A SOCIAL NETWORK ANALYSIS: EVALUATING ROLES OF OPINION LEADERS IN SHAPING PUBLIC OPINION ON COVID-19 NEWS

Lydia Oko-Epelle, Bernice Sanusi (PhD), Awofadeju Peter Olayinka (PhD), kazeem Alade Oyedeji, Sunday Adeniyi Adeagbo

Abstract


The essence of human communication is to convey meaning into understanding because communication without understanding does not result in desired behavioural change. Hence, this paper examined a social network analysis: evaluating the roles of opinion leaders in shaping public opinion on covid-19 news. 62,119 online posts from 11 social networks were examined to analyze the novel coronavirus disease information. These platforms include Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Linkedin, Pinterest, WhatApp, Tiktok, Telegram, Snapchat, and Google Hangouts. Strong influences, engagements, and hot values were the best predictors of opinion-leader classification across 11 Internet forums. This study abreast the Two-Step Flow theory, the characteristics of opinion leaders, and how they interpret media messages, all of which have much influence. The findings called into question traditional news sources because opinion leaders drew widespread attention to the health threat issues during the early stages of the COVID-19 outbreak. This study contributes to a better understanding of social network types, follower engagement, and maximizing the impact of opinion leaders in social networks. It concluded that during the COVID-19 outbreak, the roles of opinion leaders were to interpret government policies regarding the pandemic, explain non-pharmaceutical measures to stop the spread of COVID-19, and encourage the public to get the COVID-19 vaccine


Keywords


Two-step flow, Opinion Leaders, COVID-19, Social network, Public opinion.

Full Text:

PDF

References


Akinfeleye, R.A. (2003). Fourth estate of the realm or fourth estate of the wreck? Inaugural

lecture, University of Lagos.

Anderson, A. (2009). Media, Politics and climate change: towards a new research

agenda. Sociol. Compass 3, 166–182. doi: 10.1111/j.1751-9020.2008.00188.x

ACSPN, (2018). Understanding Nigeria media and elections through research: Analysis of the 2015 presidential election campaign messages. Lagos: Association of Communication Scholars and Professionals of Nigeria.

Bakshy, E., Messing, S., &Adamic, L. A. (2015). Exposure to ideologically diverse news andopinion on Facebook. Science 348, 1130–1132. doi: 10.1126/science.aaa1160

Barlett, C. P., Vowels, C. L., & Saucier, D. A. (2008). Meta-analyses of the effects of media images on men’s body-image concerns. J. Soc. Clin. Psychol. 27, 279–310. doi: 10.1521/jscp.2008.27.3.279

Fulian, Y. (2020). Quantify the role of super spreaders -opinion leaders- on COVID-19 information propagation in the Chinese Sina-microblog. Plos one journal 15(6).Published online 2020 Jun 8. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0234023

Lazarsfeld, P., Berelson, B., &Gaudet H. (1948).The People's Choice. New York:Columbia

University Press.

Katz, E. &Lazarsfeld, P. F., (1955). Personal influence: The part played by the people in the follow of mass communication. Glencoe, Illinois. The Free Press.

McQuail, D., (2012). McQuail’s mass communication theory. London, Sage

Oso, L., Soola, D., & Pate U., eds (2012). Media, governance and development.AgoIwoye:

Ogun State University.

Rogers, E. (1976), Communication and development, Critical perspective Beverly Hills,

California, saga publishers.

Shah, D., &Scheufele, D. (2006).Explicating opinion leadership.Political Communication, 23, 1–22.

Severin, W. J. & Tankard, J.W. (1979), Communication theories: origins, methods, uses. Communication Arts Books.Hasting House Publishers. New York.

Schmidt, A. L., Zollo, F., Scala, A., Betsch, C., and Quattrociocchi, W. (2018). Polarization of the vaccination debate on Facebook. Vaccine 36, 3606–3612.doi: 10.1016/j.vaccine.2018.05.040.

Swami, V., Chamorro-Premuzic, T., and Furnham, A. (2010). Unanswered questions: a preliminary investigation of personality and individual difference predictors of 9/11 conspiracist beliefs. Appl. Cogn. Psychol. 24, 749–761. doi: 10.1002/acp.1583

Shrum, L. J. (2002). Media consumption and perceptions of social reality: effects and underlyingprocesses, in Media Effects: Advances in Theory and Research, eds J.

Bryant & D. Zillmann (Lawrence: Erlbaum Associates Publishers), 69–95. doi: 10.4324/9780429491146-5

Winter, S. &Neubaum, G., (2016). Examining characteristics of opinion leaders in social

media: A motivational approach. Social media & Society 2(3).

Wei, F., Binli G. &, Nan L.(2020).Analysis of the Influence of Opinion Leaders on Public

Emergencies through Microblogging. Open Journal of Social Sciences. https://www.scirp.org/journal/paperinformation.aspx?paperid=100245


Refbacks

  • There are currently no refbacks.


Copyright (c) 2022 Lydia Oko-Epelle, Bernice Sanusi (PhD), Awofadeju Peter Olayinka (PhD), kazeem Alade Oyedeji, Sunday Adeniyi Adeagbo

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 ISSN (Print):   2695-2319

ISSN (Online): 2695-2327

 

 

   

 

Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.