The spiral of silence and journalists' outspokenness on Twitter

Abstract

This study examined whether Twitter can serve as a public sphere where opinion leaders – in this case, journalists – speak up about politically controversial issues. Based on the theoretical framework of the spiral of silence (SOS), 118 Korean journalists from nine national newspapers and two network broadcasting companies were surveyed about their behavior on Twitter with regard to two controversial issues in South Korea. Results showed that journalists who perceived a greater discrepancy between their opinions and the opinions of Twitter users about controversial issues in South Korea were less willing to voice their opinions on Twitter; moreover, the journalists' ideology was found to be a significant factor in expressing their opinions about controversial issues on Twitter. Specifically, politically conservative journalists were more likely to perceive that their opinions were in the minority; therefore, they were less likely than politically liberal journalists to discuss their opinions on Twitter because use of that particular technology is generally regarded in Korea as favored by liberals. This study contributes to the SOS theory by applying public opinion theory to opinion leaders, particularly journalists, and by suggesting that ideology can be a key factor in individuals' ability to perceive discrepancy with opinions of others. This study also contributes to the SOS literature by expanding the majority influence from offline to online environments, especially on Twitter.

Keywords:

• Twitter
• journalists
• spiral of silence
• political ideology

Notes on contributors

NaYeon Lee (Ph.D., University of Texas at Austin, 2013) is a lecturer at the Sookmyung Women's University in South Korea. Her research focuses on political communication and new media. Her papers have been published in Asian Journal of Communication and Journal of Health Communication.

Yonghwan Kim is an Assistant Professor at the University of Alabama. His research interests include new communication technologies, media psychology, public opinion, and media effects. His work has been published in Journal of Communication, Computers in Human Behavior, Asian Journal of Communication, Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking, International Journal of Strategic Communication, International Journal of Public Opinion Research, and Mass Communication and Society.

Notes

1. This study treated the following two cases as high discrepancy (or low congruency): (1) the participants support the FTA (e.g., their score may be 5) and they perceive that the majority does not support (e.g., their scores may be 1) and (2) the participants do not support the FTA (e.g., their scores may be 1) and they perceive majority supports (e.g., their scores may be 5). This is the essentially the same way by which Ho and McLeod (2008) measured congruency of participants' opinion and their perceptions of majority opinion.

2. For the comparison of liberal and conservative journalists, from 1 to 3 were re-coded as liberal, 4 was re-coded as moderate, and from 5 to 7 were re-coded as conservative.