Hernando Rojas

• PhD
• Professor (Full) at University of Wisconsin–Madison

This research applies a perceived affordance approach to examine the distinctive role of social media technologies in shaping (mis)perceptions of political polarization. We argue that users’ perceptions of platform affordances influence both (a) their self-participation in uncivil political discussion on social media and (b) perceptions of others’...

This study examined the media’s role in constructing people’s perceptions of risk and building satisfaction towards the government’s actions in dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic. Data were obtained from participants in China. The results suggest that consuming pandemic-related news from both mainstream media and social media increased people’s anx...

Chile and Colombia are two South American countries with political and economic similarities that, during 2019, faced strong social outbursts, which translated into massive street protests and the weakening of their governments. Using data collected in the period immediately prior to the start of this social unrest, this study seeks to establish th...

While many fandom activism studies see fans as a potential force to challenge the existing political order, participants of fan groups in China have been transformed into nationalists and government supporters. Utilizing online survey data collected in 2020, we established an initial statistical model to test the mobilizing mechanisms underlying Ch...

The impact of state restriction and surveillance on social media engagement has been widely investigated in communication studies. However, these studies tend not to capture the moment when these restrictions are implemented and citizens experience a high level of uncertainty. Addressing the implementation of a national security law (NSL) in Hong K...

The contemporary communication ecology contributes to affective polarization by presenting us with extreme exemplars of disliked groups. News exposure that is associated with political discussion networks is related to greater political knowledge, yet unlike previous eras where political knowledge and tolerance went hand in hand, this is no longer...

The recent rise of political extremity and radicalization has presented unique challenges to contemporary politics, governance, and social cohesion in many societies in the world. In this study, we propose an imagined audience approach to understand how social media’s expanded expression capabilities are related to users’ political extremity and re...

Este estudio examina dos tipos de percepciones relacionadas con los medios de comunicación (percepción de los medios hostiles y percepción de tercera persona) y su relación con la polarización afectiva, o la creciente hostilidad partidista entre miembros de partidos opuestos en Brasil, México y Estados Unidos. Operacionalizando la polarización afec...

False consensus, or biased projection of one’s opinion onto others, has repeatedly been described by political communication scholars as a derivative of selective exposure to attitude-consistent information. This study proposes a distinctive approach to understanding the phenomenon by suggesting “perceived threat” as a motivational factor that cont...

This study explores how emerging media platforms (i.e., social media and messaging apps) contribute to affective political polarization. We rely on cross-national data (USA and Japan), which allows us to explore the broader implications of how emerging media platforms contribute to political polarization in different cultural contexts. The results...

The communication mediation model asserts that the effects of news use on political participation are mostly indirect, mediated through discussion. Recent research has shown that this mediation process is stronger in countries where freedom of the press and expression are also greater. Relying on data collected during election cycles in seventeen c...

This study proposes and tests a communication mediation model that examines the potential influence of instant messenger (IM) apps on cognitive biases and political participation among users. Data from a national online panel of U.S. adults provide insights into how egocentric assumptions in public opinion perceptions that stem from mobile echo cha...

Studies have suggested that rumors may ultimately be “self-corrected” by online crowds. Following the previous literature, we explored how two perceptual factors, including the third-person perception (TPP) and perceived norms, predict people’s intentions to correct misinformation online. Our findings show that people’s corrective intentions are po...

universidad externado de colombia j u a n c a r l o s h e n a o m a r i o a. p i n z  n-c a m a r g o (e d i t o r e s) disrupcin tecnolgica, transformacin digital y sociedad tomo i ¿cuarta revolucin industrial?: contribuciones tecnosociales para la transformacin social

This study examines two types of news media-related perceptions, hostile media perceptions, and third-person perceptions and the relationship with affective polarization, or the increased partisan hostility between opposing members in Brazil, Mexico and the United States. Operationalizing affective polarization as the estimated discrepancy between...

Amid growing scholarly interest in identifying potential explanations for the persistence of fake news from an international context, this study explores the relationship between instant messaging (IM) app use and attitudes regarding political falsehoods. Using a 2018 survey from a nationally representative sample of South Korean adults, path analy...

This study examines the role that group consciousness plays in driving corrective action. Drawing from an online survey of Latinos in the United States ( N = 588), it tests the relationships among group consciousness, perceived media bias, proattitudinal selective exposure, and political participation. Results show support for a serial mediation mo...

This study examines the articulation of public opinion about so-called fake news using a national survey (N = 510) of U.S. adults conducted in 2018. We coded respondents' open-ended answers about what is "fake news" and found that while some respondents adopt a politically neutral, descriptive definition, others provided a partisan, accusatory answ...

Opinion leaders play a significant role in public opinion formation by highlighting, defining and framing political issues for their circle of friends. Although we know opinion leaders are more likely to participate in politics, we are less sure about how they process mediated information and what motivate them to participate more actively than ind...

This study examines the articulation of public opinion about so-called fake news using a national survey (N = 510) of U.S. adults conducted in 2018. We coded respondents’ open-ended answers about what is “fake news” and found that while some respondents adopt a politically neutral, descriptive definition, others provided a partisan, accusatory answ...

The corrective action hypothesis predicts that people will take political action in response to media content they perceive to be biased against them, and evidence has accumulated in favor of it. However, research has not yet investigated the hypothesis in comparative context. This study fills that gap in the literature, relying on the Comparative...

Recent scholarship has shown the importance of political conservatism, perceived (in)security, and communication channels (i.e. mass media) in increased or decreased tolerance toward certain groups. This study advances our knowledge in this area by integrating the importance of media exposure, interpersonal communication and attitudes toward politi...

Interactive technologies are changing the ways we learn facts, develop attitudes and participate in politics, with the ensuing risk of increasing pre-existing inequalities. Addressing this challenge is the duty of researchers, technology companies, governments and news organizations.

Second screening is a relatively new set of media practices that arguably empower audiences to shape public narratives alongside news organizations and political elites. But in developing countries such as Colombia, it is important to examine who participates in this process, as substantial inequalities in both access to and use of information and...

A long tradition of research focuses on conversation as a key catalyst for community integration and a focal mediator of media influence on participation. Changes in media systems, political environments, and electoral campaigning demand that these influences, and the communication mediation model, be revised to account for the growing convergence...

The use of social media sites for political expression has added a new layer to the study of political discussion. In this type of user-generated content applications, interpersonal and mass-mediated types of communication converge in one medium. Therefore, in this study, we bring together insights from interpersonal communication theories and mass...

This article examines exposure to political disagreement on social media and user filtration in response to it. Popular arguments suggest that social media sites prevent exposure to political disagreement either through algorithmic filtration or selective affiliation. Another popular argument says that when users are exposed to political disagreeme...

This study tests the associations between news media use and perceived political polarization, conceptualized as citizens' beliefs about partisan divides among major political parties. Relying on representative surveys in Canada, Colombia, Greece, India, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Norway, the United Kingdom, and the United States, we test whether p...

In this article, we test the relationships between Twitter and Facebook use on mobile phones and political conversation with offline and online political participation, as well as online expressive communication. Our findings show that using Twitter on mobile phones is associated with a higher likelihood for both online and offline political partic...

This study examines whether the emerging communication environment makes people perceive media as more or less biased. Do social media contribute to the perception of a hostile media environment? Or do they promote a “friendly” media phenomenon through processes of selective affiliation/exposure and/or user filtration of disagreeable content? Based...

People talk about politics with others who may or may not share their views. These conversations shape their understanding and engagement with politics. However, studies have resulted in a conundrum in the relationship between disagreeable discussion and participation. Some studies suggest that the relationship is likely contingent on the type of p...

Reflexiones alrededor de un sistema de medición para realizar seguimiento y evaluación a un programa de pedagogía ciudadana a niños, niñas y adolescentes de Bogotá.

One of the most understudied aspects of the spiral of silence theory is the influence on opinion expression of different social structures anchored in geopolitical units, such as cities or states. This study evaluates political opinion expression after an election by relying on national survey data collected in Colombia (Latin America) and using mu...

People generally believe they are less susceptible than others to influences of media, and a growing body of research implicates such biased processing, or third-person perception, in public support for censorship, a type of third-person effect. The current study extends research of the third-person effect by studying two efficacy-related concepts...

In response to the vast and sometimes conceptually inconsistent literature on valence framing, Levin and colleagues (1998) advanced a typology of valence framing that organized the differing results by risky choice, attribute, and goal framing. This study furthers the literature on goal framing by (a) applying it to the context of a social issue, e...

This study investigates whether perceptions of the media and the public are related to political participation in Colombia. Communication researchers have built a large body of literature on hostile media perceptions and the projection effect, respectively. This study links these perceptual effects with each other and with political participation....

This study, based on a content analysis of television news and survey in eleven nations, explores the split between those who see the media as politically alienating and others who see the media as encouraging greater political involvement. Here, we suggest that both positions are partly right. On the one hand, television news, and in particular pu...

Observations of the contemporary news media environment often revolve around the topics of ideological polarization and blurred boundaries between mass and interpersonal communication. This study explores these topics through a focus on the association between ideologically oriented online news use, commenting on online news, and political particip...

In analysing the news media's role in serving the functions associated with democratic citizenship, the number, diversity and range of news sources are central. Research conducted on sources has overwhelmingly focused on individual national systems. However, studying variations in news source patterns across national environments enhances understan...

The growth and integration of ICTs in the global economy have created conditions that profoundly affect our society, dividing communities between those who effectively appropriate these resources and those who do not, what is called the digital divide. This exploratory study seeks to propose and validate ways of assessing this phenomenon in higher...

The corrective action hypothesis predicts that hostile media perceptions and presumed media influence will be positively related to expressive political behaviors. According to this hypothesis, the presumed influence of biased media makes people attempt to “correct” perceived “wrongs” by voicing their own opinions in the public sphere. This study p...

This study identifies social-psychological variables that predict various types of political and civic behaviors in Colombia. While previous research shows declines in civic-group membership, it also shows increases in other forms of participation. Using data from a national biennial survey of an urban adult population, we construct a two-by-two ty...

This article investigates the volume of foreign news provided by public service and commercial TV channels in countries with different media systems, and how this corresponds to the public's interest in and knowledge of foreign affairs. We use content analyses of television newscasts and public opinion surveys in 11 countries across five continents...

As news media change, so media news consumption changes with them. This paper, part of a larger international research project involving 11 countries in four continents (Americas, Europe, Asia and Australia), is focused on news consumption. As the range of media outlets has increased dramatically in recent years, this paper asks which news sources...

The 2008–2009 subprime mortgage crisis was catastrophic, not only for the global economy but for families across the social spectrum. The resultant economic upheaval threatened the livelihoods, well-being, and health of many citizens, who were often unsure where to turn for help. At this critical juncture, public broadcasting stations worked to con...

The year 2011 was defined by the intersection of politics and economics: the Wisconsin protests, the Occupy Movement, anti-austerity demonstrations, the Buffett Rule, and so on. These events drew attention to the role of politics in the erosion of labor power, the rise of inequality, and the excesses of overconsumption. Moving beyond periodic and d...

This article proposes an agenda for research on the relation of structural inequality to the study of politics and consumption in the field of communication. The authors review evidence for increasing inequality in the United States and argue that (1) consumption choices and desires are strongly constrained by structural location; (2) political bel...

This study tests the proposition that hostile interpretations of media content can be reduced through news media literacy training. Within the context of the controversy over the adoption of biofuels as an energy source, we employ a web-based experimental design that manipulates subjects’ exposure to media literacy training and then presents them w...

This article tests the cross-cultural generality of one tenet of spiral of silence theory using an individual difference approach. We argue that the spiral of silence phenomenon is, in part, a manifestation of individual differences in stable personality traits that can be measured universally regardless of country or context -specifically, fear of...

The generation of knowledge in any discipline is sustained only by the intellectual efforts of its scholars. This is particularly true and exciting in the field of political communication, which is marked by social, political, and technological developments on many fronts and in markedly different cultures and regions. Exemplifying this confluence...

In the context of Colombia, a society with high levels of polarization, this study finds that the projection of individual ideological leanings onto others diminishes with ideological extremity. The findings also show that communication diversity, understood as heterogeneous discussion networks and exposure to ideologically dissimilar news media, i...

We extend the study of political extremity to an evolving media landscape. We differentiate between political and non-political uses of both traditional and new media, and situate political extremity within a new conceptualization of public-egocentric publics -a meso-level phenomenon enabled by new communication technologies that overcomes the trad...

This article advances a communicative approach to social capital that views communication as the fundamental source of societal integration. We contend that integration occurring at the system level via news consumption and at the individual level via interpersonal discussion is amplified through ties at the community level. This cross-level intera...

This study examines whether perceptions of media influence and perceptions of media hostility towards one's views predict taking ''corrective'' actions to ensure that one's views are ''heard'' in the public sphere. Controlling for demographics, political inter-est, efficacy, knowledge, ideological extremity, and Internet use, this study provides ev...

El libro Comunicación y Participación Política, resultado de las actividades académicas desarrolladas por el Centro de Investigación en Comunicación Política de la Facultad de Comunicación Social del Externado en sus tres primeros años de funcionamiento, con el apoyo de la Universidad de Wisconsin-Madison y sus centros para la Comunicación y la Dem...

Based on a probabilistic survey that represents the Colombian urban adult population in 2006, this study shows how an adverse public opinion context reduces the likelihood of someone expressing their political views after a presidential election. These findings are consistent with previous findings on the ‘spiral of silence’ research in public opin...

Scholars have long debated the role of media and discussion in encouraging tolerance and engagement in politics and community. Theories range from the dismissal of effects to the assertion of powerful influences, and from claims of "media malaise" to the promise of "virtuous circles." Of course, results from research exploring these issues vary by...

Recientemente, hemos experimentado una proliferación en la red de cuadernos o bitácoras, generalmente conocidos como blogs. A su vez, una expansión en el número de investigaciones en torno a estos nuevos medios de comunicación y deliberación, pone de relieve la importancia de los blogs en la Sociedad de la Información. Este estudio analiza empírica...

Researchers found those exposed to a media literacy presentation were less likely to perceive a story on a controversial issue to be biased.

This study assesses differences in use of Information Communication Technologies (ICT) and relates them to patterns of expressive political participation, mobilization efforts, and traditional civic participation. Relying on data collected in August 2008 from a random sample of respondents designed to represent Colombia's adult urban population, th...

Research has shown consistently that news consumption both online and offline is related positively to interpersonal discussion, political involvement and political engagement. However, little consideration has been given to the role that new sources of information may exert on different forms of political engagement. Based on secondary analysis of...

Ego enhancement has been offered as the psychological mechanism that drives differences in judgments about effects on self and others. This study employs a three-cell (ego threat, ego enhancement, and control) experimental design to test the validity of the ego-enhancement argument in explaining the third-person perception and related outcomes (e.g...

This study combines empirical political communication research models with theoretical accounts provided by the theory of communicative action to expand the understanding of how communication matters for democratic political functioning, particularly under conditions of social instability. Building on the Habermasian distinction between strategic o...

This study examines the effects of online information seeking and social interactions in the context of early Internet adopters in Bogotá, Colombia. Data analyses of a stratified sample survey conducted in 2004 provide evidence that online news media use and online social interactions affect online political engagement. In this data there is a clea...

Habermas's late theory of the public sphere is funda- mentally about democracy and growing complexity. The network form is at the core of growing complexity, and the centrality of networks in the economy, political system, civil society, and the lifeworld calls for revisions in central theoretical assumptions about the structure of the public spher...

This paper empirically explores the role of media and political conversation as antecedents to political engagement, a set of political attitudes and behaviors. Political engagement was operationalized as political interest, political knowledge, political efficacy, associational membership, and civic and political participation. The relationships o...

Este estudio explora empíricamente el rol de los medios de comunicación y la conversación política como fundamento de una serie de actitudes y comportamientos políticos. Estar involucrado en política es concebido en términos de interés político, conocimiento político, eficacia política, membresía en asociaciones cívicas, así como de participación c...

While a majority of the population now has Internet access in countries such as the United States, Canada, Korea, Australia and the United Kingdom, the situation is quite different in other parts of the world where penetration rates are much lower. Worldwide, it is estimated that only 13.7% of the population is online (International Telecommunicati...

After more than a decade of public journalism efforts, empirical knowledge of whether these efforts have met the movement's goals remains largely based on in-depth case studies. To address this shortcoming, this study analyzes 651 cases of public journalism conducted between 1994 to 2002. Hierarchical multiple regression analysis is used to conside...

This paper explores the role of demographics, personal predispositions, mass media use, interpersonal relationships and civic behaviors as antecedents of altruistic blood donation in Bogotá, Colombia. Findings suggest that education, emotional intelligence, density of social networks, membership in voluntary associations, community voluntary work,...

This study examines relationships among individual dispositions, news framing of civil liberties restrictions, security concerns, and political tolerance. We theorize that news frames condition the effects of individual dispositions on security and tolerance attitudes. To explore these relationships, an online-survey experiment was conducted with 6...

This study examines relationships among individual dispositions, news framing of civil liberties restrictions, security concerns, and political tolerance. We theorize that news frames condition the effects of individual dispositions on security and tolerance attitudes. To explore these relationships, an online-survey experiment was conducted with 6...

This research explores the relationship between Internet use and gratifications gained within the context of the digital divide framework. Analyses within sub-samples defined by age and socio-economic status reveal that there are notable differences in uses and gratifications across subgroups. For instance, t hose who are young and high in socioeco...

The third person effect hypothesis, which states that individuals exposed to a mass media messaage will expect the communication to have a greater effect on others than on themselves, may help to explain the growing trend in support of media censorship. It is suggested here that overestimating the effect of media on others may play an important rol...

Este estudio busca dilucidar el efecto de la comunicación autoritaria en la niñez sobre las prácticas comunicativas del adulto, y especialmente considerando si las plataformas emergentes de comunicación se ven afectadas por la comunicación autoritaria de igual forma que nuestras conversaciones tradicionales.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 2005. Includes bibliographical references (p. 133-151). Photocopy.