Awareness, Reporting, and Branding: Exploring Influences on Brazilian Journalists’ Social Media Use across Platforms

ABSTRACT

This study examines the individual and organizational level factors shaping Brazilian journalists’ use of social media. Results from a survey of 774 reporters show that individual factors influence awareness and reporting uses, while organizational factors are associated with branding. Results suggest no difference between groups of journalists, when it comes to incorporating social media for reporting; but online reporters engage in branding and use social media as an awareness system more than their counterparts. Findings also reveal that journalists have not fully embraced the participatory potential of social media, as only trust in information posted by other journalists relates to adoption.

Acknowledgments

The authors thank Professor Rosental Alves and the Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas for their generosity and support with the database of Brazilian journalists.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

¹ Assumptions were tested using Shapiro-Wilk (approximate normally distributed), Levene’s test (equal variance) and boxplots (outliers were removed from the analysis).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Rachel R. Mourão

Rachel R. Mourão (PhD, The University of Texas at Austin) is an assistant professor in the School of Journalism at Michigan State University. Her research interests include political journalism, social movements, new media, and Latin American Studies.

Summer Harlow

Summer Harlow (PhD, The University of Texas at Austin) is an assistant professor in the Valenti School of Communication at the University of Houston. She researches the intersections of emerging media technologies, international communication/journalism, alternative media, and activism, with an emphasis on Latin America and marginalized groups.