Social Media Studies
Social media as a discipline involves the production of online content, analysis of user driven data, interpreting of communications between users. The study of this disciplinary field can also involve:
- Studying analytics and metrics across different platforms (things such as likes, watch time, engagement, shares, etc.)
- Social monitoring and listening / extracting information from what people say and how they behave online
- Using sources outside of social media platforms to take a pulse on public sentiment about those platforms
Social Media studies often leads to research that is directly indicative of human behavior and culture due to the constant up to date data it provides .Social media research as a discipline holds the amazing ability to help us understand ourselves better by holding a mirror to society and culture as we document ourselves and our lives. As technology rapidly evolves, so does the discipline of social media. By utilizing new technologies researchers can more easily document what it means to be human through the analysis of online behavior.
While it is important to understand that this research can often times be used to manipulate platform users, it still has the capacity to do good as shown through projects like “Everyday Project“.