Social Media Theory and Schema (Research Paper Sample)

Social Media Theory and Schema Student’s Name Institutional Affiliations Course Title Professor’s Name Date Social Media Theories and Schema Introduction Psychological theories are significant in understanding social media usage. Celebrities and famous politicians use social media to influence and persuade. Barrack Hussein Obama is an American political icon and a member of the Democratic Party who served as the 44th president of the U.S for eight years, from 2009 to 2017. He is regarded as the first American president to utilize the services of platforms like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, and Snapchat (Bogost, 2017). Many have described him as “The first social media president.” He is among the most followed people across all social media platforms, with 133.5 million followers on Twitter, 55 million followers on Facebook, and 35.4 million on Instagram, among other social media platforms, as of October 2022. He has thousands of posts and engagements across these platforms. Although little was known about Obama before 2008, his Chicago-based presidential campaign team exploited the power of social media as a political and influence strategy. It helped raise campaign funds and persuade volunteers to engage in online advocacy and voting Americans to support his course. This paper explores Obama’s content and social media engagement using psychological theories, including schema/script theory, cultivation, agenda setting, social learning, and uses and gratification theory. It analyzes Barrack Obama’s social media behavior and posts that lead to socioeconomic and political influence on his followers across different social media platforms. Schema/script theory Schema refers to a cluster of memories and knowledge or a mental template about situations, people, and objects constructed by previous experiences. The schema simplifies reality into expectations of specific situations and populations. Schema/script theory perceives the human mind as a mental framework that people use to organize and categorize information for easy accessibility and significantly influences behavior and cognition. The schemas help save cognitive energy when an individual is processing millions of pieces of information. Relating new information to new data sets significantly influences processing and confirmation bias. People tend to focus on details that are consistent with existing schema and are significant in reinforcing stereotypes. Schema theory explores how controversial information impacts subjective judgment among followers (Szabo, 2020). Obama’s social media use pattern indicates the use of this theory in explaining how people understand public agenda, resist misinformation, learn from the news, and change past attitudes. For instance, Obama uses his Twitter and Facebook following to influence social perception concerning issues that align with their current schemas, such as abortion and equality. Cultivation theory The cultivation theory posits that exposure to media impacts followers’ perceptions concerning reality. The theory draws from three main areas: messages, institutions, and the public. In modern societies, people are regularly exposed to media for a long and are more likely to change their perceptions of what is real in line with the content they consume from the media, which in turn influences their behaviors and attitudes. Social media significantly influences political opinions and may enhance change in views because it offers an abundance of ideas and thoughts when users engage with pseudo-realities daily (Nevzat, 2018). For instance, Obama has used the social network to influence followers on issues of democracy and constitutional rights. For instance, using Twitter as a platform to enhance freedom of speech and expression. Agenda-setting theory The theory postulates that media institutions shape political ideas and discussions by examining and determining the most significant issues and featuring them in media content and news broadcasts. Their selection of specific political, economic, and social issues and power to establish a hierarchy of news prevalence significantly influence what is trending and the related sympathy and antipathy attitudes on specific issues. Obama and his administration leveraged the advancement of technology and social media usage during his reign to influence political agendas and stay ahead of the curve. Social platforms like Twitter and Facebook enabled him to not only connect directly with Americans but also bypass traditional media that set and prioritized political debates, such as TV and Newspaper. Famous politicians influence debates by creating and prioritizing agendas through social media stories and posts. During his campaigns, people associated Obama’s cultural background with the intention to care about the socioeconomic issues facing America in 2008. President Obama used his social media accounts to prioritize agendas like Obamacare, economic revival after 2008 incidents, and security. The theory is significant in understanding his intentions to influence climate change, LGBTQ+ rights, and abortion debates. Social learning theory According to proponents of this theory, social behavior can be learned by observing and imitating other people. Therefore, social media platforms are avenues that politicians leverage to model the behavior of their followers. The network promotes self-directed learning, and leaders can influence the decisions of their followers, who observe and imitate what their leaders are doing. For instance, politicians can use media networks to create critical awareness of social and political issues, including social identity/race, political participation, self-worth, gender roles, political views, and religion (Jarche, 2021). For example, in the last elections, Obama used Facebook, Twitter, and other social platforms to encourage people to go and cast their votes. Uses and gratification theory (UGT) The theory focuses on motives, needs, and gratifications for social network users and helps understand content consumption behaviors by relating active roles in media consumption with specific needs. Binge-watching behavior has increased across social media live coverage, and the UGT can explain the growth of this behavior (Steiner & Xu, 2020). For example, they may need to escape from routine problems and emotional baggage. They may also use media for social utility needs, such as developing interpersonal relationships. People may create personal identities, reinforce value, explore reality, and self-reference via so...