ArticlePDF Available

Who are the social media influencers? A study of public perceptions of personality

DOI:10.1016/j.pubrev.2010.11.001
Authors:
Karen Freberg at University of Louisville
Karen Freberg
Kristin Graham
Kristin Graham
Kristin Graham
  • This person is not on ResearchGate, or hasn't claimed this research yet.
Karen Mcgaughey at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo
Karen Mcgaughey
Laura A. Freberg at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo
Laura A. Freberg
Download full-text PDF
Read full-text
Download citation

Abstract

Social media influencers (SMIs) represent a new type of independent third party endorser who shape audience attitudes through blogs, tweets, and the use of other social media. A mature public relations literature has identified the characteristics of effective spokespersons, but relatively little is known about audience perceptions of the SMI. A q-sort technique identified core perceived attributes of four sample SMIs. A better understanding of the perceived personality of SMIs provides tools for optimizing an organization's SMI capital.
Content uploaded by Laura A. Freberg
Author content
All content in this area was uploaded by Laura A. Freberg on Oct 15, 2017
Content may be subject to copyright.
Please cite this article in press as: Freberg, K., et al. Who are the social media influencers? A study of public perceptions
of personality. Public Relations Review (2010), doi:10.1016/j.pubrev.2010.11.001
ARTICLE IN PRESS
G Model
PUBREL-861; No. of Pages 3
Public Relations Review xxx (2010) xxx–xxx
Contents lists available at ScienceDirect
Public Relations Review
Research in brief
Who are the social media influencers? A study of public perceptions
of personality夽
Karen Freberga,∗, Kristin Grahamb,1, Karen McGaughey c,2, Laura A. Frebergc,3
aUniversity of Tennessee, Knoxville, United States
bUniversity of Virginia, United States
cCalifornia Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo, United States
article info
Article history:
Received 7 August 2010
Received in revised form 27 October 2010
Accepted 1 November 2010
Keywords:
Social media influencer
California Q-sort
Social media influencer capital
Public relations
abstract
Social media influencers (SMIs) represent a new type of independent third party endorser
who shape audience attitudes through blogs, tweets, and the use of other social media. A
mature public relations literature has identified the characteristics of effective spokesper-
sons, but relatively little is known about audience perceptions of the SMI. A q-sort technique
identified core perceived attributes of four sample SMIs. A better understanding of the
perceived personality of SMIs provides tools for optimizing an organization’s SMI capital.
© 2010 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
1. Introduction
Social media influencers (SMIs) represent a new type of independent third party endorser who shape audience attitudes
through blogs, tweets, and the use of other social media. Although some scholars appear to view SMIs as competing, possibly
hostile voices (Gorry & Westbrook, 2009), others recognize the possibilities of forging alliances with SMIs to promote a
brand or organization. Just as the contribution of a Chief Executive Officer (CEO) to an organization’s bottom line can be
referred to as CEO capital (Gaines-Ross, 2003), we propose that an analogous “SMI capital” exists. To maximize organizational
SMI capital requires methods that provide precise information about relevant influencers and how they are perceived by
audiences.
Because of the persuasive power of social media influencers, technologies have been developed to identify and track the
influencers relevant to a brand or organization. Most of these efforts to identify SMIs rely on factors such as number of daily
hits on a blog, number of times a post is shared, or number of followers. Given the recognition that online influence is about
quality, not quantity, these methods should be viewed as a starting place only (Basille, 2009; Straley, 2010). Public relations
夽A previous version of this paper was presented at the 14th International Conference on Corporate Reputation, Brand, Identity and Competitiveness,
May 19–21, 2010 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
∗Corresponding author at: School of Advertising and Public Relations, College of Communication and Information, University of Tennessee, Knoxville
37996, United States. Tel.: +1 352 219 7915.
E-mail addresses: kfreberg@utk.edu (K. Freberg), Kristin.graham@yahoo.com (K. Graham), kmcgaugh@calpoly.edu (K. McGaughey),
lfreberg@calpoly.edu (L.A. Freberg).
1Tel.: +1 808 783 3279.
2Tel.: +1 805 756 6578.
3Tel.: +1 805 756 2357.
0363-8111/$ – see front matter © 2010 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.pubrev.2010.11.001
Please cite this article in press as: Freberg, K., et al. Who are the social media influencers? A study of public perceptions
of personality. Public Relations Review (2010), doi:10.1016/j.pubrev.2010.11.001
ARTICLE IN PRESS
G Model
PUBREL-861; No. of Pages 3
2K. Freberg et al. / Public Relations Review xxx (2010) xxx–xxx
practitioners need additional tools to evaluate the quality and relevance of particular SMIs to their organizations and brands
and to compare audience impressions of one SMI relative to others.
The California Q-sort (CAQ; Block, 1961, 2008) allows researchers to quantify and compare participants’ subjective impres-
sions of people or entities by ranking a set of 100 attributes standardized and validated over more than 50 years of use by
the scientific community. To demonstrate the potential of the CAQ for evaluating audience perceptions of SMIs, we asked
participants to respond to four sample SMIs selected by the researchers: Brian Solis, Deirdre Breakenridge, Charlene Li, and
Jeremiah Owyang.
2. Method
Biographical fact sheets consisting of a color photograph and publicly available information were prepared for each of
the four sample social media influencers. YouTube videos featuring each social media influencer were selected on the basis
of comparable length and context. After viewing the fact sheets and videos, 32 college undergraduates attending a large
public university completed the CAQ for one of the four SMIs. According to Block (2008), 8 participants are sufficient for
constructing a reliable and valid prototype for a person, concept, or entity.
The California Q-sort (CAQ) gives a participant a series of 100 attributes to rank order depending on how well the attribute
describes the target. Attributes were sorted into nine categories (1 =least characteristic or salient to 9 = most characteristic or
salient) using the following quasi-normal distribution of items per category: 5, 8, 12, 16, 18, 16, 12, 8, and 5. All statistical
analyses were conducted using PASW18 with the bootstrapping module. The default value of 1000 bootstrap samples was
used for each analysis.
3. Results
3.1. Inter-judge reliability
Overall SMI Profiles were constructed by averaging the responses of all 32 judges for each of the 100 attributes across the
four targets. Especially considering the diversity represented by the targets (2 males, 2 females; 1 Hispanic, 1 non-Hispanic
Caucasian, and 2 Asians), inter-judge reliability for the profile was strong (Spearman’s rho = .48, p< .01).
Profiles for each individual SMI were constructed by averaging the responses of the relevant 8 judges for each of the
100 attributes. Once again, the resulting profiles enjoyed a high degree of inter-judge reliability. The mean correlation
(Spearman’s rho) among judges was .53 for Solis, .458 for Breakenridge, .524 for Li, and .42 for Owyang. The profiles of the
individual SMIs were highly correlated with each other (Spearman rho ranged from .818 to .889, all p’s < .001).
3.2. SMI prototype
To construct a prototype from the profile, mean item scores were computed and then transformed by a requeuing process
(Block, 2008; Reise & Oliver, 1994; Reise & Wink, 1995). Specifically, the 5 items with the lowest means were assigned a value
of 1, the next 8 items were assigned a value of 2, and so on according to the number of items allowed in each category for
all 100 CAQ items. According to Block (2008), a prototype can be constructed by assembling the top 13 most characteristic
attributes (8’s and 9’s) and the bottom 13 least characteristic attributes (1’s and 2’s). Based on the resulting overall SMI
Prototype, participants viewed the SMIs as verbal, smart, ambitious, productive, and poised. The attributes that were seen
as least characteristic of SMIs were self-pitying, indecisive, easily frustrated, self-defeating, and lacking meaning in life.
3.3. Comparisons between SMI and CEO prototypes
Because CEOs and other internal leaders often play the role of official spokespersons for their organizations, we com-
pared the SMI profile with a CEO profile constructed using the same methodology for a previous study (Freberg, Graham,
McGaughey, & Freberg, 2010). Because the SMIs selected for this study are also high-ranking executives in their respective
firms, the significant overlap between the two profiles (Spearman’s rho = .846, p< .01) was not surprising. The SMIs and CEOs
were perceived as smart, ambitious, productive, poised, power-oriented, candid, and dependable. The SMIs and CEOs were
perceived as NOT being victimized, likely to give up, self-defeating, lacking meaning in life, doubting adequacy, submissive,
fearful, anxious, and thin-skinned.
Possibly more interesting to practitioners’ evaluation of influencers are the discriminate properties of the SMI and CEO
Profiles, which were evaluated using an analysis of absolute differences described by Reise and Oliver (1994). An absolute
difference score between two ranks (1 through 9) is computed for each attribute in the CAQ. An absolute difference of 3 or
more units between ranks was used as a criterion for considering an item to be a discriminate attribute (Block, 1961; Reise
& Oliver, 1994). Three attributes in the current comparison between CEOs and SMIs met the criteria for discriminates. CEOs
were viewed as more critical, skeptical, and difficult to impress than SMIs. SMIs were viewed as more likely to be sought
out for advice and reassurance and more likely to give advice than CEOs.
Please cite this article in press as: Freberg, K., et al. Who are the social media influencers? A study of public perceptions
of personality. Public Relations Review (2010), doi:10.1016/j.pubrev.2010.11.001
ARTICLE IN PRESS
G Model
PUBREL-861; No. of Pages 3
K. Freberg et al. / Public Relations Review xxx (2010) xxx–xxx 3
4. Discussion
The California Q-sort (CAQ; Block, 2008) successfully quantified subjective perceptions of four demonstration social media
influencers (SMIs), allowing reliable comparisons to be made between this group and entities of interest such as a sample
of CEOs. Obtaining detailed subjective audience impressions of an SMI adds a new dimension to practitioners’ abilities to
assess SMI capital, which heretofore has relied heavily on less precise measures such as number of followers. Once salient
SMIs for a brand or organization have been identified, the CAQ provides practitioners with a method for evaluating and
comparing the subjective impressions of relevant audiences to each SMI.
The current results confirmed the perception of trade analysts that SMIs take pleasure in offering advice (Straley, 2010).
Two CAQ attributes relevant to advice (gives advice, is turned to for advice) were viewed as quite characteristic and salient
for SMIs. In contrast, scores for CEOs on these attributes (Freberg et al., 2010) were 4 and 5, or neutral. Practitioners eval-
uating the impact of messages from traditional spokespersons, such as a CEO, versus an SMI might wish to consider this
perceived difference. Further research on the relationships between spokesperson credibility and being perceived as willing
and interested in sharing advice, as opposed to appearing relatively close-lipped, could be potentially very useful.
Although our focus has been on SMI capital, or the benefits of SMIs to brands, there are also instances in which an SMI
can have a negative effect on a brand, perhaps by writing a negative review (Gorry & Westbrook, 2009). In these cases, it
could be useful to understand how this particular SMI is perceived by audiences before crafting a response. A highly credible,
positively perceived SMI would warrant a different response than one without those qualities.
The current study was viewed as preliminary and exploratory, and thus made use of an arbitrary choice of SMIs for
demonstration purposes, as well as a convenience sample of university students. Although representative of an important
marketing demographic, the participants in this study cannot be considered fully representative of the public at large. In
particular, due to their age and familiarity with social media, their responses to SMIs might be significantly different than
people in different age and education demographics. Practitioners interested in this method would be expected to identify
their own relevant SMIs and audiences.
Acknowledgements
The authors wish to thank Rebecca Adams, Brian Werter, Anu Menon, Marisa Blume, and Meg Rust for their assistance
in gathering and recording data for this study.
References
Basille, D. (2009). Social media influencers are not traditional influencers. Retrieved July 30, 2010, from http://www.briansolis.com/2009/11/social-media-
influencers-are-not-traditional-influencers/.
Block, J. (1961). The Q-sort method in personality assessment and psychiatric research. Springfield, IL: Charles C Thomas.
Block, J. (2008). The Q-sort in character appraisal: Encoding subjective impressions of persons quantitatively. Washington, D.C: American Psychological
Association.
Freberg, K., Graham, K., McGaughey, K., & Freberg, L. (2010). Leaders or snakes in suits: Public perceptions of today’s CEO. In Poster presented at the 22nd
annual convention of the Association for Psychological Science Boston, MA,
Gaines-Ross, L. (2003). CEO capital: A guide to building CEO reputation and company success. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley.
Gorry, G. A., & Westbrook, R. A. (2009). Winning the internet confidence game. Corporate Reputation Review,12(3), 195–203.
Reise, S., & Oliver, C. J. (1994). Development of a California Q-set indicator of primary psychopathy. Journal of Personality Assessment,62(1), 130–144.
Reise, S., & Wink, P. (1995). Psychological implications of the psychopathy Q-sort. Journal of Personality Assessment,65(2), 300–312.
Straley, B. (2010). How to: Target social media influencers to boost traffic and sales. Retrieved July 29, 2010, from http://mashable.com/2010/04/15/social-
media-influencers/.
... Os influenciadores digitais são um novo tipo de aconselhadores independentes que, através do Eletronic Word of Mouth (boca a boca eletrônico), moldam e influenciam as atitudes dos consumidores através de publicações em redes sociais (Freberg et al., 2011). Eles buscam elevar a confiança, e estimular o engajamento, com o intuito de persuadir e influenciar seus seguidores em suas tomadas de decisão de consumo. ...
O impacto dos influenciadores digitais sobre o comportamento do consumidor de investimentos financeiros
Article
Full-text available
  • Sep 2023
Este artigo apresenta uma revisão narrativa da literatura sobre o impacto dos influenciadores digitais sobre o comportamento do consumidor de investimentos financeiros. Este trabalho aborda essa temática apontando a possibilidade de aprofundamento e exploração de gaps advindos das mudanças no ambiente social, econômico e tecnológico. O presente estudo explora a ideia central de que os influenciadores digitais, através do trabalho de produção de conteúdo que realizam em redes e mídias sociais impactam o comportamento das pessoas que fazem investimentos no mercado financeiro. O comportamento do consumidor é um tema de estudo de interesse para muitas áreas das ciências econômicas e sociais, tendo em vista a necessidade de compreensão do comportamento humano enquanto ator econômico e social. No Brasil, aumenta, cada vez mais o número de pessoas buscando por informações financeiras e iniciando seus investimentos financeiros. Nesse sentido se apresentam como grande fonte de informação as redes sociais, sejam elas, presenciais ou virtuais. No âmbito das redes sociais virtuais surge a figura do influenciador digital; pessoas que se destacam nas redes sociais e que possuem a capacidade de mobilizar e influenciar um grande número de seguidores, pautando opiniões e comportamentos e até mesmo criando conteúdos que sejam exclusivos. Na revisão realizada, não foram encontrados estudos que analisaram diretamente o impacto dos influenciadores digitais sobre o comportamento dos consumidores de investimentos financeiros. Esse trabalho, portanto, contribui teoricamente com o tema proposto.
View
... Social influence can occur through information and knowledge about other individuals, even when there are no direct face-to-face interactions [18]. Social media influencers have influence over the social media users who follow them on various platforms, such as Instagram or YouTube [19][20][21][22]. The influence that social media influencers hold includes their ideas and behaviors that are positively evaluated and are also imitated by the social media users who follow them [12]. ...
The effects of social media influencers’ credibility on product evaluation, product attitude, and purchase intention: The mediating effects of product-influencer fit
Article
Full-text available
  • Sep 2023
The primary objective of this study was to investigate the impact of social media influencers' credibility, knowledge, and attractiveness on customers' evaluations of products and services within the domain of social media. This investigation was conducted by utilizing the theoretical framework of source credibility theory. This study also investigates the impact of product appraisal on customers' views about the product and its subsequent influence on their intentions to make a purchase. This study identified three key qualities, including source credibility, product appraisal, and product-influencer fit, which were found to be significant. Additionally, this study also revealed the mediating impact of these characteristics. A web-based survey was administered, and the collected data was subjected to analysis via structural equation modeling (SEM). This study found that out of the three elements of source credibility, trustworthiness was the only one that had a statistically significant impact on product appraisal. The findings from the conducted tests indicate that there was no statistically significant impact of competence and attractiveness on the appraisal of the product. Furthermore, it is important to note that the concept of product-influencer fit played a role as a mediator solely in the association between trustworthiness and product appraisal. Also, a significant correlation was seen between product evaluation and product perception. More importantly, it was determined that the purchase intentions of customers were notably impacted by their perceptions and evaluations of the respective products. Therefore, given the influence of trustworthiness on customers' evaluations of items and their positive brand perceptions, social media influencers could be a reliable and effective medium for disseminating marketing communications to consumers.
View
... Such research may prove invaluable in offering insight into how the influencer and fashion industries can best cater to Muslim women and ensure that they have the resources they need in order to undertake aesthetic labor in ways that do not conflict with their understandings and practices of modesty. 3. Social media influencers are tastemakers who use social media platforms to exercise their credibility and power as knowledgeable and trendy authorities in order to influence the purchase and lifestyle decisions of an audience (Freberg et al. 2011). 4. Data for this article comes from a larger project that investigates how United States and UK based Muslimah influencers perform and (re)define a post-9/11 Muslim womanhood through fashion, aesthetic labor, the hijab, and modest embodiment practices online. Data was collected from interviews with 14 Muslimah social media influencers residing in the United States, UK, and Canada; a survey with 180 of their social media followers; and a content analysis of 250 photos and videos collected over 2.5 years from 30 United States and UK based Muslimah social media influencers' public Instagram and YouTube pages. ...
When Modesty Meets Aesthetic Labor: Islamic Modesty as Antithetical to Muslimah Social Media Influencers' Aesthetic Labor
Article
  • Jun 2023
What is the relationship between Islamic principles of modesty and practices of aesthetic labor in the industries of influencer marketing and fashion? I respond to this question by examining the aesthetic labor of self-proclaimed modest Muslim female social media influencers to show how Islamic modesty—as it is understood via patriarchal interpretations of Islamic texts, and by cultural authorities in secular circles of fashion, is deemed inherently antithetical to Muslim female aesthetic labor in the fashion and influencer marketing industries. My findings show that Muslimah influencers face a doubly burdened challenge: on the one hand, Muslim women are expected to modify their performances of modesty to align with the secular expectations of aesthetic labor in these industries, but on the other, they are expected to observe modesty according to patriarchal interpretations of Islamic texts. In either case, failure to abide by racialized and gendered expectations renders Muslim women vulnerable to critique from Muslim and non-Muslim communities. I argue that this conflict illustrates that Islamic modesty is deemed fundamental to contemporary conceptions and embodied performances of Muslim womanhood online and plays a key role in shaping racialized and gendered expectations of Muslim women held by Muslim and non-Muslim communities in the west.
View
... 132 comments on the social media, which left the company at the risk of losing $560million. 8 However, the company had to do it to maintain its overall brand image to the customers. ...
Celebrity Endorsement and Its Impact on Sales
Chapter
Full-text available
  • Sep 2023
Celebrity Endorsement is a marketing technique aimed to attract consumers to a product through the use of a celebrity. The aim of such an association is to positively influence the consumer’s purchase decision. Research shows that sale is positively influenced when endorsed by a celebrity over those brands that don’t use a celebrity to promote their product. CE has both positive and unfavorable impacts on the sales and overall image of the company. The concept of celebrity has evolved and continues to evolve over time. Future consumers are going to be more informed and the influence of traditional CE is likely to fade with the rise of SMIs. Marketers ought to be more creative, open-minded, and opportunist in nature to make proper use of this marketing technique in the days to come.
View
... During this time, Bonnevie et al. (2021b) registered a 79.9% increase of anti-vaccination postings on Twitter, while the number of existing anti-vaccination accounts almost tripled. To combat increasing antivaccination attitudes and to execute successful campaigns, research has been frequently addressing the cooperation of public health institutions with SMI, that is, individuals who are capable of influencing attitudes through content creation (Freberg et al., 2011). Compared or public health institutions, they are said to possess several advantages. ...
Toward a Taxonomy of Social Media Influencers in Public Health Communication
Conference Paper
  • Jan 2024
In recent years, researchers have been discussing various strategies for public health communication to support individuals, populations, and communities in making healthier choices. In this context, the employment of social media influencers (SMI) is considered especially effective. Although we have seen extensive practical application during the COVID-19 pandemic, we possess little theoretical knowledge about the characteristics and narratives conveyed by SMI that engage in public health communication. This study takes a first step toward solving this issue by developing a taxonomy of SMI in public health communication. For the taxonomy development, qualitative content analyses of Twitter and YouTube data from the case of the German COVID-19 vaccination were conducted. The taxonomy emphasizes that SMI in public health communication can show major variations across different characteristics, thereby representing many facets of society. Moreover, conveyed narratives are not limited to health but also extend to political and social issues. This study contributes to the literature on broader SMI frameworks with a taxonomy of SMI in public health communication. The taxonomy offers a basis for further theory development and practical evaluations for context-specific employment of SMI.
View
Influencer recommendation system: choosing the right influencer using a network analysis approach
Article
Purpose The rise of social media has led to the emergence of influencers and influencer marketing (IM) domains, which have become important areas of academic inquiry. However, despite its prominence as an area for study, several significant challenges must be addressed. One significant challenge involves identifying, assessing and recommending social media influencers (SMIs). This study proposes a semantic network model capable of measuring an influencer's performance on specific topics or subjects to address this issue. This study can assist managers in identifying suitable SMIs based on their estimated reach. Design/methodology/approach Data from popular YouTube influencers and publicly available performance measures (views and likes) are extracted. Second, the titles of the past videos made by the influencer are used to develop a semantic network connecting all the videos to other videos based on similarity measures. Third, the nearest neighbor approach extracts the neighbors of the target title video. Finally, based on the set of neighbors, a range prediction is made for the views and likes of the target video with the influencer. Findings The results show that the model can predict an accurate range of views and likes based on the suggested video titles and the content creator, with 69–78% accuracy across different influencers on YouTube. Research limitations/implications The current study introduces a novel and innovative approach that exploits the textual association between a SMI's previous content to forecast the outcome of their future content. Although the findings are encouraging, this research recognizes various constraints that upcoming researchers may tackle. Forecasting views of posts concerning novel subjects and precisely adjusting video view counts based on their age constitute two primary limitations of this study. Practical implications Managers interested in hiring influencers can employ the suggested approach to evaluate an influencer's potential performance on a specific topic. This research aids managers in making informed decisions regarding influencer selection, utilizing data-based metrics that are simple to comprehend and explain. Originality/value The study contributes to outreach evaluation and better estimating the impact of SMIs using a novel semantic network approach.
View
Sponsorship Disclosure in Social Media Influencer Marketing: The Algorithmic and Non-Algorithmic Barriers
Article
  • Sep 2023
The growth of social media influencer marketing has created sophisticated opportunities for deceptive marketing practices to proliferate online. While sponsorship disclosures alert consumers to the commercial nature of social media content and are required in different jurisdictions around the world, many influencer ads do not incorporate disclosures that comply with applicable laws. Building on Bourdieu’s theory of field as the theoretical lens, this research examines the disconnect between formal regulation and on-the-ground influencer marketing practices in Canada by investigating the current barriers to compliant sponsorship disclosure. Using semi-structured interviews with influencer relations professionals, who play an intermediary role between brands and influencers, the research explicates the (1) algorithmic challenges (e.g., algorithmic deprioritization or shadowbanning) and (2) non-algorithmic challenges (e.g., lengthy disclosure processes) to maintaining high disclosure standards. The research identifies the strategies influencer intermediaries can use to achieve upfront and conspicuous disclosure in a social media landscape where the algorithmic determinants of success are unpredictable, and the adaptation of applicable legal frameworks is traditionally slow.
View
Kanaat Önderliği Bağlamında Influencerlar ve İçerikleri Üzerine Fenomenolojik Bir Araştırma
Thesis
Full-text available
  • Jul 2023
Lazarsfeld, Berelson ve Gaudet tarafından 1940’lı yıllarda ortaya atılan kanaat önderliği kavramı iki aşamalı akış modeli sonucunda ortaya çıkmıştır. Kitle iletişim araçlarının etkisinin sınırlı olduğunun kabul edildiği dönemde ortaya atılan kavram geleneksel medya ortamlarında bulunan bireylerin rollerini açıklamak için kullanılırken günümüzde ise bilgi ve iletişim teknolojilerinde yaşanan gelişmelerle birlikte yaygınlaşan sosyal medya ortamlarında bulunan influencerlar için kullanılmaya başlanmıştır. Kavramın geleneksel kabullerinin sosyal medya ortamlarında bulunan influencerlar özelinde devam edip etmediğine ilişkin araştırmaların yapılması önem teşkil etmektedir. Dolayısıyla bu araştırmada, influencerların kanaat önderi olarak değerlendirilip, değerlendirilemeyeceği influencerların görüş, tutum, davranış, deneyim ve sosyal medya kullanım pratikleriyle birlikte Instagram içerikleri çerçevesinde sorgulanması amaçlanmıştır. Araştırmada karma yöntem benimsenerek keşfedici sıralı desen kullanılmıştır. Araştırmanın ilk aşamasında amaçsal örnekleme yöntemiyle seçilen 12 influencer ile yarı yapılandırılmış görüşmeler gerçekleştirilmiştir. İkinci aşamada ise alanyazın ve nitel görüşmeleri destekleyecek ve doğrulayacak nitelikte araştırmanın amacına uygun olarak kodlama cetveli oluşturularak influencerların hesapları ve içerikleri üzerine içerik analizi yapılmıştır. Araştırmanın evrenini influencerlar oluştururken, örneklemini ise amaçsal örnekleme yöntemiyle seçilen 12 farklı kategorideki influencerlar ve influencerların 120 içeriği oluşturmaktadır. Elde edilen bulgulara göre, iki aşamalı akış kuramının günümüze uyarlanması güncellenmesi gerektiği, influencerların kendilerini kanaat önderi olarak gördüğü ve influencerlarda da takipçileriyle etkileşim sonucunda kanaat önderi olduklarına yönelik algı oluştuğu belirlenmiştir. Ancak influencerların tam anlamıyla kanaat önderi oldukları veya kanaat önderi rollerinin kesin anlamda var olduğunu söylemek doğru olmamakla birlikte böyle bir durumdan söz edilebilmesi için birden fazla faktörle (sosyal medya kullanım pratikleri, içerikleri, takipçileriyle etkileşimleri, kurum, kuruluş, marka veya ajanslarla iletişim düzeyi vb.) birlikte değerlendirilmesi gerektiği sonucuna ulaşılmıştır. Anahtar Sözcükler: Sosyal medya, Instagram, İki aşamalı akış modeli, Kanaat önderliği, Influencerlar
View
View
How Clubhouse Influencers Cultivated Parasocial Relationships During COVID-19
Conference Paper
  • Mar 2022
This qualitative research study explores the development of parasocial relationships (PSR) on Clubhouse; the social audio application. Through the lens of Clubhouse influencers, the researchers sought to understand how and why Clubhouse influencers cultivated PSR during COVID-19, how Clubhouse PSRs are comparable to friendships, and the role of loneliness in the evolution of PSR on Clubhouse during COVID-19. This study takes the lead in exploring PSR on the Clubhouse application within the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. It is also one of the few studies to focus on PSR from the perspective of influencers as opposed to audiences. Accordingly, the researchers aim to fill the void of academic research in this area while giving a first-hand account of how the coronavirus pandemic transformed communication, primarily through social audio and, more specifically, through Clubhouse.
View
The Q Sort Method in Personality Assessment and Psychiatric Research
Article
  • Jan 1961
• In the last half-generation or so there has been increased emphasis on an understanding of personality functioning. It is asked what, if anything, is known or agreed to in this field. Is there a typical mother of schizophrenics, for example? In all the talk about the "creative personality" or the "authoritarian personality" just what is meant by these terms? What really is "hysteria"? Doctor Jack Block's monograph introduces the California Q-set—a method for describing comprehensively in contemporary psychodynamic terms an individual's personality. This method for encoding personality evaluation will prove highly useful in research applications by psychiatrists, psychologists, and sociologists, for it permits quantitative comparisons and calibrations of their evaluations of patients. He compares the Q-sort procedure with conventional rating methods and adjective check lists. He considers in detail the various forms of application of Q-sort procedure and appropriate statistical procedures to employ for these applications. Included in the Appendices are conversion tables for calculation of Q-sort correlations, California Q-set descriptions of various clinical concepts to be employed for calibration purposes, and an adjective Q-set for use by non-professional sorters. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2015 APA, all rights reserved) • In the last half-generation or so there has been increased emphasis on an understanding of personality functioning. It is asked what, if anything, is known or agreed to in this field. Is there a typical mother of schizophrenics, for example? In all the talk about the "creative personality" or the "authoritarian personality" just what is meant by these terms? What really is "hysteria"? Doctor Jack Block's monograph introduces the California Q-set—a method for describing comprehensively in contemporary psychodynamic terms an individual's personality. This method for encoding personality evaluation will prove highly useful in research applications by psychiatrists, psychologists, and sociologists, for it permits quantitative comparisons and calibrations of their evaluations of patients. He compares the Q-sort procedure with conventional rating methods and adjective check lists. He considers in detail the various forms of application of Q-sort procedure and appropriate statistical procedures to employ for these applications. Included in the Appendices are conversion tables for calculation of Q-sort correlations, California Q-set descriptions of various clinical concepts to be employed for calibration purposes, and an adjective Q-set for use by non-professional sorters. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2015 APA, all rights reserved)
View
Winning the Internet Confidence Game
Article
  • Sep 2009
In major organizations today, senior management is increasingly apprehensive about the threats to company reputation from Internet criticism and rumor rapidly spreading through online communities. We believe the source of the threat lies in the emerging culture of the Internet, which has been largely ignored by practitioners and academics alike. In particular, the Internet has fundamentally altered the notion of authority. Where it once vested in the few, authority has now become the claim of many, who are empowered and emboldened by the Internet. Managing damage to company reputation, however, requires more than adapting traditional media relations to the Internet. In addition, we believe it requires business leaders to re-invigorate their connections with customers and encourage their employees to speak to customers directly and forthrightly about their own work, plans and aspirations related to company's products and services.
View
The Q-sort in character appraisal: Encoding subjective impressions of persons quantitatively.
Article
  • Jan 2008
For over half a century, the Q-sort procedure has been fruitfully used to quantitatively and systematically characterize individual personalities in a variety of clinical and other settings. Through the years, the technique has been greatly enhanced by subsequent conceptual and methodological developments and has gained wide currency in a host of appraisal settings. In this long-awaited expansion of his classic 1961 monograph, Jack Block traces the history, rationale, and productive ramifications of the Q-sort technique, as implemented by the long-established California Q-sort. Major versions of the Q-sort currently in use are included, complete with detailed instructions, empirically based savvy, and descriptive "prototypes" especially apt for the individual sorter's reference frame. Clinical and personality psychologists, psychiatrists, social workers, and graduate students will find this book to be the definitive work on an important and underused personality assessment tool. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
View
Development of a California Q-Set Indicator of Primary Psychopathy
Article
  • Mar 1994
Seven judges described the personality characteristics of the primary psychopath by sorting the 100 items of the California Q-set in a forced-normal distribution. Item scores resulting from these sorts were aggregated across judges to form a Psychopathy Prototype. The reliability of the seven-judge aggregate prototype was .90. To examine the reliability of scores derived from the prototype, the personalities of 65 target subjects were described by two peer judges using the California Q-set (Block, 1961). For each subject, Psychopathy Prototype scores were derived by correlating each judge's Q-sort profile with the Psychopathy Prototype. Findings indicated that the peer-generated psychopathy scores correlated r = .61 between judges. Using the Spearman-Brown formula, Psychopathy Prototype scores have reliabilities of .75, .82, and .86 when aggregated over two, three, and four peer judges, respectively. To further explore properties of the measure, the Psychopathy Prototype was compared with independently developed California Q-set prototypes describing the narcissist and the female hysteric. The results revealed some interesting contrasts among these concepts and serve to support our contention that the Psychopathy Prototype has utility in regard to distinguishing between pathologies with overlapping features.
View
Psychological Implications of the Psychopathy Q-Sort
Article
  • Nov 1995
The construct validity of the Psychopathy Q-sort (PQS; Reise & Oliver, 1994) was investigated by correlating it with an array of observer-based and self-report personality measures in a sample of 350 men and women assessed at the Institute of Personality Assessment and Research (IPAR). High discriminant validity of the PQS was indicated by a pattern of significant correlations with self-report measures of the Cluster B personality disorder scales of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (3rd ed., rev.; American Psychiatric Association, 1980) and the absence of correlations with scales belonging to Clusters A and C of the manual. The PQS also correlated positively with the California Psychological Inventory measures of social poise and assurance and correlated negatively with measures of normative control of impulse. Gender differences in psychopathy were explored using Adjective Check List (Gough & Heilbrun, 1983) ratings provided by IPAR staff observers and by 76 pairs of spouses.
View
Leaders or snakes in suits: Public perceptions of today's CEO CEO capital: A guide to building CEO reputation and company success
  • Jan 2003
  • K Freberg
  • K Graham
  • K Mcgaughey
  • L Science Freberg
  • Ma Boston
  • L Gaines-Ross
Freberg, K., Graham, K., McGaughey, K., & Freberg, L. (2010). Leaders or snakes in suits: Public perceptions of today's CEO. In Poster presented at the 22nd annual convention of the Association for Psychological Science Boston, MA, Gaines-Ross, L. (2003). CEO capital: A guide to building CEO reputation and company success. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley.
Social media influencers are not traditional influencers
  • Jul 2009
  • D Basille
Basille, D. (2009). Social media influencers are not traditional influencers. Retrieved July 30, 2010, from http://www.briansolis.com/2009/11/social-mediainfluencers-are-not-traditional-influencers/.
How to: Target social media influencers to boost traffic and sales
  • Jul 2010
  • B Straley
Straley, B. (2010). How to: Target social media influencers to boost traffic and sales. Retrieved July 29, 2010, from http://mashable.com/2010/04/15/socialmedia-influencers/.