Tal Samuel-Azran
Dados Biográficos
| ID | 315790 |
|---|---|
| NOME | Tal Samuel-Azran |
| PRENOMES | Tal |
| SOBRENOME | Samuel-Azran |
| ASSINATURA | SAMUEL-AZRAN T |
| AFILIAÇÕES | Reichman University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-9501-2949 |
| VERIFICADO | Sim |
| TOTAL DE OBRAS | 37 |
| TOTAL DE CITAÇÕES | 100 |
| TOTAL COMO AUTOR | 37 |
| TOTAL COMO EDITOR | 0 |
| PRIMEIRO ANO DE PUBLICAÇÃO | 2012 |
| ANO MAIS RECENTE DE PUBLICAÇÃO | 2025 |
| ÍNDICE H | 5 |
The Social Side of Online Learning
Social factors, including social ties (the extent to which students form social ties with other students in the course) and social capital (the resources which are accessed through our social networks), have been acknowledged as important predictors of learning outcomes. Furthermore, they may be particularly important in online distance learning environments, in which social presence and interaction may be compromised. Nonetheless, there is a pau…
Digital Diplomacy Followers as Indicator of Clout
The “Al-Jazeera Effect” posits that Al-Jazeera has reshaped global news flows while challenging the hegemony of Western news outlets. However, few studies to date have measured this “Effect” or offered a method for doing so. This study addressed this gap by conceptualizing news outlets’ online following as Clout and assessing Al-Jazeera’s ability to attract high-quality digital diplomacy followers on Twitter including Ministries of Foreign Affair…
The surprising role of marital status on sport second-screening
To better understand what characterizes those who use a second screen while watching sport, the study examine a variety of demographic factors influencing browsing device trends before, during (“second screen”), and after sports games. It does so by utilizing survey data from Israeli viewers of the 2022 World Cup using a convenience sample ( N = 242). In line with our hypotheses, those with higher education and higher reported income were more li…
Unveiling the Intersection of Individual Stardom and Team Loyalty in Social Network Reflections
This study investigates sport fandom's major dimensions: star attraction and team identification, analyzing transfers of soccer players Ronaldo and Messi. Data from teams' official social media (Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter/X) using scripts inform our analysis. Results reveal star attraction's significant prominence over team identification. Instagram, linked to celebrity culture and star fandom, displays the highest online growth, emphasizin…
Analyzing AI Bias
Sporting events have been the target of terrorist groups for decades due to their high profile. Since 9/11, a bias against Muslims has been evident in both traditional and social media with Muslims being depicted as likely perpetrators of attacks against sporting events. The 2024 Paris Olympics represents the first major sporting events in the age of generative artificial intelligence (AI) platforms. This study is the first to examine to what ext…
Global Sport Protest Activism Is Exclusive to the Global Elite
Toward better understanding the nature of sport global protest, this article examines the profiles of users of the #boycottqatar2022 ( N = 111,172), a global initiative calling to boycott the 2022 World Cup on grounds of Qatar's alleged breach of human rights. A social network analysis identified that 82% of users of the hashtag were from North America and Western Europe, that 88% of the uses of the hashtag were on Twitter (and a minority on Face…
The Twitter Following For the Beijing Winter Olympics and the Russian-Chinese Fans' Alliance
The current study examines the extent to which mega sport events play a role in connecting people from different countries, using the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics as its case study. The analysis examines social connection (on Twitter) between Chinese and Russians and whether these connections are more likely to occur among the followers of the @Beijing2022 Twitter account, if compared with Twitter users in these countries who do not follow this a…
Sport Fanship at the Age of the Pandemic
Sport fanship is immeasurable and represents one of society's most universal leisure activities. The current collection of research on the fanship phenomena is truly global: 25 scholars from 4 continents (including North and south America, UK, Australia, Norway, Netherland, and Israel) looked closely at various dimensions of sport fanship. The ongoing COVID pandemic presents both spectators on and off the field with various challenges side to uni…
Less critical and less informed
The growing number of undecided voters has attracted a lot of interest due to its important role in determining election results. Many studies have addressed the media consumption of undecideds but few have examined the role of undecideds’ attitudes towards the media institution. This paper is innovative in its attempt to address the issue of the role of media trust in undecided versus decided voters’ media engagement, based on a survey (N = 1427…
Empirical support for the Al-Jazeera Effect notion
Globalization scholars argue that the launch of Al-Jazeera has promoted a fairer horizontal news flow as a non-Western perspective entered the global public sphere leading to the Al-Jazeera Effect. In contrast, other scholars argue that Al-Jazeera outlets face biases and boycotts due to their Qatari origin, thus casting a shadow over the Al Jazeera Effect argument. This study employs an innovative approach to contribute to this debate by examinin…
Not all undecided voters are alike
The changing face of fandom
The article seeks to document the changing patterns in football fandom over the past three decades, since the advent of the so-called era of globalisation, using the case study of Israel. It shows how, in line with global trends, Israeli fans moved from passive following of sport clubs identified with political parties to becoming active supporters with growing involvement in the clubs' management. The article also traces the shift from party pol…
The geography of the Arab public sphere on Twitter
Can celebrity athletes burst the echo chamber bubble? The case of LeBron James and Lady Gaga
This study examines the case of basketball superstar LeBron James, who openly identifies as a liberal. Our analysis of LeBron James' Twitter profile revealed normal distribution between liberals and conservatives following his account. We then compared James' followers' distribution to those of the singer Lady Gaga and liberal-tilting sport network ESPN and found that James' followers' distribution represented the most diverse distribution of the…
The independent reinforcement effect
In this study, we explore the effect of diversity among people who share a story about a scientific discovery, on the recipient’s credibility assessment regarding that story. The data used in this study were gathered in two phases. Initial data were collected through the Twitter application program interface. The data were then used in an experimental setting: We manipulated the level of diversity of real-life Twitter followings, supposedly retwe…
Online news recommendations credibility
In this paper, we wish to examine the perceived credibility of news items shared through Social Networking Sites (SNS) –specifically, as a function of tie strength and perceived credibility of the media source from which the content originated. We utilized a between-subjects design. The Facebook account of each participant (N=217) was analyzed. Based on this analysis, our participants were shown a fictitious Facebook post that was presumably shar…
Women politicians are more engaging
In light of past studies’ findings that male politicians usually receive more salient coverage in the traditional media, this study examines whether social media provide a more equal opportunity platform for female politicians to generate users’ engagement and mobilize their supporters. Our study focuses on male versus female politicians’ ability to engage social media users during an election campaign, using the Israeli 2015 campaign as our case…
Military Public Diplomacy 2.0
The Arabic-language Facebook page of the Israeli Defense Forces’ spokesperson has attracted a massive following in the Arab world and serves as an interesting and unique case study towards understanding the effect of a military public diplomacy initiative. Content analysis of the Facebook page reveals a mixture of power and deterrence messages, with posts designed to emphasize shared values. Analysis of audience engagement with those messages — m…
A clash-of-civilizations prism in German media? Documenting a shift from political to religious framing of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict
The impact of political events on media’s conflict coverage prism is widely established. To assess the role of mounting tensions between Muslims and non-Muslims in Europe in 2013–2014 on German media’s coverage prism of Muslim-related conflicts, this article compares coverage of the 2008 and 2014 Israeli military operations in Gaza by three major German newspapers. The empirical analysis indicates a dramatic rise in the use of religious terms in …
The impact of political context on news coverage
Political environment is an important factor in news coverage, both in terms of the news items selected (the amount of coverage) and the tone of the coverage. Through an analysis of news coverage of Qatar in the Israeli press, the current study examines the impact of the political circumstances and the contextual cues in news stories on the framing of foreign news. The analysis includes 1,199 articles appearing in the mainstream online Israeli pr…
Counter-hegemonic contra-flow and the Al Jazeera America fiasco
Al Jazeera America, arguably the most ambitious attempt in history by a non-Western network to broadcast to US audiences, was shut in April 2016. A social network analysis of Al Jazeera America’s following on Twitter reveals that 42 per cent of Al Jazeera America’s followers did not follow any other US news outlet and that most of the remaining 58 per cent followed liberal stations. The findings illustrate mainstream US news consumers’ reluctance…
Let the Germans Win? Israeli Attitudes towards Die Mannschaft during The 2014 World Cup Tournament
To contribute to analyses of the sport-politics nexus, the study examines Jewish-Israeli attitudes toward the German soccer team and Germany. The analysis reveals that more Israelis root against the German soccer team than support it, despite the team’s impressive achievements. The analysis of attitudes toward Germany surprisingly reveals that the 18–20 age group expressed the strongest animosity towards Germany, which may indicate that Israeli g…
Friend or Foe? Perceptions of Qatar in the Israeli Online General and Sports Press
The current paper is looking into the way in which Qatar’s investment in sport, both directly and indirectly, is being perceived by the Israeli press. In order to accomplish the task set above, a content analysis of Qatar’s media coverage in the Israeli online press was conducted. Our analysis includes 1199 articles appearing in the mainstream online Israeli press and the findings point out to an interesting trend; there are significant differenc…
Jewish-Israeli attitudes towards the Iranian football team during the 2014 World Cup tournament
To contribute to analysis of the interplay between sport and politics, this study examines Jewish-Israeli attitudes towards the Iranian football team during the 2014 World Cup tournament. A survey amongst a representative sample of the Jewish-Israeli population reveals that the Iranian team was the least favored team to win the games but, at the same time, young and secular respondents were more likely than other groups to believe that the Irania…
Is there a Qatari–Al-Jazeera nexus? Coverage of the 2022 Fifa World Cup controversy by Al-Jazeera versus Sky News, CNNI and ITV
The Al-Jazeera–Qatari nexus is debatable and hard to examine because Qatari affairs are rarely in the news. Recently, Qatar made global headlines in connection with an alleged bribe to win the 2022 World Cup bid, which creates a rare opportunity to examine Al-Jazeera’s coverage of this as well as other Qatari affairs. We compared coverage by Al-Jazeera Arabic, Al-Jazeera English and Al-Jazeera America with coverage of international networks (Sky …
Al-Jazeera, Qatar, and New Tactics in State-Sponsored Media Diplomacy
The use of international broadcasting, a tool of public diplomacy since World War I, can be divided into two chronological periods. The first, which began during World War I and declined in the post-Cold War era, was characterized by international government-sponsored radio broadcasters. The second began with the emergence of privately owned global news networks (e.g., CNN, Sky News, and MSNBC) in the 1980s and 1990s, which were deemed more credi…
Political information repertoires and political participation
This study examines the relationship between various forms of media use and political participation. The major argument is that in today’s high-choice media environment, individuals and groups with the highest level of political interest are more likely to develop richer political information repertoires that involve exploiting both digital and traditional ways of searching for political information. Individuals and groups with richer political i…
Equalization versus Normalization
The question of whether social media grant challengers a fair opportunity to compete with incumbents, thus promoting equalization rather than normalization, is a key issue in studies of the web's contribution to democratic systems. To contribute to the current debate, whose evidence so far strongly supports the normalization hypothesis, we examined the ability of the five leading political candidates in Israel popularity to promote engagement to …
Online news recommendations credibility
In this paper, we wish to examine the perceived credibility of news items shared through Social Networking Sites (SNS) –specifically, as a function of tie strength and perceived credibility of the media source from which the content originated. We utilized a between-subjects design. The Facebook account of each participant (N=217) was analyzed. Based on this analysis, our participants were shown a fictitious Facebook post that was presumably shar…
Is there an Al-Jazeera–Qatari nexus? A study of Al-Jazeera’s online reporting throughout the Qatari–Saudi conflict
This article evaluates the high-profile accusations published on Wikileaks that Al-Jazeera was used as a diplomatic tool by Qatar, with the 2002–2007 Qatari–Saudi conflict serving as a case study. The analysis is aimed at revealing whether the conflict affected Al-Jazeera’s coverage of Saudi affairs, specifically whether Al-Jazeera Arabic ( N = 285) and Al-Jazeera English ( N = 220) websites increased the volume of articles casting Saudi Arabia i…
Rhetoric Styles and Political Affiliations During Israel’s 2013 “Facebook Elections”
Not all undecided voters are alike
Counter-hegemonic contra-flow and the Al Jazeera America fiasco
Al Jazeera America, arguably the most ambitious attempt in history by a non-Western network to broadcast to US audiences, was shut in April 2016. A social network analysis of Al Jazeera America’s following on Twitter reveals that 42 per cent of Al Jazeera America’s followers did not follow any other US news outlet and that most of the remaining 58 per cent followed liberal stations. The findings illustrate mainstream US news consumers’ reluctance…
Is there a Qatari–Al-Jazeera nexus? Coverage of the 2022 Fifa World Cup controversy by Al-Jazeera versus Sky News, CNNI and ITV
The Al-Jazeera–Qatari nexus is debatable and hard to examine because Qatari affairs are rarely in the news. Recently, Qatar made global headlines in connection with an alleged bribe to win the 2022 World Cup bid, which creates a rare opportunity to examine Al-Jazeera’s coverage of this as well as other Qatari affairs. We compared coverage by Al-Jazeera Arabic, Al-Jazeera English and Al-Jazeera America with coverage of international networks (Sky …
The Boston Game and the Isis Match
The world is becoming largely interconnected. This notion has thought-provoking implications due to the fact that this interdependence affords terrorist organizations opportunities to perpetrate attacks. It is inevitable that an increased risk of terrorism, especially on the forefront of megasporting events, is on the rise due to the global publicity such attacks receive. This article focuses on the Boston Marathon Bombing and the Islamic State a…
Global Sport Protest Activism Is Exclusive to the Global Elite
Toward better understanding the nature of sport global protest, this article examines the profiles of users of the #boycottqatar2022 ( N = 111,172), a global initiative calling to boycott the 2022 World Cup on grounds of Qatar's alleged breach of human rights. A social network analysis identified that 82% of users of the hashtag were from North America and Western Europe, that 88% of the uses of the hashtag were on Twitter (and a minority on Face…
Empirical support for the Al-Jazeera Effect notion
Globalization scholars argue that the launch of Al-Jazeera has promoted a fairer horizontal news flow as a non-Western perspective entered the global public sphere leading to the Al-Jazeera Effect. In contrast, other scholars argue that Al-Jazeera outlets face biases and boycotts due to their Qatari origin, thus casting a shadow over the Al Jazeera Effect argument. This study employs an innovative approach to contribute to this debate by examinin…
The changing face of fandom
The article seeks to document the changing patterns in football fandom over the past three decades, since the advent of the so-called era of globalisation, using the case study of Israel. It shows how, in line with global trends, Israeli fans moved from passive following of sport clubs identified with political parties to becoming active supporters with growing involvement in the clubs' management. The article also traces the shift from party pol…
Can celebrity athletes burst the echo chamber bubble? The case of LeBron James and Lady Gaga
This study examines the case of basketball superstar LeBron James, who openly identifies as a liberal. Our analysis of LeBron James' Twitter profile revealed normal distribution between liberals and conservatives following his account. We then compared James' followers' distribution to those of the singer Lady Gaga and liberal-tilting sport network ESPN and found that James' followers' distribution represented the most diverse distribution of the…
Narratives used to portray in-group terrorists
Studies of US and UK media reveal that the press adheres to a dichotomous religion-based us/them worldview that portrays Muslims as terrorists but ‘repairs’ the image of Jews and Christians as criminals, creating concerns that the Western media promotes a clash-of-civilizations thinking pattern. To examine whether this pattern is representative of other Western democracies, the authors analyzed Israeli press coverage of Jewish settlers’ attacks a…
Analyzing AI Bias
Sporting events have been the target of terrorist groups for decades due to their high profile. Since 9/11, a bias against Muslims has been evident in both traditional and social media with Muslims being depicted as likely perpetrators of attacks against sporting events. The 2024 Paris Olympics represents the first major sporting events in the age of generative artificial intelligence (AI) platforms. This study is the first to examine to what ext…
The Twitter Following For the Beijing Winter Olympics and the Russian-Chinese Fans' Alliance
The current study examines the extent to which mega sport events play a role in connecting people from different countries, using the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics as its case study. The analysis examines social connection (on Twitter) between Chinese and Russians and whether these connections are more likely to occur among the followers of the @Beijing2022 Twitter account, if compared with Twitter users in these countries who do not follow this a…
The geography of the Arab public sphere on Twitter
The impact of political context on news coverage
Political environment is an important factor in news coverage, both in terms of the news items selected (the amount of coverage) and the tone of the coverage. Through an analysis of news coverage of Qatar in the Israeli press, the current study examines the impact of the political circumstances and the contextual cues in news stories on the framing of foreign news. The analysis includes 1,199 articles appearing in the mainstream online Israeli pr…
Jewish-Israeli attitudes towards the Iranian football team during the 2014 World Cup tournament
To contribute to analysis of the interplay between sport and politics, this study examines Jewish-Israeli attitudes towards the Iranian football team during the 2014 World Cup tournament. A survey amongst a representative sample of the Jewish-Israeli population reveals that the Iranian team was the least favored team to win the games but, at the same time, young and secular respondents were more likely than other groups to believe that the Irania…
Promoting Terror or Sport? The Case of Qatar's International Image
Qatar's successful bid for hosting the 2022 soccer World Cup is regarded as one in a series of attempts to change Qatar's image as a terror-sponsoring state. To understand the power of hosting megasport events to rebuild a country's international image, the present study compares the coverage of Qatari sport affairs with concurrent terror-sponsoring allegations, via a sentiment analysis of coverage of Qatari affairs by three international network…
Globalization and Social Justice in Sports Broadcasting
This article highlights sport broadcasting as an emergent battlefield of “globalization from above and below” based on analysis of the strained relationship between Al-Jazeera Sport (AJS) and sports fans in Middle East and North Africa (MENA) over subscription fees to the 2010 and 2014 World Cup games. The article illustrates how sports globalization weakened national broadcasters’ bidding power and allowed corporations to turn the World Cup from…
The Mobile Phone and Indigenous Teens
To examine whether indigenous adolescents demonstrate distinct usage patterns and perceptions of mobile phones, I compared phone usage and perceptions of indigenous Bedouin teens enrolled in two schools located in Bedouin villages in the Israeli desert (N = 100) and teens studying in two high schools (N = 100) in Tel Aviv, a more technologically advanced environment. I found that the Tel-Aviv adolescents use mobile phones primarily for self-expre…
“Our” Criminals—Israeli Press Coverage of Domestic Political Criminals
The study examined media coverage of Israeli citizens convicted of committing political crimes against the state in order to determine how the media portrays such perpetrators, ultimately to discern what these framing choices suggest about citizens involved in political crimes. In contrast to external acts of political crime for which the explanation provided by the media is clear, mainly that the perpetrator, “the other,” is evil and acting agai…
Al-Jazeera, Qatar, and New Tactics in State-Sponsored Media Diplomacy
The use of international broadcasting, a tool of public diplomacy since World War I, can be divided into two chronological periods. The first, which began during World War I and declined in the post-Cold War era, was characterized by international government-sponsored radio broadcasters. The second began with the emergence of privately owned global news networks (e.g., CNN, Sky News, and MSNBC) in the 1980s and 1990s, which were deemed more credi…
Narratives used to portray in-group terrorists
Studies of US and UK media reveal that the press adheres to a dichotomous religion-based us/them worldview that portrays Muslims as terrorists but ‘repairs’ the image of Jews and Christians as criminals, creating concerns that the Western media promotes a clash-of-civilizations thinking pattern. To examine whether this pattern is representative of other Western democracies, the authors analyzed Israeli press coverage of Jewish settlers’ attacks a…
Globalization and Social Justice in Sports Broadcasting
This article highlights sport broadcasting as an emergent battlefield of “globalization from above and below” based on analysis of the strained relationship between Al-Jazeera Sport (AJS) and sports fans in Middle East and North Africa (MENA) over subscription fees to the 2010 and 2014 World Cup games. The article illustrates how sports globalization weakened national broadcasters’ bidding power and allowed corporations to turn the World Cup from…
Is there an Al-Jazeera–Qatari nexus? A study of Al-Jazeera’s online reporting throughout the Qatari–Saudi conflict
This article evaluates the high-profile accusations published on Wikileaks that Al-Jazeera was used as a diplomatic tool by Qatar, with the 2002–2007 Qatari–Saudi conflict serving as a case study. The analysis is aimed at revealing whether the conflict affected Al-Jazeera’s coverage of Saudi affairs, specifically whether Al-Jazeera Arabic ( N = 285) and Al-Jazeera English ( N = 220) websites increased the volume of articles casting Saudi Arabia i…
Political information repertoires and political participation
This study examines the relationship between various forms of media use and political participation. The major argument is that in today’s high-choice media environment, individuals and groups with the highest level of political interest are more likely to develop richer political information repertoires that involve exploiting both digital and traditional ways of searching for political information. Individuals and groups with richer political i…
Equalization versus Normalization
The question of whether social media grant challengers a fair opportunity to compete with incumbents, thus promoting equalization rather than normalization, is a key issue in studies of the web's contribution to democratic systems. To contribute to the current debate, whose evidence so far strongly supports the normalization hypothesis, we examined the ability of the five leading political candidates in Israel popularity to promote engagement to …
Let the Germans Win? Israeli Attitudes towards Die Mannschaft during The 2014 World Cup Tournament
To contribute to analyses of the sport-politics nexus, the study examines Jewish-Israeli attitudes toward the German soccer team and Germany. The analysis reveals that more Israelis root against the German soccer team than support it, despite the team’s impressive achievements. The analysis of attitudes toward Germany surprisingly reveals that the 18–20 age group expressed the strongest animosity towards Germany, which may indicate that Israeli g…
Friend or Foe? Perceptions of Qatar in the Israeli Online General and Sports Press
The current paper is looking into the way in which Qatar’s investment in sport, both directly and indirectly, is being perceived by the Israeli press. In order to accomplish the task set above, a content analysis of Qatar’s media coverage in the Israeli online press was conducted. Our analysis includes 1199 articles appearing in the mainstream online Israeli press and the findings point out to an interesting trend; there are significant differenc…
Jewish-Israeli attitudes towards the Iranian football team during the 2014 World Cup tournament
To contribute to analysis of the interplay between sport and politics, this study examines Jewish-Israeli attitudes towards the Iranian football team during the 2014 World Cup tournament. A survey amongst a representative sample of the Jewish-Israeli population reveals that the Iranian team was the least favored team to win the games but, at the same time, young and secular respondents were more likely than other groups to believe that the Irania…
Is there a Qatari–Al-Jazeera nexus? Coverage of the 2022 Fifa World Cup controversy by Al-Jazeera versus Sky News, CNNI and ITV
The Al-Jazeera–Qatari nexus is debatable and hard to examine because Qatari affairs are rarely in the news. Recently, Qatar made global headlines in connection with an alleged bribe to win the 2022 World Cup bid, which creates a rare opportunity to examine Al-Jazeera’s coverage of this as well as other Qatari affairs. We compared coverage by Al-Jazeera Arabic, Al-Jazeera English and Al-Jazeera America with coverage of international networks (Sky …
Rhetoric Styles and Political Affiliations During Israel’s 2013 “Facebook Elections”
Promoting Terror or Sport? The Case of Qatar's International Image
Qatar's successful bid for hosting the 2022 soccer World Cup is regarded as one in a series of attempts to change Qatar's image as a terror-sponsoring state. To understand the power of hosting megasport events to rebuild a country's international image, the present study compares the coverage of Qatari sport affairs with concurrent terror-sponsoring allegations, via a sentiment analysis of coverage of Qatari affairs by three international network…
Terrorism and Sport
The Boston Game and the Isis Match
The world is becoming largely interconnected. This notion has thought-provoking implications due to the fact that this interdependence affords terrorist organizations opportunities to perpetrate attacks. It is inevitable that an increased risk of terrorism, especially on the forefront of megasporting events, is on the rise due to the global publicity such attacks receive. This article focuses on the Boston Marathon Bombing and the Islamic State a…
A clash-of-civilizations prism in German media? Documenting a shift from political to religious framing of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict
The impact of political events on media’s conflict coverage prism is widely established. To assess the role of mounting tensions between Muslims and non-Muslims in Europe in 2013–2014 on German media’s coverage prism of Muslim-related conflicts, this article compares coverage of the 2008 and 2014 Israeli military operations in Gaza by three major German newspapers. The empirical analysis indicates a dramatic rise in the use of religious terms in …
The impact of political context on news coverage
Political environment is an important factor in news coverage, both in terms of the news items selected (the amount of coverage) and the tone of the coverage. Through an analysis of news coverage of Qatar in the Israeli press, the current study examines the impact of the political circumstances and the contextual cues in news stories on the framing of foreign news. The analysis includes 1,199 articles appearing in the mainstream online Israeli pr…
Counter-hegemonic contra-flow and the Al Jazeera America fiasco
Al Jazeera America, arguably the most ambitious attempt in history by a non-Western network to broadcast to US audiences, was shut in April 2016. A social network analysis of Al Jazeera America’s following on Twitter reveals that 42 per cent of Al Jazeera America’s followers did not follow any other US news outlet and that most of the remaining 58 per cent followed liberal stations. The findings illustrate mainstream US news consumers’ reluctance…
Women politicians are more engaging
In light of past studies’ findings that male politicians usually receive more salient coverage in the traditional media, this study examines whether social media provide a more equal opportunity platform for female politicians to generate users’ engagement and mobilize their supporters. Our study focuses on male versus female politicians’ ability to engage social media users during an election campaign, using the Israeli 2015 campaign as our case…
Military Public Diplomacy 2.0
The Arabic-language Facebook page of the Israeli Defense Forces’ spokesperson has attracted a massive following in the Arab world and serves as an interesting and unique case study towards understanding the effect of a military public diplomacy initiative. Content analysis of the Facebook page reveals a mixture of power and deterrence messages, with posts designed to emphasize shared values. Analysis of audience engagement with those messages — m…
The independent reinforcement effect
In this study, we explore the effect of diversity among people who share a story about a scientific discovery, on the recipient’s credibility assessment regarding that story. The data used in this study were gathered in two phases. Initial data were collected through the Twitter application program interface. The data were then used in an experimental setting: We manipulated the level of diversity of real-life Twitter followings, supposedly retwe…
Online news recommendations credibility
In this paper, we wish to examine the perceived credibility of news items shared through Social Networking Sites (SNS) –specifically, as a function of tie strength and perceived credibility of the media source from which the content originated. We utilized a between-subjects design. The Facebook account of each participant (N=217) was analyzed. Based on this analysis, our participants were shown a fictitious Facebook post that was presumably shar…
The changing face of fandom
The article seeks to document the changing patterns in football fandom over the past three decades, since the advent of the so-called era of globalisation, using the case study of Israel. It shows how, in line with global trends, Israeli fans moved from passive following of sport clubs identified with political parties to becoming active supporters with growing involvement in the clubs' management. The article also traces the shift from party pol…
The geography of the Arab public sphere on Twitter
Political science (35 obras) · Law (32 obras) · Sociology (31 obras) · Politics (26 obras) · Media studies (22 obras) · Social Media and Politics (19 obras) · Law (17 obras) · Psychology (16 obras) · Media Studies and Communication (15 obras) · Business (12 obras)