Social Media Culture Influences on Malaysian Digital News Reporting

Chew, Sean Thong (2022) Social Media Culture Influences on Malaysian Digital News Reporting. Final Year Project (Bachelor), Tunku Abdul Rahman University College.

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Abstract

This study looks into the influences of social media culture in the realm of Malaysian digital news reporting. Since social media has become the most common means of communication in the 21st century, particularly after the lockdowns since the global COVID-19 pandemic, the influence of its culture on the public has become more prominent than ever. This has reinforced unprecedented assimilation of social media culture into local digital news reporting, which has altered the format of local digital news reporting and caused potential issues to arise, such as decline of quality online journalism and the facilitation of fake news. Hence, the researcher has used two data collection methods – survey and intensive interviews – to understand the impacts of social media culture on local online journalism and to what extent it has potentially compromised its standards. The researcher also looked into Cultivation Theory, which looked into how the media shapes the perspectives of individuals. From this, the researcher found that social media has affected the way Generation Z’s perceive quality news due to constant exposure. However, they are not all easily influenced by it and still have their own point of views, personal experiences and perceptions that they hold onto. Aside from what was gathered in this study, the researcher hopes that future researchers who do wish to pursue this topic can do so at an in depth range by including participants from across the globe instead of just focusing on a small percentage of a particular population. Other than that, the researcher also hopes that this study could include various mass communication media aside from news in order to further study the extent of influence that social media culture has on modern media.