The specifics of digital media and the communication role of media content consumers in assessing the student audience (based on the materials of a sociological study)

The article highlights the results of a study, the subject of which was the student audience's ideas about the specific characteristics of digital media, the role and place of authors and consumers of media content in the communication process. The authors consider such aspects of the topic as awareness of the reasons that encourage the audience to turn to digital media content; the grounds and directions for evaluating relevant media phenomena; reflection on the activity or passivity of the role that the audience assumes. Particular attention is paid to the respondents' perception of social norms and rules that determine the forms and types of communicative behavior in the digital media space, since the dynamism of their development disposes not only to search for options for adaptation to innovative technologies for working with information, but also to search for a reliable value basis both in the field of media communications and in broader areas of social life. During the research, the questionnaire method, descriptive method and analysis method were used. The respondents included students majoring in Advertising and Public Relations. In analyzing digital media, the target audience relies on both their own individual experience and the experience gained from studying theories and practices relevant to specialists in the field of communication studies. In the process of reflection on the specific characteristics of digital media, students demonstrate primarily a value-based approach, choosing traditional moral values and norms as the basis for evaluating the studied phenomena. The main attention is paid to the problem of responsibility to society of both authors and consumers of media content, who must be guided by such requirements as honesty, conscientiousness and willingness to act in the interests of the majority of people. Analyzing the role of communicators, students, in addition to being involved in ethical issues, also demonstrate a desire to develop critical thinking and personal development. The activity of this role, however, is assessed in two ways: respondents record both the opportunity for digital media audiences to act as active figures implementing the function of co-authors of media content, and their exposure to media influence, in which the active role of co-authors is replaced by the passive role of addressees who act within the dominant code.