagion through social networks. PNAS, 111, 8788–8790.
Recommended: Zimmer, M. (2010). “But the data is already public”: on the ethics of research
in Facebook. Ethics and Information Technology, 12(4), 313-325.
COMM 305, Fall 2015
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______________________________
Day 23 – Thu, November 19
No class: Group work day
Assignment: Group meetings (online or offline).
______________________________
Day 24 – Mon, November 23
Social media in organizations
Required: Ellison, N. B., Gibbs, J. L., & Weber, M. S. (2015). The Use of Enterprise Social
Network Sites for Knowledge Sharing in Distributed Organizations: The Role of
Organizational Affordances. American Behavioral Scientist, 59(1), 103-123.
Recommended: Leonardi, P. M., Huysman, M., & Steinfield, C. (2013). Enterprise Social
Media: Definition, History, and Prospects for the Study of Social Technologies in
Organizations. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 19(1), 1-19.
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Thu, November 26
Thanksgiving break
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Day 25 – Mon, November 30
News and information diffusion
Required: Pew Research (2015) The Evolving Role of News on Twitter and Facebook.
Recommended: Wu, S., Hofman, J. M., Mason, W. A., & Watts, D. J. (2011). Who says what to
whom on Twitter. Paper presented at the 20th international World Wide Web (WWW)
Conference.
Recommended: Bennett, W. L., & Manheim, J. B. (2006). The One-Step Flow of Communication.
The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 608(1), 213.
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Day 26 – Thu, December 3
Traditional media and social media
Required: Kwak, H., Lee, C., Park, H., & Moon, S. (2010). What is Twitter, a Social Network or a
News Media? Paper presented at the 19th international World Wide Web (WWW)
Conference.
Recommended: Conway, B. A., Kenski, K., & Wang, D. (2015). The Rise of Twitter in the
Political Campaign: Searching for Intermedia Agenda‐Setting Effects in the
Presidential Primary. Journal of Computer‐Mediated Communication, 20, 363-380.
COMM 305, Fall 2015
Page 13 of 14
Recommended: Walther, J. B., Carr, C. T., Choi, S. S. W., DeAndrea, D. C., Kim, J., Tong, S. T.,
& Van Der Heide, B. (2011). Interaction of interpersonal, peer, and media influence
sources online: A research agenda for technology convergence. In Z. Papacharissi
(Ed.), A networked self: Identity, community, and culture on social network sites (pp. 17-38).
New York, NY: Routledge.
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Day 27 – Mon, December 7
Final presentations I
Assignment: Final presentations.
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Day 28 – Thu, December 10
Final presentations II
Assignment: Final presentations.
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Sat, December 12
Final paper
Assignment: Final paper due.
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COMM 305, Fall 2015
Page 14 of 14