News Engagement on Social Media and Democratic Citizenship: Direct and Moderating Roles of Curatorial News Use in Political Involvement

Abstract

Social media allow users not only to read news, but also to evaluate, reconstruct, and share it. This study conceptualizes curatorial news use via social media as an important news use behavior, which involves evaluating the existing news, adding new values by reconstructing it, and then sharing it with other social media users. An analysis of survey data from 650 South Korean adults shows that curatorial news use on social media has a significantly positive association with political knowledge, internal political efficacy, and offline and online political participation. The interaction of social media news use and curatorial news use is also significantly associated with high levels of political knowledge and political participation.

Keywords

social media curatorial news use political knowledge internal political efficacy political participation

On August 31, 2017, many American news outlets reported that President Donald Trump had pledged US$1 million of his own money to help the victims of Hurricane Harvey. After reading the story on CNN’s website, a 47-year old Facebook user looked up other related news stories. He found one that described Trump’s decades of nonexistent or exaggerated charitable donations. Using the old stories and the newer CNN report as a basis, he then reconstructed the issue with a Facebook post:

Trump has publicly pledged money to many charities and then never actually donated. If history is any indicator, he’ll find a way to get the funds from another source and funnel them through Trump Foundation. People are asking “show us the receipt.” Forbes Magazine estimates his net worth to be $3.5 billion.

Before the era of digital social news, the ordinary news consumer would have seen the CNN report on television but could not have gone through archived stories and reformulated them for public consumption.

Social media have become one of the major media channels through which citizens obtain information about political affairs (Diehl, Weeks, & de Zúñiga, 2016; Rainie, Smith, Schlozman, Brady, & Verba, 2012). However, the consumption of political news on social media is a substantially different experience from that via other media. For example, social media users can be part of the news production and dissemination process instead of mere receivers of content. Unlike the one-directional top-down nature of news consumption in the traditional media environment (Chaffee & Metzger, 2001), social media foster more “engaged types of news processing” such as rating, modifying, or restructuring news stories (Bruns, 2015; Merrin, 2009; Thorson & Wells, 2015). This study conceptualizes this kind of active news use via social media as curatorial news use, which is one of the noticeable forms of news use on social media (Howarth, 2015). Curatorial news use is evaluating existing news and adding new value by reconstructing or reformulating it into different news material, and then sharing it through social media. Drawing on the theoretical framework of news engagement (Deuze, 2003; Hargittai & Walejko, 2008; Jenkins, 2006; Napoli, 2011), this study proposes that curating news is different from other types of news use activities, such as news exposure or simply forwarding news links, which are passive activities that do not require high cognitive effort.

Expanding prior findings of a positive relationship between news use via social media and democratic engagement (e.g., de Zúñiga, Puig-I-Abril, & Rojas, 2009; Kaufhold, Valenzuela, & de Zúñiga, 2010), the current study also examines how curatorial news use on social media is related to three dimensions of democratic engagement: political knowledge, political efficacy, and political participation, which are the major indicators of a properly functioning democracy (Kenski & Stroud, 2006). A politically knowledgeable electorate is desirable for citizens to make informed decisions (Delli Carpini & Keeter, 1996), and political efficacy is a key trigger of political behavior (Kenski & Stroud, 2006). Political participation influences government action and policy making (Verba, Schlozman, & Brady, 1995), and holds politicians and the government accountable (Rosenstone & Hansen, 1993). Theoretically, in an optimal democracy, citizens show high levels of political knowledge, efficacy, and participation (Verba & Nie, 1987).

By focusing on curatorial news use, the present study examines what people do with news on social media after news exposure and illuminates the nuanced mechanisms by which curatorial news use on social media relates to democratic outcomes. To this end, this study conducted an online survey of 650 South Korean adults in 2014.

Literature Review

News Engagement and Curatorial News Use on Social Media

Prior to the Internet and digitization, the news was disseminated mostly via printed newspapers, television, and radio—all one-way forms of communication. News consumers were generally spectators and essentially peripheral to the chain of information. In their traditional form, mass media exercised control over news flow, often overlooking the role and importance of the news audience (Cook, 1998).

The interactive nature of the Internet and digital communication has changed news consumption and the media power structure. The one-way, linear stream of news from the media to the audience has given way to a two-way response flow, which has become almost as equally important as providing original news content (Jenkins, Ford, & Green, 2013).

Focusing on the functionality of online news consumption, Choi, Lee, and Metzgar (2013) offer two distinctive dimensions of news use: news internalizing (the reception of news offered by information producers) and news externalizing (the dissemination of news for others to read). Although the two-dimensional model reflects changing patterns of online news use, it falls short in describing today’s social media ecology that offers diverse and advanced ways of using news. For example, on social media, in many cases, the externalizing behavior of news use does not take the form of mere dissemination or sharing of preexisting news content; instead, the information acquired from news is often reframed, repurposed, or reevaluated by users (Goode, 2009), thus introducing a new method of news consumption—curatorial news use.

“Curation” is traditionally defined as “to pull together,” “sift through,” “assemble,” “manage,” “present,” or “archive” some type of content (see Dictionary.com; Merriam-Webster). In other words, traditional curation means the process of evaluation and selection, and the “presentation of artefacts around a central theme or motif” (Howarth, 2015). Recently, curation-related discourses have expanded beyond the traditional realm of museum studies (Snyder, 2015). Since 2010, professional journalism outlets have adopted news curation into their business model (Howarth, 2015). For example, Andy Carvin, while at National Public Radio (NPR), built an international reputation by curating the turmoil in the Middle East by crowdsourcing tweets posted by eyewitnesses as the region became too dangerous for foreign correspondents to enter (Farhi, 2011; Howarth, 2015). Using tidbits of news, photos, and videos, Carvin “constructed a vivid and constantly evolving mosaic of the region’s convulsions,” which he tweeted to tens of thousands of followers (Farhi, 2011). But such curating and reformulating of the news are not limited to professionals. In the traditional museum context, curation requires knowledge or expertise, but in today’s news world, such prerequisites are less important. Social media tools make it easy for ordinary users to aggregate, analyze, reorganize, and reformulate information according to their own news judgment (Clark & Aufderheide, 2009).

The present study concentrates on audiences’ curatorial use of news instead of professional news organizations’ or journalists’ curation. It is becoming increasingly common for ordinary social media users to curate the news (Howarth, 2015), and more importantly, their reformulated stories are often just as, if not more influential, than those reformulated by professionals (Picard, 2014). Nonprofessional news curators are driven in part by curiosity, a growing distrust of media organizations (Holmberg, 2015), and the emergence of tools that make it easy to remix, reimagine, and make existing news into something new (Navas & Gallagher, 2014).

Curatorial news use is conceptually differentiated from other types of online news use. For example, commenting usually means a simple reaction or reply by clicking “like,” or expressing agreement or disagreement (UX Movement, 2011), but news curators go further by critically assessing news reports and adding different perspectives.

Curatorial news use also differs from sharing (e.g., retweeting, replying, forwarding), which is considered a lean-back behavior (Picone, 2007) that does not require much effort from users. Thus, it is doubtful that the simple act of news forwarding reflects the depth of engagement (Ksiazek, Peer, & Lessard, 2016) that curatorial news use demands. Curatorial news use requires more active, lean-forward engagement than replying to, superficially commenting on or sharing the news.

More specifically, curatorial news use possesses three different, but related, attributes. First, news curators connect new information to prior knowledge based on their understanding and judgments of the value of news content. For instance, a user needs to associate the news with her or his prior knowledge to rate and evaluate it. Second, curatorial news use reconstructs the meaning of the news in the form of value-added comments or posts. Unlike the reactive form of commenting with a simple expression of agreement, news curators interweave items with their own thoughts and contextualize news based on their own interpretation (Becker, Naaman, & Gravano, 2010; Villi, Moisander, & Joy, 2012; Viner, 2013). Such information reconstruction is a type of textual expression that helps others gain a clearer grasp of the news (Pennebaker, 1997). The third attribute of curatorial news use is sharing. But the sharing of curated news is qualitatively different from simple forwarding in that it is contingent upon reformulation of existing news. In sum, through reasoned and engaged curation, existing news is reevaluated, restructured, and circulated to the audience.

Curatorial News Use and Democratic Attributes

Active forms of news use and democratic engagement are positively and solidly linked. Social media provide a plethora of information about politics, candidates, and issues that increase understanding of a democratic system. Even politically unaware social media users can become politically astute (Zhang, 2012), learn that they have the power to bring about political change (de Zúñiga, Jung, & Valenzuela, 2012), and thus become more interested in participating in the political process (Bentley, 2006).

Political knowledge

Social media provide volumes of political information and include newsfeeds and hyperlinks for digging into issues (Zhang, 2012). Traditional news media use, in general, has long been positively associated with a higher level of political knowledge (Chaffee, Zhao, & Leshner, 1994; de Vreese & Boomgaarden, 2006), as have newer digital media (Delli Carpini, Cook, & Jacobs, 2004; Kaye, 2010).

Curatorial news use on social media starts with the acquisition of substantial political information, but does not stop there. Curating news and information about public affairs also requires grappling with ideas, elaborating on arguments, and reflecting on the information (Baum, 2003). This kind of mental process is similar to the notion of news elaboration, which is “the process of connecting new information with other pieces of information stored in memory, including prior knowledge, personal experiences, or the connection of two new bits of information together in new ways” (Eveland, 2001, p. 573).

Curatorial news use is also closely related to expression, which can “motivate exposure, attention and elaboration of media messages” (Pingree, 2007, p. 447). Knowing that a curated news story will be critiqued and analyzed by an audience motivates the curator to get the facts straight, and prepare well-reasoned and insightful commentary (Goode, 2009). Therefore, it logically follows that curatorial news use encourages news reflection and elaboration, eventually cultivating better informed citizens (Delli Carpini et al., 2004). Based on the above reasoning, this study poses the following hypothesis:

H1: Curatorial news use on social media is positively associated with political knowledge.

Internal political efficacy

Internal political efficacy refers to a sense of competence that an individual believes her or his behaviors influence the political system and process (Campbell, Gurin, & Miller, 1954; Holbert, Lambe, Dudo, & Carlton, 2007). Although exposure to political news is linked to political efficacy, expressing opinions about the news is a much better predictor of efficacy than news reception (Eveland, Shah, & Kwak, 2003; Shah, McLeod, & Lee, 2009). Speaking out and raising public awareness and concerns develop a sense of psychological empowerment, including internal political efficacy (Leung, 2009).

News curators seek and reconstruct news and express it, and in this process they are likely to feel that they understand the political system and have the confidence to advocate for issues and candidates. Accordingly, the present study expects that curatorial news users are politically efficacious.

H2: Curatorial news use on social media is positively associated with strong internal political efficacy.

Political participation

Active forms of news use online and democratic engagement are positively and solidly linked. For example, political blog use is positively related to online political participation (de Zúñiga et al., 2009), reliance on apps for political news is a positive predictor of both online and nononline political activity (Kaye & Johnson, 2017), and involvement in user-generated content is significantly tied to high levels of offline political participation (Wei & Yan, 2010).

People pursue their political goals online by forwarding emails, sharing opinions about politics and current events, expressing dissatisfaction by commenting on government officials’ social media pages, and participating in online collective actions for and against certain policies (Best & Krueger, 2005; di Gennaro & Dutton, 2006). The ease of using social media have spawned an explosion of grassroots participation, allowing individuals to express their opinions more openly and freely as well as to build a more active and significant relationship with politicians (de Zúñiga, 2016).

When individuals learn about pressing issues, political causes, and social movements from the media and other online sources, they are likely to join related activities (David, 2009; de Vreese & Boomgaarden, 2006; Ksiazek, Malthouse, & Webster, 2010), and become more engaged in political affairs (de Boer & Velthuijsen, 2001; Eveland, 2004). For instance, a curator on Twitter who learns about a planned demonstration might end up participating in the march. In particular, online users who rely on user-generated content found on social media are politically active both online and in person (de Zúñiga et al., 2009; Kaufhold et al., 2010).

Curatorial news use requires intense engagement in news processing and deep reasoning, and entails identifying major issues from existing political discourse, collecting related information, analyzing and verifying the information, and finally delivering reformulated news content to others (Ksiazek et al., 2016). In other words, unlike simple news reception, commenting, or forwarding, curatorial news use by its nature requires considerable engagement with the news. Accordingly, this study hypothesizes that curatorial news use is an antecedent to both offline and online political participation.

H3a: Curatorial news use on social media is positively associated with participation in offline political affairs.

H3b: Curatorial news use on social media is positively associated with participation in online political affairs.

Curatorial News Use as a Moderator of Political Knowledge, Efficacy, and Participation

Audience engagement is measured on a continuum of various metrics of exposure and interactive behaviors that ranges from low (i.e., mere exposure) to high (i.e., adding new content and opinion to news) engagement (Beckett, 2010). As social media have lowered the wall between consumers and producers of content (Bruns, 2006), citizens are becoming more politically knowledgeable (Park, in press). Curatorial news use on social media facilitates fact-checking, exposure to different perspectives, and learning new information, which increase political knowledge (Kaufhold et al., 2010). News curators need to know as much as possible about a subject before they can effectively speak about it (Pingree, 2007). For example, the act of curating the possible repeal of Obamacare and its proposed substitutes involves learning about the issue from different perspectives, and gaining the knowledge and understanding needed to piece together bits of information into a cohesive, rational argument about the medical system.

Based on the above reasoning, this study expects that curatorial news use will moderate the impact of social media news use on political knowledge. In other words, those who both access and curate news will have a high level of political knowledge than those who access news but do not curate.

H4a: Curatorial news use moderates the relationship between social media news use and political knowledge, with news curators having a higher level of political knowledge than those who rarely or never curate the news.

Political news users have a strong interest in what is happening in the world. Individuals who curate the news go one step further: They try to make sense of what is happening by seeking additional information to enhance their understanding of politics. Such active use of news leads to increased competence and confidence in the ability to help change the political system (de Zúñiga, Bachmann, Hsu, & Brundidge, 2013). Accordingly, this study predicts that curatorial news use strengthens the association between social media news use and internal political efficacy:

H4b: Curatorial news use moderates the relationship between social media news use and internal political efficacy, with news curators being more self-efficacious than those who rarely or never curate the news.

The differential gains model (Scheufele, 2002) posits that interpersonal political discussion enhances the effects of news media use on political behavior. For example, the relationship between Internet hard news use and offline political participation is stronger for those who more frequently engage in political chat online (Hardy & Scheufele, 2005). Although curatorial news use is not equivalent to online political talk, it has the property of expression that resembles political talk, and it also provides more opportunities for civic engagement by encountering and learning about various political events. Based on the above theoretical discussion, this study poses the following hypothesis:

H4c: Curatorial news use moderates the relationship between social media news use and political participation, with news curators participating more actively in offline and online political affairs than those who rarely or never curate the news.

Method

Data Collection

This study is based on data collected from 650 adults who live in South Korea, which is one of the most wired countries in the world. From the time of its independence from Japan in 1945 until the 1980s, authoritarian regimes and dictators had suffocated the voices of South Korean citizens. Through a series of protests and demonstrations for democracy in the late 1980s and early 1990s, South Korean citizens gained greater freedom of speech and became more politically engaged. The advent of the Internet opened South Korean citizens to unprecedented opportunities for becoming involved in politics. Residents express their ideas, access diverse information, exchange opinions with others, and openly participate in the political process (Park & Karan, 2014). The Internet and subsequent digital tools stand out in a country in which the mainstream media have been remiss in providing a public forum of deliberative conversation and political participation (Park, 2017).

Data were collected from a survey that was posted online between May 1 and May 25, 2014, ending 10 days before the Election Day (June 4). Up for election were national governors and mayors, and city council members of local governments. In total, 41,304,394 people voted in the election (82% of total population; female 49.5%). Unlike the United States, South Koreans who are 19 and older are automatically registered by the Korea Election Management Committee.

The data collection period was timed to assess respondents’ opinions during the height of the campaign and before the last days of hyper-promotions. To ensure a representative sample, data were collected by a national survey research firm, which has demographic and email information about more than 3 million South Korean adults. The firm constructed a stratified sampling frame of more than 100,000 people based on the 2014 voter registration data of the Korea Election Management Committee. The target sample was then stratified by age, gender, education, and household income. A total of 2,400 possible respondents were selected. Finally, the target respondents were emailed the survey’s URL. The email invitation provided respondents with a time estimate to complete the survey and information about how to enter a drawing for 10 US$20 gift cards for their participation. A reminder email was sent 10 days after the initial survey request. A total of 950 respondents completed the survey (response rate 39.6%; American Association for Public Opinion Research [AAPOR], 2011). Of the 950 respondents, 650 (68.4%) indicated they use social media. Only social media users are included in the analyses.

Dependent Variables

Political knowledge

Survey participants were asked 10 multiple-choice questions related to major campaign issues, political systems, and public figures.¹ Correct responses were coded as “1,” and incorrect or missing responses were coded as “0.” The scores were summed to create an index of political knowledge (M = 5.05, SD = 2.86, Kuder–Richardson Formula 20 [KR-20]² = .53).

Internal political efficacy

Statements measuring internal political efficacy were taken from the Craig, Niemi, and Silver (1990) study that examined the validity and reliability of political efficacy items used in the 1987 National Election Studies. The following items were also used in Niemi, Craig, and Mattei (1991) and Morrell (2003): (a) “I consider myself to be well qualified to participate in politics,” (b) “I feel that I have a pretty good understanding of the important political issues facing our country,” and (c) “I think that I am as much as informed about politics and government as most people.” An index was constructed by averaging the answers on a 5-point agree–disagree scale (M = 3.28, SD = 0.76, α = .93).

Political participation

Respondents’ political participation was gauged using a shortened version of the Index of Civic and Political Engagement developed by the Center for Information and Research on Civic Learning and Engagement (Andolina, Jenkins, Zukin, & Keeter, 2003). Regarding online political participation, respondents were asked to mark on a 4-point scale (1 = never, 2 = rarely, 3 = sometimes, 4 = regularly)—During the last month, how often they engaged in the following online activities: (a) contacted a politician using emails or social media, (b) signed an online petition, (c) made an online campaign contribution, and (d) signed up to volunteer for an online campaign (M = 2.25, SD = 0.70, α = .82).

For offline political participation, respondents were asked during the last month how often they participated in the following offline activities: (a) posted a campaign sticker, banner, or button; (b) called or sent a letter to an elected public official; (c) attended a political meeting, rally, or speech; (d) worked for a political party or a candidate; (e) contributed money to political campaigns or candidates; and (f) participated in groups that took any action for political reform (M = 2.03, SD = 0.62, α = .80).

Independent Variables

Social media news

Participants were asked during the last month how often they (a) received political news links from friends or family (M = 3.49, SD = 1.52), (b) received political news links from news organizations or individual journalists they follow or subscribe to (M = 3.37, SD = 1.84), and (c) received political news links from other organizations or public figures they follow or subscribe to (M = 3.08, SD = 2.38). A 7-point scale ranging from “never” to “very frequently” was used. Responses were averaged to create an index (M = 3.47, SD = 1.65, α = .88).

Curatorial news use

To measure online news use, prior studies have relied on various measures, such as opinion posting (e.g., “the frequency of posting one’s opinion online”; Chan, Wu, Hao, Xi, & Jin, 2012), the number of comments (e.g., Ksiazek et al., 2016), or news sharing (e.g., “whether a user posted news links on social media”; Beam, Hutchens, & Hmielowski, 2016). Few studies have taken an approach that captures the unique nature of curatorial news use that contains the attributes of evaluation, reformulation, and sharing of news content.

Based on the theoretical conceptualization of curatorial news use, respondents were asked how often they engaged in the following activities on social media during the current campaign: (a) posted political news together with their own comments about the news (M = 2.25, SD = 2.04), (b) combined related political news and posted it on social media (M = 2.03, SD = 1.66), and (c) posted a summary of political news for others to read (M = 2.16, SD = 1.48). Responses were coded on a 5-point scale ranging from “never” to “very frequently” and were averaged to create an index (M = 2.11, SD = 1.73, α = .81).

Control Variables

General social media use

To measure general social media use, participants were first asked, “Do you use social media such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Reddit?” If participants said “Yes,” they were asked, “How much time do you spend on those social media on a typical day during the election period?” Respondents answered on a 7-point scale ranging from “less than 30 min” to “more than 3 hr” (M = 3.68, SD = 1.42, Mdn = more than 1 hr and up to 1½ hr).

Social media news sharing and reactive commenting

Because curatorial news use is a lean-forward behavior, this study controlled for reactive commenting and news sharing. To measure social media news sharing, participants were asked how often they passed on political news to others on social media during the current campaign. Responses were coded on a 5-point scale ranging from “never” to “very frequently” (M = 3.08, SD = 1.27). For social media reactive commenting, this study asked participants during the current campaign how often they responded to political news comments that other people posted. The responses were coded on a 5-point scale ranging from “never” to “very frequently” (M = 2.96, SD = 1.60).

Conventional media use

Respondents indicated how many days in the past week they had used four types of conventional media: (a) network television news, (b) local television news, (c) printed newspapers, and (d) radio news. Answers ranged from 0 to 7 days per week.³ Responses were averaged to create a conventional media use index (M = 3.42, SD = 1.95, α = .80).

Political attributes

Strength of party ties was assessed on a 7-point scale ranging from “very weak” to “very strong” (M = 4.28, SD = 2.50). Local and national political interest was assessed on a 5-point scale (1 = not interested at all, 5 = very interested). For local politics, the mean score is 2.95 (SD = 1.08), and for national politics, the mean score is 3.39 (SD = 1.24). Responses for local and national interest were averaged to create a political interest index (M = 3.03, SD = 1.16, r = .65). Political ideology was measured on a 5-point scale (1 = very liberal, 2 = liberal, 3 = moderate, 4 = conservative, 5 = very conservative). Responses were collapsed into three categories to create a political ideology index (1 = moderate, 2 = liberal or conservative, 3 = very liberal or very conservative; M = 1.35, SD = 0.71).

Sociodemographic attributes

Four sociodemographic variables were included in the analyses: gender, age, sex, and annual family income. Respondents were asked their gender (51% males), and entered in their age as of their last birthday (M = 39.4, SD = 12.54). Respondents marked their highest level of formal education completed on a 6-point scale ranging from “middle school or less” to “doctoral degree” (Mdn = 2-year college degree). Family household income for 2013 was selected from a 9-point scale ranging from 1 (less than US$20,000) to 9 (more than US$100,000) (Mdn = US$40,000 ~ US$49,999).⁴

Data Analysis

To test the proposed hypotheses, a series of hierarchical ordinary least squares (OLS) regressions were run in which the independent variables were entered in the model in blocks. The measures were entered in as blocks in the following order: sociodemographics, political attributes, media use, curatorial news use, and the interaction term of curatorial news use and social media news.

To create the interaction, the curatorial news use and social media news variables were centered by subtracting the mean score from each data point. Centering was conducted to forestall possible problems with multicollinearity. In other words, if the independent variable is not centered, the product (used in computing the interaction) is highly correlated with the original independent variable (Aiken, West, & Reno, 1991). After centering the variables, they were multiplied to create an interaction variable. To test H4a, H4b, and H4c, another hierarchical regression was run, placing the interaction terms at the last block of the analysis.

Results

Factor Analysis and Correlations Summary

As an initial phase of the analysis, the study conducted a factor analysis of a total of 10 items about news use to obtain an empirical summary of how those items cluster around several factors (Table 1). A partial correlations test reveals that curatorial news use is significantly related to all four criterion variables: political knowledge (r = .23, p < .001), internal political efficacy (r = .26, p < .001), offline political participation (r = .14, p < .01), and online political participation (r = .32, p < .001), meaning that news curators are more likely to get involved in political processes or feel political efficacious or get informed about political matters. Using social media for news is also positively correlated with all the criterion variables. On the contrary, general social media use does not have a significant relationship with any indicators of political engagement except for social media news (r = .09, p < .05; Table 2).

Table 1.

Factor Analysis of News Media Use Items (n = 640).

Item	Conventional media news use	Social media news use	Curatorial news use on social media
Network television news	.84	.38	.32
Local television news	.83	.23	.24
Printed newspapers	.72	−.06	−.12
Radio news	.76	−.10	−.04
Received political news links from friends or family	.38	.90	.57
Received political news links from news organizations or journalists	.33	.89	.52
Received political news links from other organizations or public figures	.36	.75	.55
Posted political news together with their own comments about the news	.29	.50	.88
Combined related political news and posted it on social media	.20	.47	.80
Posted a summary of political news for others to read	.18	.45	.76
Cronbach’s α	.80	.88	.81
Eigen values	1.58	6.28	2.03

Note. Bold items indicate factor loadings >.60. Online news use was not included here because the index was measured with just one item. Total variance accounted for 68.4%.

Table 2.

Partial Correlations Among Political Knowledge, Efficacy, Participation, Social Media News, General Social Media Use, and Curatorial News Use.

	M	SD	1	2	3	4	5	6	7
1. Political knowledge	5.05	2.86	1
2. Internal political efficacy	3.28	0.76	.11*	1
3. Offline participation	2.03	0.62	.19***	.22***	1
4. Online participation	2.25	0.70	.22***	.35***	.40***	1
5. Social media news	3.47	1.65	.44***	.10*	.11*	.14**	1
6. General social media use	3.68	1.42	.05	.02	.03	.05	.09*	1
7. Curatorial news use on social media	2.11	1.73	.23***	.26***	.14**	.32***	.33***	.12**	1

Note. Entries are two-tailed partial correlation coefficients, controlling for age, gender, education, income, strength of party ties, political interest, and political ideology.

p < .05. **p < .01. ***p < .001.

Curatorial News Use and Political Knowledge

This study first hypothesizes that curatorial news use is positively associated with political knowledge. The hypothesis is supported (β = .17, p < .001). The model accounts for 26.2% of the variance of political knowledge. Social media news (β = .12, p = .008) is also significantly associated with political knowledge. However, general social media use, social media news sharing, and social media reactive commenting do not predict political knowledge (Table 3). The above results demonstrate that involvement in activities related to curatorial news use via social media results in a high level of political knowledge.

Table 3.

Prediction of Political Knowledge and Internal Political Efficacy.

Predictor variables	Political knowledge	Internal political efficacy
Block 1: Sociodemographics
Gender (1 = male)	0.03	0.02
Age	0.02	−0.07*
Education	0.14***	0.20***
Income	0.05	0.05
R² (%)	8.9***	6.7***
Block 2: Political attributes
Strength of party ties	0.07*	0.06*
Political interest	0.16***	0.21***
Political ideology	0.04	0.06*
Incremental R² (%)	5.5***	12.7***
Block 3: Media use
Conventional media news use	0.15***	0.10***
Social media news	0.12**	0.10*
General social media use	0.04	0.03
Social media news sharing	0.04	0.09*
Social media reactive commenting	0.05	0.08*
Incremental R² (%)	9.9***	3.2***
Block 4: Social media news curation
Curatorial news use	0.17***	0.14***
Incremental R² (%)	1.9***	2.5***

Total R²(%)	26.2***	25.3***
n	642	640

Note. Entries are standardized final regression coefficients.

p < .05. **p < .01. ***p < .001.

The sociodemographic block is by far the strongest predictor of political knowledge in the model, constituting 8.9% of explained variance. Inside this block, education (β = .14, p < .001) is significant. The political attributes block explains 5.5% of the variance of political knowledge. Strength of party ties (β = .07, p = .037) and political interest (β = .16, p < .001) also predict political knowledge (Table 3).

Curatorial News Use and Internal Political Efficacy

The second hypothesis asserts that curatorial news use is positively associated with internal political efficacy. The hypothesis is supported—The more intensely respondents engage in curatorial news use through social media, the stronger their feeling of political efficacy (β = .14, p < .001). Social media news (β = .10, p = .019), social media news sharing (β = .09, p = .026), and social media reactive commenting (β = .08, p = .034) are positively related to internal political efficacy. General social media use fails to predict political efficacy. The model accounts for 25.3% of the variance of internal political efficacy.

In the sociodemographic block, age (β = –.07, p = .040) and education (β = .20, p < .001) predict internal political efficacy. Political attributes are the strongest predictor of internal political efficacy in the model, constituting 12.7% of explained variance of internal political efficacy. In the political attributes block, strength of party ties (β = .06, p = .046), political interest (β = .21, p < .001), and political ideology (β = .06, p = .044) exhibit positive links to internal political efficacy (Table 3).

Curatorial News Use and Political Participation

The third hypothesis predicts that curatorial news use is positively associated with political participation. Curatorial news use has a positive link to offline political participation (β = .12, p < .001); thus, H3a is supported. Social media news (β = .08, p = .036) and social media news sharing (β = .06, p = .045) are also positively related to offline political participation. But general social media use and social media reactive commenting are not linked to offline political participation. The model for offline political participation explains 20.6% of the variance (Table 4).

Table 4.

Prediction of Offline and Online Political Participation.

Predictor variables	Offline political participation	Online political participation
Block 1: Sociodemographics
Gender (1 = male)	0.06*	0.07*
Age	−0.02	−0.02
Education	0.06	0.08*
Income	0.02	0.05
R² (%)	4.1***	6.5***
Block 2: Political attributes
Strength of party ties	0.09*	0.11**
Political interest	0.11**	0.12***
Political ideology	0.07*	0.07*
Incremental R² (%)	8.6***	9.9***
Block 3: Media use
Conventional media news use	0.06*	0.09*
Social media news	0.08*	0.11**
General social media use	0.04	0.03
Social media news sharing	0.06*	0.04
Social media reactive commenting	0.05	0.06*
Incremental R² (%)	4.6***	3.1***
Block 4: Social media news curation
Curatorial news use	0.12***	0.15***
Incremental R² (%)	3.3***	3.8***

Total R² (%)	20.6***	24.3***
n	643	643

Note. Entries are standardized final regression coefficients.

p < .05. **p < .01. ***p < .001.

Among the sociodemographic variables, only gender (β = .06, p = .048) has a significant relationship. All three variables in the political attributes block have strong links to offline political participation: strength of party ties (β = .09, p = .021), political interest (β = .11, p = .009), and political ideology (β = .07, p = .033).

Regarding online political participation, the model explains 24.3% of the variance for social media users. Curatorial news use on social media predicts online political participation (β = .15, p < .001), supporting H3b. Social media news (β = .11, p = .008) and social media reactive commenting (β = .06, p = .043) also predict online political participation. However, general social media use and social media news sharing are not linked to online participation (Table 4).

In the sociodemographic block, males engage in online political activities more often than female respondents (β = .07, p = .039). Strength of party ties (β = .11, p = .007), political interest (β = .12, p < .001), and political ideology (β = .07, p = .034) are positively associated with online political participation.

Moderating Role of Curatorial News Use

The fourth hypothesis expects that curatorial news use moderates the relationship between social media news and democratic attributes. The interaction of social media news with curatorial news use has a significant effect on political knowledge (β = .20, p < .001), offline political participation (β = .18, p < .001), and online political participation (β = .24, p < .001), but not on internal political efficacy. These findings indicate that respondents who consume news via social media are highly knowledgeable about politics and more likely to engage in political affairs if they engage in curatorial activities of news content (see Table 5 and Figures 1 -3).

Table 5.

Interactive Effects of Curatorial News Use and Social Media News on Political Knowledge, Efficacy, and Participation.

	Political knowledge	Internal political efficacy	Offline political participation	Online political participation
Prior blocks (R²%)	26.2	25.3	20.6	24.3
Curatorial News Use × Social Media News	0.20***	0.05	0.18**	0.24***
Incremental R² (%)	1.0***	0.5	0.9*	1.8***
Total R² (%)	27.2***	25.8***	29.6***	26.1***
n	642	640	643	643

Note. Prior blocks include age, gender, education, household income, strength of party ties, political interest, political ideology, conventional media news use, social media news use, general social media use, social media news sharing, social media reactive commenting, and curatorial news use. Entries are standardized final regression coefficients.

p < .05. **p < .01. ***p < .001.

Figure 1.

Interactive effect of curatorial news use and social media news on political knowledge.

Figure 2.

Interactive effect of curatorial news use and social media news on offline political participation.

Figure 3.

Interactive effect of curatorial news use and social media news on online political participation.

Discussion

There is a general consensus that informed citizenship and political participation are the foundations of democracy (Carpentier, 2007; Schudson, 2008). Today’s social media environment provides an additional opportunity for citizens to engage in democratic processes. This study expands the current literature on social media use for news by conceptualizing curatorial news use as an important method of using social media and by investigating its role in democratic engagement.

While websites and blogs were the first providers of interactive tools that allowed users to interact with news providers and journalists, social media have significantly expanded the opportunities for curating news and distributing curated news and commentary (Bruns & Highfield, 2012; Rosenbaum, 2011; Villi et al., 2012). News consumption on social media is a complex and layered mix of the passive form of news consumption and the active form of curatorial news use. Curatorial news use emphasizes reinterpretation and reworking of published information rather than merely reporting current events (Howarth, 2015), and thus, it is more active than simple news exposure, reactive commenting, or forwarding. When applying the news engagement framework that views audience engagement as a continuum of less to more engagement (Beckett, 2010), curatorial news use is clearly more engagement. Therefore, assessment of the impact and significance of social media news use should include “curatorial news use” as a distinct part of news use.

Drawing on the concept of curatorial news use, the present study found that news curation via social media is a strong predictor of three key dimensions of democratic engagement—political knowledge, political efficacy, and political participation. The positive association between curatorial news use and political knowledge, a connection that has not been reported previously, suggests that curatorial news use provides an additional avenue to healthy citizenship by enhancing political knowledge, which is a cornerstone of a robust democracy (de Vreese & Boomgaarden, 2006). This finding implies that curatorial news use entails news elaboration, which helps make mental connections between otherwise disconnected pieces of information (Eveland, 2002). Curatorial behaviors, such as evaluating political news or reorganizing several political news stories in a different way, entail cognitive involvement in relevant news, consequently triggering political learning. In addition, social media are highly interactive, which coupled with the simplicity to organize information and relate similar topics could enhance the way users become informed (de Zúñiga et al., 2012). Particularly, this study’s finding shows that the coefficient of curatorial news use predicting political knowledge is larger than the coefficient of social media news use, suggesting that curatorial news use does a better job in promoting informed citizenship.

The finding of the positive association between curatorial news use and internal political efficacy is in line with findings about traditional media news use. Several studies have reported that as individuals actively use the media, their understanding about political issues increases and their political competence grows (de Zúñiga et al., 2012; Holbert et al., 2007). Similar logic can be applied to curatorial news use. Curatorial news users on social media access a variety of political news and information, such as shared/posted news stories and images or videos coming from diverse sources. Through assessing, restructuring, and sharing news content, news curators enhance their confidence to speak out to others and feel that they are an important part of the political process.

Another meaningful finding of this study is the positive and strong association between curatorial news use and political participation. Prior studies on social media and political participation have focused on either general social media use (i.e., Kim, Hsu, & de Zúñiga, 2013; Valenzuela, Arriagada, & Scherman, 2012), or motivations, such as surveillance or information seeking (i.e., de Zúñiga et al., 2012; Johnson & Kaye, 2015; Kaye & Johnson, 2015). But curatorial news use is different from motivations and simple one-way consumption of information. Curatorial news use as a unique form of social media use requires “physical” and “behavioral” involvement in news-related activities beyond a mental motive (Seitzinger, 2014), and it is a goal-oriented and engaging, which distinguish it from general social media news browsing or reception. Accordingly, this study asserts that curatorial news use creates more opportunities for political learning and engagement than merely reading or forwarding social media news. Indeed, this study found that curatorial news use leads to higher levels of offline and online participation than social media news use, reactive commenting, and sharing. Particularly, curatorial news use is more strongly associated with online political participation than offline political participation. This outcome is understandable, given that curatorial news use is done online and, as a result, curatorial news users may easily engage in political activities online, such as online petitioning or online campaigning.

Finally, the importance of news curation can be noted from the interaction result of curatorial news use and social media news use. On social media, curating news content is relatively easy and more convenient than via other types of media. It takes relatively little effort to reorganize and reformulate news and share the curated content with other users. Thus, curatorial activities appear to help social media news users learn more about politics and trigger political engagement. Results of this study show that curatorial news use strengthens the association between social media news use and political knowledge and participation. This interaction result indicates that social media create opportunity for news users to get involved in diverse activities after news exposure, and as a result they encounter more chances to increase their political knowledge and take part in political affairs. Curatorial news use is clearly more than simple news use and should be placed somewhere on a continuum between news exposure and news creation.

This study also has practical implications in relation to the unique social and political context of South Korea. For decades, South Koreans have been deprived of opportunities to express their thoughts to the public sphere during the authoritarian regimes. In addition, mainstream news media have failed to address the public’s interests and concerns. In such a historical and social context, social media’s role as a facilitator of political learning, efficacy, and participation is proving important. Considering that social media are widely used across the world, the implications of this study’s findings could be applicable to other countries as well.

Although this study shows that curatorial news use on social media has the potential to promote democratic citizenship, its implications should not be overinterpreted. For example, regarding internal political efficacy and offline and online political participation as criterion variables, the political attributes block makes the largest contribution to the explained variance. Although the incremental R²s made by the curatorial news use block are statistically significant in all four criterion variables, the changes are quite small. These findings indicate that curatorial news use helps citizen engagement to a limited extent.

It should be also noted that this study relies on a cross-section dataset, which does not allow a cause–effect claim. For example, politically knowledgeable people may engage more often in news curation than less knowledgeable people because evaluating and critiquing content requires a higher degree of knowledge (Villi et al., 2012). For this reason, this study reported only statistical associations between variables, instead of causal relationships. Future research should conduct a panel study to more accurately examine the causal effects of curatorial news use.

Also, future research should investigate the differences in the roles of curatorial news use among different types of social media. For instance, Twitter is limited by 140 characters, and accordingly curatorial activities on Twitter are constrained compared with Facebook or Reddit. Some social media are information-heavy (i.e., Reddit), while other social media are entertainment-oriented (i.e., Instagram). Finally, this study measured only domain-specific political knowledge which were constructed based on current political issues. The literature generally identifies two dimensions of political knowledge: general knowledge about the structures and institutions that comprise a political system, and domain-specific knowledge about current policies and issues within that system (Delli Carpini & Keeter, 1996; Zaller, 1992). Although the current research finds a significant association between curatorial news use and domain-specific knowledge, it is possible that curatorial news use will exercise long-term effects on general knowledge.

Despite some limitations, this study sheds light on the conceptualization and role of curatorial news use in the democratic process. This research contributes to political communication (a) by theorizing curatorial news use as an important form of social media use, (b) by providing evidence that curatorial news use is significantly linked to democratic engagement, and finally (c) by suggesting a moderating role of curatorial news use between social media news use and democratic engagement.

Footnotes

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Notes

Author Biographies

Chang Sup Park, PhD, is assistant professor of mass communications at Bloomsburg University of Pennsylvania. His research interests include social/mobile media, digital journalism, and civic engagement.

Barbara K. Kaye, PhD (Florida State University), is professor in the School of Journalism & Electronic Media at the University of Tennessee–Knoxville. Her research interests are in the areas of media effects and consumer uses of new communication technologies. She examines how the Internet, blogs, social media, and new television program delivery platforms influence political attitudes and how they have changed media use behavior.

References

Aiken

L. S.

West

S. G.

Reno

R. R.

(1991). Multiple regression: Testing and interpreting interactions. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE.

American Association for Public Opinion Research. (2011). Standard definitions: Final dispositions of case codes and outcome rates for surveys (7th ed.). Deerfield, IL: Author.

Andolina

M. W.

Jenkins

Zukin

Keeter

(2003). Habits from home, lessons from school: Influences on youth civic engagement. Political Science & Politics, 36, 275-280.

Baum

M. A.

(2003). Soft news and political knowledge: Evidence of absence or absence of evidence? Political Communication, 20, 173-190.

Beam

M. A.

Hutchens

M. J.

Hmielowski

J. D.

(2016). Clicking vs. sharing: The relationship between online news behaviors and political knowledge. Computers in Human Behavior, 59, 215-220.

Becker

Naaman

Gravano

(2010, February). Learning similarity metrics for event identification in social media. In Proceedings of the third ACM International Conference on Web Search and Data Mining (pp. 291-300). New York, NY: Association for Computing Machinery.

Beckett

(2010, October 26). Getting beyond just pageviews: Philly.com’s seven-part equation for measuring online engagement. Nieman Reports. Retrieved from http://www.niemanlab.org/2010/10/getting-beyond-just-pageviews-philly-coms-seven-part-equation-for-measuring-online-engagement/

Bentley

(2006). Imagine a child of five today. London, England: Demos and HTI.

Best

S. J.

Krueger

B. S.

(2005). Analyzing the representativeness of internet political participation. Political Behavior, 27, 183-216.

10.

Bruns

(2006). Towards produsage: Futures for user-led content production. Proceedings Cultural Attitudes Towards Communication and Technology. Retrieved from http://eprints.qut.edu.au/4863/1/4863_1.pdf

11.

Bruns

(2015). Working the story: News curation in social media as a second wave of citizen journalism. In Atton

(Ed.), The Routledge companion to alternative and community media (pp. 379-388). New York, NY: Routledge.

12.

Bruns

Highfield

(2012). Blogs, Twitter, and breaking news: The produsage of citizen journalism. Produsing Theory in a Digital World: The Intersection of Audiences and Production in Contemporary Theory, 80, 15-32.

13.

Campbell

Gurin

Miller

W. E.

(1954). The voter decides. Evanston, IL: Row, Peterson.

14.

Carpentier

(2007). Journalism, media and democracy. In Reclaiming the media: Communication rights and democratic media roles, European communication research and education association series (Vol. 3, pp. 151-156). Chicago, IL: Intellect Books.

15.

Chaffee

S. H.

Metzger

M. J.

(2001). The end of mass communication? Mass Communication and Society, 4, 365-379.

16.

Chaffee

S. H.

Zhao

Leshner

(1994). Political knowledge and the campaign media of 1992. Communication Research, 21, 305-324.

17.

Chan

Hao

Jin

(2012). Microblogging, online expression, and political efficacy among young Chinese citizens: The moderating role of information and entertainment needs in the use of Weibo. Cyberpsychology, Behavior and Social Networking, 15, 345-349.

18.

Choi

Lee

J. K.

Metzgar

(2013, August). Networks versus news media, or networks and news media? The interactive effects of network heterogeneity and news sharing on social network services (SNSs) on citizens’ participatory activities. Paper presented at the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication (AEJMC), Washington, DC.

19.

Clark

Aufderheide

(2009). Public media 2.0: Dynamic, engaged publics. Washington DC: Center for Social Media.

20.

Cook

T. E.

(1998). Governing with the news: The news media as a political institution. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.

21.

Craig

S. C.

Niemi

R. G.

Silver

G. E.

(1990). Political efficacy and trust: A report on the NES pilot study items. Political Behavior, 12, 289-314.

22.

David

C. C.

(2009). Learning political information from the news: A closer look at the role of motivation. Journal of Communication, 59, 243-261.

23.

de Boer

Velthuijsen

A. S

. (2001). Participation in conversations about the news. International Journal of Public Opinion Research, 13, 140-158.

24.

Delli Carpini

M. X.

Cook

F. L.

Jacobs

L. R

. (2004). Public deliberation, discursive participation, and citizen engagement: A review of the empirical literature. Annual Review of Political Science, 7, 315-344.

25.

Delli Carpini

M. X.

Keeter

. (1996). What Americans don’t know about politics and why it matters. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

26.

Deuze

(2003). The web and its journalisms: Considering the consequences of different types of newsmedia online. New Media & Society, 5, 203-230.

27.

de Vreese

C. H.

Boomgaarden

. (2006). News, political knowledge and participation: The differential effects of news media exposure on political knowledge and participation. Acta Politica, 41, 317-341.

28.

de Zúñiga

H. G

. (2016). Modeling the process of political participation in the EU. In Thiel

(Ed.), European identity and culture: Narratives of transnational belonging (pp. 75-95). New York, NY: Routledge.

29.

de Zúñiga

H. G.

Bachmann

Hsu

S. H.

Brundidge

. (2013). Expressive versus consumptive blog use: Implications for interpersonal discussion and political participation. International Journal of Communication, 7, 1538-1559.

30.

de Zúñiga

H. G.

Jung

Valenzuela

. (2012). Social media use for news and individuals’ social capital, civic engagement and political participation. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 17, 319-336.

31.

de Zúñiga

H. G.

Puig-I-Abril

Rojas

. (2009). Weblogs, traditional sources online and political participation: An assessment of how the internet is changing the political environment. New Media & Society, 11, 553-574.

32.

Diehl

Weeks

B. E.

de Zúñiga

H. G.

(2016). Political persuasion on social media: Tracing direct and indirect effects of news use and social interaction. New Media & Society, 18, 1875-1895.

33.

di Gennaro

Dutton

. (2006). The internet and the public: Online and offline political participation in the United Kingdom. Parliamentary Affairs, 59, 299-313.

34.

Eveland

W. P.

Jr. (2001). The cognitive mediation model of learning from the news: Evidence from nonelection, off-year election, and presidential election contexts. Communication Research, 28, 571-601.

35.

Eveland

W. P.

Jr. (2002). News information processing as mediator of the relationship between motivations and political knowledge. Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, 79, 26-40.

36.

Eveland

W. P.

Jr. (2004). The effect of political discussion in producing informed citizens: The roles of information, motivation, and elaboration. Political Communication, 21, 177-193.

37.

Eveland

W. P.

Jr. Shah

D. V.

Kwak

(2003). Assessing causality in the cognitive mediation model: A panel study of motivations, information processing, and learning during campaign 2000. Communication Research, 30, 359-386.

38.

Farhi

(2011, April 12). NPR’s Andy Carvin, tweeting the Middle East. The Washington Post. Retrieved from https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/npr-andy-carvin-tweeting-the-middle-east/2011/04/06/AFcSdhSD_story.html?utm_term=.bdcc00402915

39.

Goode

(2009). Social news, citizen journalism and democracy. New Media & Society, 11, 1287-1305.

40.

Hardy

B. W.

Scheufele

D. A.

(2005). Examining differential gains from internet use: Comparing the moderating role of talk and online interactions. Journal of Communication, 55, 71-84.

41.

Hargittai

Walejko

(2008). The participation divide: Content creation and sharing in the digital age. Information Communication and Society, 11, 239-256.

42.

Holbert

R. L.

Lambe

J. L.

Dudo

A. D.

Carlton

K. A.

(2007). Primacy effects of the daily show and national TV news viewing: Young viewers, political gratifications, and internal political self-efficacy. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 51, 20-38.

43.

Holmberg

(2015). Politicization of the low-carb high-fat diet in Sweden, promoted on social media by non-conventional experts. International Journal of E-Politics, 6, 27-42.

44.

Howarth

(2015). Exploring a curatorial turn in journalism. M/C Journal: A Journal of Media and Culture, 18(4). Retrieved from http://journal.media-culture.org.au/index.php/mcjournal/article/view/1004

45.

Jenkins

(2006). Convergence culture: Where old and new media collide. New York: New York University Press.

46.

Jenkins

Ford

Green

(2013). Spreadable media: Creating value and meaning in a networked culture. New York: New York University Press.

47.

Johnson

T. J.

Kaye

B. K.

(2015). Reasons to believe: Influence of credibility on motivations for using social networks. Computers in Human Behavior, 50, 544-555.

48.

Kaufhold

Valenzuela

de Zúñiga

H. G.

(2010). Citizen journalism and democracy: How user-generated news use relates to political knowledge and participation. Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, 87, 515-529.

49.

Kaye

B. K.

(2010). Between Barack and a net place: Users and uses of social network sites and blogs for political information. In Papacharissi

(Ed.), The networked self: Identity, community and culture on social network sites (pp. 208-231). New York, NY: Routledge.

50.

Kaye

B. K.

Johnson

T. J.

(2015). I only have eyes for YouTube: Motives for political use. Journal of Social Media Studies, 1, 91-104.

51.

Kaye

B. K.

Johnson

T. J.

(2017, July). An appetite for apps: A comparison of app reliant users on political activity and media reliance. Paper presented at the World Association for Public Opinion Research annual conference. Lisbon, Portugal.

52.

Kenski

Stroud

N. J.

(2006). Connections between internet use and political efficacy, knowledge, and participation. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 50, 173-192.

53.

Kim

Hsu

S. H.

de Zúñiga

H. G.

(2013). Influence of social media use on discussion network heterogeneity and civic engagement: The moderating role of personality traits. Journal of Communication, 63, 498-516.

54.

Ksiazek

T. B.

Malthouse

E. C.

Webster

J. G.

(2010). News-seekers and avoiders: Exploring patterns of total news consumption across media and the relationship to civic participation. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 54, 551-568.

55.

Ksiazek

T. B.

Peer

Lessard

(2016). User engagement with online news: Conceptualizing interactivity and exploring the relationship between online news videos and user comments. New Media & Society, 18, 502-520.

56.

Kuder

G. F.

Richardson

M. W.

(1937). The theory of the estimation of test reliability. Psychometrika, 2, 151-160.

57.

Leung

(2009). User-generated content on the internet: An examination of gratifications, civic engagement and psychological empowerment. New Media & Society, 11, 1327-1347.

58.

Merrin

(2009). Media Studies 2.0: Upgrading and open-sourcing the discipline. Interactions: Studies in Communication & Culture, 1, 17-34.

59.

Morrell

M. E.

(2003). Survey and experimental evidence for a reliable and valid measure of political efficacy. Public Opinion Quarterly, 67, 589-602.

60.

Napoli

P. M.

(2011). Audience evolution: New technologies and the transformation of media audiences. New York, NY: Columbia University Press.

61.

Navas

Gallagher

(2014). Routledge companion to remix studies. London, England: Routledge.

62.

Niemi

R. G.

Craig

S. C.

Mattei

(1991). Measuring internal political efficacy in the 1988 national election study. The American Political Science Review, 85, 1407-1413.

63.

Park

C. S.

(2017). Citizen news podcasts and engaging journalism: The formation of a counter-public sphere in South Korea. Pacific Journalism Review, 23, 231-248.

64.

Park

C. S.

(in press). Do social media facilitate political learning? Social media use for news, reasoning and political knowledge. The Journal of Social Media in Society, 6, 206-238.

65.

Park

C. S.

Karan

(2014). Unraveling the relationships between smartphone use, exposure to heterogeneity, political efficacy, and political participation: A mediation model approach. Asian Journal of Communication, 24, 370-389.

66.

Pennebaker

J. W.

(1997). Writing about emotional experiences as a therapeutic process. Psychological Science, 8, 162-166.

67.

Picard

R. G.

(2014). Twilight or new dawn of journalism? Digital Journalism, 15, 500-510.

68.

Picone

(2007). Conceptualising online news use. Observatorio, 1, 93-114.

69.

Pingree

R. J.

(2007). How messages affect their senders: A more general model of message effects and implications for deliberation. Communication Theory, 17, 439-461.

70.

Rainie

Smith

Schlozman

K. L.

Brady

Verba

(2012). Social media and political engagement. Pew Internet & American Life Project. Retrieved from http://pewinternet.org/~/media//Files/Reports/2012/PIP_SocialMediaAndPoliticalEngagement_PDF.pdf

71.

Rosenbaum

(2011). Curation, community and the future of news. Nieman Reports, 65(2), 14. Retrieved from http://niemanreports.org/articles/curation-community-and-the-future-of-news/

72.

Rosenstone

S. J.

Hansen

J. M.

(1993). Mobilization, participation, and democracy in America. New York, NY: Macmillan.

73.

Scheufele

D. A.

(2002). Examining differential gains from mass media and their implications for participatory behavior. Communication Research, 29, 46-65.

74.

Schudson

(2008). Why democracies need an unlovable press. Cambridge, UK: Polity.

75.

Seitzinger

(2014, April). Curate Me! Exploring online identity through social curation in networked learning. In 9th International Conference on Networked Learning (pp. 7-9). Brussels, Belgium: Electronic Platform for Adult Learning in Europe.

76.

Shah

D. V.

McLeod

J. M.

Lee

(2009). Communication competence as a foundation for civic competence: Processes of socialization into citizenship. Political Communication, 26, 102-117.

77.

Snyder

(2015). Discourses of “curation” in digital times. In Harris

R. H.

Chik

Hafner

(Eds.), Discourse and digital practices: Doing discourse analysis in the digital age (pp. 209-225). Oxford, UK: Routledge.

78.

Thorson

Wells

(2016). Curated flows: A framework for mapping media exposure in the digital age. Communication Theory, 26, 309-328.

79.

UX Movement. (2011, June 1). How the “thumbs up/like” button is dumbing users down. Retrieved from http://uxmovement.com/thinking/how-the-thumbs-uplike-button-is-dumbing-users-down/

80.

Valenzuela

Arriagada

Scherman

(2012). The social media basis of youth protest behavior: The case of Chile. Journal of Communication, 62, 299-314.

81.

Verba

Nie

N. H.

(1987). Participation in America: Political democracy and social equality. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.

82.

Verba

Schlozman

K. L.

Brady

H. E.

(1995). Voice and equality: Civic voluntarism in American politics (Vol. 4). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

83.

Villi

Moisander

Joy

(2012). Social curation in consumer communities: Consumers as curators of online media content. Advances in Consumer Research, 40, 490-495.

84.

Viner

(2013, October 9). The rise of the reader: Journalism in the age of the open web. The Guardian. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/oct/09/the-rise-of-the-reader-katharine-viner-an-smith-lecture

85.

Wei

Yan

(2010, March). Knowledge production and political participation: Reconsidering the knowledge gap theory in the web 2.0 environment. Paper presented at the 2nd International Conference on Information Management and Evaluation, Chengdu, China.

86.

Zaller

(1992). The nature and origins of mass opinion. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.

87.

Zhang

(2012). College students’ uses and perceptions of social networking sites for health and wellness information. Information Research: An International Electronic Journal, 17(3), 1-20.