Thesis
The influence of Weibo news use on Chinese young adults' political information efficacy: an application of the cognitive elaboration perspective
Washington State University
Master of Arts (MA), Washington State University
2013
Handle:
https://hdl.handle.net/2376/101982
Abstract
This study explores the influence of Weibo news use on Chinese young adults' political information efficacy from the perspective of cognitive elaboration. It develops a theoretical model examining the roles of Weibo news use, traditional media news use, Weibo news discussion; offline news discussion, news attention, news elaboration, and political interest in shaping political information efficacy. Online survey was conducted and distributed on Chinese social networking service including Sina Weibo and the Renren network with a sample including undergraduate and graduate students from 119 universities at home and abroad (N=253). Regression model reveals that Weibo news use, Weibo news discussion, news attention, news elaboration, offline news discussion, and political interest are all significant predictors of political information efficacy. Traditional media news use has no significant effect on political information efficacy. Weibo news use has a weak effect on factual political knowledge, but it disappeared when including only female participants. Structural knowledge is not associated with any other theoretical variables. Also, gender differences are found in this study. Male iv participants showed stronger interests in political and/or public affairs issues compared to females. Also, males are more willing to engage in political news discussion on Weibo. And they demonstrated higher level of political information efficacy than females. Further, these findings supported the O-S-R-O-R model of communication effects, providing evidence regarding the mediating role of political discussion in stimulating reflective thinking, which results in the improved political information efficacy.
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Details
- Title
- The influence of Weibo news use on Chinese young adults' political information efficacy
- Creators
- Xiaoting Yang
- Contributors
- Douglas Blanks Hindman (Degree Supervisor)
- Awarding Institution
- Washington State University
- Academic Unit
- Edward R. Murrow College of Communication
- Theses and Dissertations
- Master of Arts (MA), Washington State University
- Publisher
- Washington State University; [Pullman, Washington] :
- Identifiers
- 99900525048901842
- Language
- English
- Resource Type
- Thesis