Fake News is Not a Virus: On Platforms and Their Effects

IF 4.7 1区文学 Q1 COMMUNICATION

Communication Theory Pub Date : 2020-08-10 DOI:10.1093/ct/qtaa008

C. W. Anderson

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引用次数: 32

Abstract

This article attempts to uncover the intellectual, economic, and methodological structures that have led to the recent emergence of a particular notion of digital communication on social media platforms, one that emphasizes the power of (false) media messages to cause irrational political behavior and combines individual level understanding of media effects with a networked notion of society and information diffusion After pointing out some of the real political-economic forces at work in setting the contours of this intellectual turn, I discuss how spaces between mutually constructed but overlapping paradigmatic understandings of media behavior lead to theories that serve as boundary objects, linking (and misunderstanding) older fields in order to advance new agendas I then turn to the consequences of particular methodological choices, drawing on key works in Science and Technology Studies (STS) to make the point that these methodological choices not only establish scientific fields, they construct certain types of human subjects as well The article concludes with a call for a more humanistic and interpretive approach to the understanding of political behavior and communication

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假新闻不是病毒：在平台上及其影响

本文试图揭示导致最近在社交媒体平台上出现特定数字通信概念的智力、经济和方法结构，强调(虚假)媒体信息导致非理性政治行为的力量，并将个人层面对媒体效应的理解与社会和信息传播的网络化概念结合起来。在指出了在设定这一智力转向的轮廓时起作用的一些真正的政治经济力量之后，我讨论了相互构建但重叠的媒体行为范式理解之间的空间如何导致作为边界对象的理论。链接(和误解)旧的领域，以推进新的议程，然后我转向特定的方法选择的后果，借鉴科学与技术研究(STS)的关键著作，指出这些方法选择不仅建立了科学领域，它们也构建了某些类型的人类主体。文章的最后呼吁一种更人性化和解释性的方法来理解政治行为和沟通

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

Communication Theory COMMUNICATION-

CiteScore

9.00

自引率

2.70%

发文量

期刊介绍： Communication Theory is an international forum publishing high quality, original research into the theoretical development of communication from across a wide array of disciplines, such as communication studies, sociology, psychology, political science, cultural and gender studies, philosophy, linguistics, and literature. A journal of the International Communication Association, Communication Theory especially welcomes work in the following areas of research, all of them components of ICA: Communication and Technology, Communication Law and Policy, Ethnicity and Race in Communication, Feminist Scholarship, Global Communication and Social Change, Health Communication, Information Systems, Instructional/Developmental Communication, Intercultural Communication, Interpersonal Communication, Journalism Studies, Language and Social Interaction, Mass Communication, Organizational Communication, Philosophy of Communication, Political Communication, Popular Communication, Public Relations, Visual Communication Studies, Children, Adolescents and the Media, Communication History, Game Studies, Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Studies, and Intergroup Communication. The journal aims to be inclusive in theoretical approaches insofar as these pertain to communication theory.