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Правильная ссылка на статью:
Mustapha M., Agyei S. — Assessing The Effects Of New Media And The Channels For Accessing Political News In West Africa: A Case Of Ghana And Nigeria. // Litera. - 2021. - № 11. DOI: 10.25136/2409-8698.2021.11.36702 URL: https://nbpublish.com'library_read_article.php?id=36702
Assessing The Effects Of New Media And The Channels For Accessing Political News In West Africa: A Case Of Ghana And Nigeria. / Оценка влияния новых СМИ и каналов доступа к политическим новостям в Западной Африке: пример Ганы и Нигерии
Mustapha Muhammed Jamiu
ORCID: 0000-0001-8239-5808 доктор философских наук ассистент, кафедра Mass Communication, RUDN University of Russia 117198, Россия, Moscow область, г. Moscow, ул. Ulitsa miklukho-Maklaya, 6
Agyei Stephen Obiri
доктор философских наук
докторант, кафедра Social and Differential Psychology, RUDN University of Russia 117198, Россия, Moscow область, г. Moscow, ул. Ulitsa miklukho-Maklaya,, 6
Статья из рубрики "Журналистика"
DOI:
10.25136/2409-8698.2021.11.36702
Дата направления статьи в редакцию:
24-10-2021
Аннотация: В последнее время быстрые изменения в технологиях продолжают влиять на все аспекты жизни. Появление и распространение Интернета - один из примеров, который также нашел свое отражение в том, как люди получают доступ к политической информации и новостям. Предыдущие исследования были сосредоточены на изучении влияния СМИ на аудиторию, в то время как другие исследовали недоверие к новым СМИ. Благодаря использованию метода количественного исследования с общим числом 199 респондентов из Ганы и Нигерии в онлайн-опросе это исследование обнаружило, что большое количество людей читают политические новости через онлайн-СМИ, в то время как другие иногда слушают радио в этих двух регионах. . Печатные СМИ получили самый низкий рейтинг, поскольку интерес людей к чтению печатных копий снизился. В
документе делается вывод о том, что люди в Гане и Нигерии склонны к использованию новых СМИ для политических новостей по сравнению с основными СМИ. Таким образом, основные СМИ должны инвестировать адекватные ресурсы в улучшение своего присутствия в Интернете и качества своего новостного контента. Вывод заключается в том, что новые СМИ сейчас являются наиболее массовым инструментом для привлечения людей к протесту против политики правительства, которая, по их мнению, будет иметь негативные последствия для их средств к существованию. Шокирует тот факт, что большинство респондентов заявили, что они получают доступ к политическим новостям через телевидение, по сравнению с небольшим количеством людей, которые получают доступ к политическим новостям через радио. Особый вклад авторов - выявление наиболее часто используемых средств политической коммуникации жителей западноафриканских стран. Он открывает глаза для политической коммуникации и исследователей, что требует дальнейшего изучения.
Ключевые слова: СМИ, основные СМИ, политические новости, Западная Африка, дезинформация, журналистика, политическая коммуникация, ТИК Так, Использование и удовлетворение, печатные СМИ
Introduction
The role of the new media in the political, social and religious lives of people has been tremendous. It has permeated every aspect of our modern-day existence. Prior to the age of the internet, the mainstream media played a very seminal role in how audience members receive and act on the information -Ш although; not as fast as it is happening today but the mainstream media were the key agenda setters for what citizens would discuss. Thus, the mainstream media was the "heart" of our everyday conversation.
The advent of the internet, therefore, was a major change in the discourse and how the media began to operate. Access to the news was easier and faster as compared to the period before the internet and the audience shifted their attention to the consumption of online news and this ease of access will increase the level of participation and engagement
of all the audience members .. It is worth noting that African, unlike the other western countries, just woke up to the effective usage of new media for political participation and the practice of democracy only came to popularity in 2010
The new (social) media has now emerged as the arena where people now seek information and this interest in seeking information has increased recently, more specifically, the interest in political news. Thus, this paper assesses the effects of the new media in this information era in tandem with the channels the audience use to access this political news and to what extent they are interested in politics.
Literature review
The relationship between traditional media and new media is no more of a supplementary effort since new media is now tools the journalists are also leveraging on for campaigns
Owen D. Fletcher and Nielson [1] noted that the exposure of information on social media is confronted with different types of information whether they are interested or not. And this, they note, makes it essential to understand the role of social media in the "news ecosystem" (P: 3).
Bosch et. al in their work on Facebook and politics in Africa examined how Facebook has
affected the political discourse in Zimbabwe and Kenya. They noted that social media facilitate political discussions and that it is an extension of the real-life political discourse online. However, the authors did not examine whether the audience was interested in continuing the conversation online.
Today, social media is used by the audience to participate in the political discourse and the news media and politicians capitalize on the new media to reach a large audience and J6-also, due to the emergence of the new media, the audience members are able to obtain political news through this medium and to collaborate in making and sharing news to their followers on the new media. They posit that the youth are taking advantage of the new media to make their voices heard in the political arena and to participate in politics and
thus their interest in political news has increased and this is due to the new media [6]. Owen D.
In their study, Kristoffer Holt et. all [7], notes that age plays a very seminal role in how people develop an interest in political news. They argue that youth uses social media essentially for political purposes more often than the older people while the older ones prefer the mainstream media for their political news. This, the authors say, "shows a clear gap in the patterns of media use" [7: 30].
Data and Method
Data for this study were collected from a web-based online survey of simple random sampling from 199 people in Ghana and Nigeria. The survey was conducted within the period of six months, thus, from February to July. The quantitative research technique was us e d in t his s t udy.
Analysis and discussion
The finding of this research is on two major areas; Interest of people in Politics and political news, and frequent usage of a particular media outlet as a source for political information. news and new media. In other words, the study assesses the effects of new media use and political interest as well as the channels respondents use to access political information.
Political interest
Politics largely affects us in so many ways and it is really intrusive in our everyday lives. The majority of people, therefore, want to be politically inclined and to be abreast of all that is happening in their countries.
Interest in Political News { Figurel}.
We gather ed that a lot of respondents are either somewhat interested in political news or very interested in political news which buttresses the idea that people care about politics because it affects every aspect of the economy and life. If one sits aloof without adding his voice or being interested in what might affect his or her life, it must be worrying. Politics is that which affects life. So people are interested. In contrast, respondents are not really extremely interested in politics and thus we could say that politicians might be extremely interested and not ordinary citizens who are already burdened with the pressures of life and probably tired of the same circle of politicians and their promises. Thus, they might not be extremely interested in it. One fascinating thing is that few respondents noted that they are not at all interested. Which is quite revealing! This means that politicians should not just take the citizens for a ride but should be concerned about them in the sense that they really monitor whatever politicians do.
Frequent usage of a particular media outlet for political information in the previous week
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WMiApp
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{ Figure2}.
The authors hypothesized that the traditional media might be the media that they would be interested to watch political news because they are seen as accurate, truthful, objective and factual as it is required of journalists. On the contrary, in figure 2, respondents rely on social media for their political news. In this section, a large number of the respondents said that they access their political news from WhatsApp messages and as it is noted by
Cheeseman et. al J81, in their paper that, "WhatsApp reflects changing attitudes concerning the impact of new digital technologies on democracy". Thus, WhatsApp has become a veritable trove where all kinds of political news are shared instantly and go "viral". It is the
dominant messaging platform in forty African countries ^ This makes it one of the widely used and accessible ways for people to access political news in Africa and specifically, Ghana and Nigeria. Twitter is also widely used by the respondents who said that they also use the platform to get political news. Many studies have contented that radio is more accessible to TV, however, the current study has revealed something different. The respondents accessed political news through television to radio. Due to the dwindling reading culture of 'hardcopy' newspapers recently among many Africans, it's not surprising that newspapers emerged as the least used to access political news. People now prefer the 'softcopy' on their phones instead, especially among the Millennials. According to the United Nations World Population Prospects 2019 [9], in sub-Saharan Africa, for example,
Conclusion and Further research
The new media has now become part of our political discourse and citizens use the new media to access political news due to their interest in political information. The study has revealed that people are very interested in political news in Ghana and Nigeria and that we
recommend that politicians should pay attention to what the citizens say and their grievances. Thus, the new media is now the most populous tool to garner people to protest against policies of the government that the people think will have negative consequences on their livelihoods. It is evident from the study that Whatsapp is the most dominant new media that respondents use to access political news, shockingly is the fact that the majority of respondents said that they access political news via television as compared to a small number of people who access political news via radio.
Some of the respondents chose other social media platforms like; Instagram, Snapchat, Linked In, WeChat, blogs, Telegram. These are new media platforms that need further research to ascertain the effects it has on the audience.
Библиография
1. Fletcher, Richard, and Rasmus Kleis Nielsen. "Are people incidentally exposed to news on social media? A comparative analysis." New media & society 20.7 (2018): 24502468.
2. Chadwick, Andrew. The hybrid media system: Politics and power. Oxford University Press, 2017.
3. Essoungou, A. M. (2010). A social media boom begins in Africa. Africa renewal, 24(4), 3-4. Mutsvairo, B., & R0nning, H. (2020). The Janus face of social media and democracy? Reflections on Africa. Media, Culture & Society, 42(3), 317-328.
4. Owen, D. (2017). New media and political campaigns. In The Oxford handbook of political communication.
5. Bosch, Tanja Estella, Mare Admire, and Meli Ncube. "Facebook and politics in Africa: Zimbabwe and Kenya." Media, Culture & Society 42.3 (2020): 349-364.
6. Cohen, Cathy J., and Joseph Kahne. "Participatory politics. New media and youth political action." (2011)
7. Holt, Kristoffer, et al. "Age and the effects of news media attention and social media use on political interest and participation: Do social media function as leveller?." European journal of communication 28.1 (2013): 19-34.
8. Cheeseman, Nic, et al. "Social Media Disruption: Nigeria's WhatsApp Politics." Journal of Democracy 31.3 (2020): 145-159.
9. United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division (2019). World Population Prospects 2019: Highlights. ST/ESA/SER.A/423.
https ://population.un.org/wpp/Publications/Files/W PP2019_Highlights.pdf
Результаты процедуры рецензирования статьи
В связи с политикой двойного слепого рецензирования личность рецензента не раскрывается.
Со списком рецензентов издательства можно ознакомиться здесь.
Рецензируемая работа «Оценка влияния новых СМИ и каналов доступа к политическим новостям в Западной Африке: пример Ганы и Нигерии» написана на английском языке и посвящена изучению степени заинтересованности политикой, а также средств массовой информации и каналов, которые используется для получения новостей о политике. Методы, выбранные автором, являются продуктивными для данного исследования. Данные для исследования собирались с помощью интернет-опроса 199 человек в Гане и Нигерии, отобранных методом случайной выборки. Опрос проводился в течение шести месяцев с февраля по июль (здесь необходимо указать год!!!). В исследовании также
использованы методы статистической обработки данных. Выбранная тематика соответствует целям и читательской аудитории журнала «Litera», статья может быть интересна широкой аудитории. Цель статьи и её предмет четко прослеживаются. По структуре работа состоит из введения, обзора литературы, методов исследования, обсуждений результатов исследования, заключения, перспектив и библиографического списка, который насчитывает 9 источников. В результате автор получает вывод, что Whatsapp является доминирующим новым средством массовой информации, которое респонденты используют для доступа к политическим новостям. Кроме того, автор заключает, что большинство респондентов узнают политические новости по телевизору и лишь небольшое количество людей выбирают радио в качестве источника политических новостей. Данные выводы не вызывают сомнений, поскольку они являются результатами проведенного опроса. Статистические данные также, видимо, представлены в графиках или диаграммах, однако автор их некорректно загрузил в систему журнала, поэтому они, к сожалению, не отображаются. Вызывает сомнение также формулировка темы статьи, она не совсем релевантна содержанию работы, поскольку в статье не проводится никакого исследования влияния СМИ, а выявляются лишь используемые современные ресурсы. В связи с этим формулировка названия работы нуждается в корректировке. В работе также есть несколько предложений, которые требуют стилистической правки: 1) « ... thus their interest in political news has increased and this is due to the new media [6]. Owen D.»; 2) «Interest of people in Politics and political news, and frequent usage of a particular media outlet as a source for political information. news and new media»; 3) «Politics is that which affects life. So people are interested. In contrast, respondents are not really extremely interested in politics and thus we could say that politicians might be extremely interested and not ordinary citizens who are already burdened with the pressures of life and probably tired of the same circle of politicians and their promises. Thus, they might not be extremely interested in it. One fascinating thing is that few respondents noted that they are not at all interested» (совсем примитивный язык, не соответствует жанру научной статьи); 4) «According to the United Nations World Population Prospects 2019, in sub-Saharan Africa, for example,» (предложение не закончено). Необходимо также исправить оформление ссылки на библиографию в этом предложении: «This, the authors say, "shows a clear gap in the patterns of media use" [7: 30].». Необходимо также расширить библиографический список, поскольку по требованиям экспертного совета РИНЦ должно быть не менее 15 источников. Библиографический список необходимо оформить в соответствии с предъявляемыми журналом требованиями. На основе всего вышесказанного можно заключить, что статью необходимо отправить на доработку.
