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Department of Journalism & Media Communication

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https://hdl.handle.net/10217/100460
These digital collections include theses, dissertations, faculty presentations, and faculty publications from the Department of Journalism & Media Communication. Due to departmental name changes, materials from the following historical department are also included here: Journalism and Technical Communication.

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Browsing Department of Journalism & Media Communication by Author "Anderson, Ashley A., committee member"

Now showing 1 - 4 of 4
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    Effectiveness of promotion or prevention message frames on food storage messages about black bears
    (Colorado State University. Libraries, 2018) Young, Heather Alexa, author; Abrams, Katie M., advisor; Anderson, Ashley A., committee member; Solomon, Jennifer N., committee member
    As conflict between humans and black bears (Ursus americanus) increases, researchers and managers look for strategies to decrease this conflict. One main driver of conflict is the availability of anthropogenic food. Bears are attracted to these food sources, conditioning them to continue to seek anthropogenic food and more frequently visit areas where humans are present. When a bear becomes food-conditioned, bears and people are at higher risk. When humans store food properly in bear-proof storage containers, this risk decreases. However, motivating people to comply with proper food storage can be difficult. We hypothesized that promotion- and prevention-framed messaging placed on storage containers would help motivate behavior change. No statistically significant difference was found between message frames. However, we did find support for constructs from the theory of planned behavior: subjective norms and perceived behavioral control. Results also inform future research on message framing and field research in park settings to motivate behavior change in visitors.
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    Effects of goal-framed and dynamic norm messages on national park campers' intentions to comply with wildlife attractant storage guidelines
    (Colorado State University. Libraries, 2023) Gorostiza, Jordan Matthew, author; Abrams, Katie M., advisor; Anderson, Ashley A., committee member; Niemiec, Rebecca, committee member
    Wildlife habituation and conditioning have posed persistent issues for managers of U.S. national parks and protected areas. The tendency for park campers to unintentionally feed wildlife by improperly storing known attractants contributes to these issues. There are park regulations requiring campers to properly store wildlife attractants that often go unfollowed. There is a noted management preference for addressing this noncompliance through communication. Previous research suggests that goal-framed and dynamic norm message frames may be effective at fostering behavioral antecedents and intentions to engage in pro-environmental behaviors such as proper attractant storage. This study examined if goal-framed and dynamic norm messages were effective at encouraging compliance. Results demonstrate no statistically significant impact on antecedents or intentions to store attractants from either goal-framed messages, dynamic norm messages, or goal-framed messages paired with dynamic norm messages. However, these statistically nonsignificant findings are aligned with a growing body of literature that have highlighted the complexities of accurately measuring the effects of goal-framed messages and the potential limited effectiveness of dynamic norm messages. Future research should focus on exploring these complexities in order to better understand how goal-framed and dynamic norm messages might be useful tools to park managers in mitigating the effects of negative human-wildlife interactions.
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    The affect and effect of Internet memes: assessing perceptions and influence of online user-generated political discourse as media
    (Colorado State University. Libraries, 2017) Huntington, Heidi E., author; Martey, Rosa Mikeal, advisor; Anderson, Ashley A., committee member; Burgchardt, Carl R., committee member; Long, Marilee, committee member; McIvor, David W., committee member
    In our modern media environment characterized by participatory media culture, political internet memes have become a tool for citizens seeking to participate actively and discursively in a digital public sphere. Although memes have been examined as visual rhetoric and discursive participation, such political memes' effects on viewers are unclear. This study responds to calls for research into effects of internet memes. Specifically, this work represents early, foundational research to quantitatively establish some media effects of internet memes as a form of political, user-generated media. This study focuses on memes' influence on affect, as well as perceptions of internet memes' persuasiveness to look for evidence of motivated reasoning in consuming political memes. To establish effects of viewing political memes, an online, post-test only, quasi-experimental design was employed to test the relationships between viewing political internet memes, affect, and perceived persuasiveness of memes. To better attribute results to specific genres (e.g. political vs. non-political) and attributes of memes (i.e., the role of images), the main study (N = 633) was comprised of five experimental conditions – to view either liberal political memes, conservative political memes, text-only versions of the liberal memes, text-only versions of the conservative memes, or non-political memes – with a sixth comparison group, who did not view any stimuli at all. Before running the main study, a pilot study (N = 133) was conducted to determine which memes to use as the stimuli in the main study, based on participants' ratings of the memes' political stances and similarity to their text-only versions. Results indicate that political internet memes produce different effects on viewers than non-political internet memes, and that political memes are subject to motivated reasoning in viewers' perceptions of memes' persuasiveness. Specifically, viewing political internet memes resulted in more feelings of aversion than did viewing non-political memes, and political internet memes were rated as less effective as messages and their arguments were scrutinized more than were non-political memes. However, non-political memes were significantly discounted as simple jokes more than were political memes. This suggests that participants understood political memes as attempts at conveying arguments beyond mere jokes, even if they were unconvinced regarding memes' effectiveness for doing so. Additionally, participants whose own political ideology matched that of the political memes they saw, as well as those who stated they agreed with the ideas presented by the memes, rated the memes as being more effective as messages and engaged in less argument scrutiny than did participants whose ideology differed from that of the memes, or than those who disagreed with the memes. This finding indicates that memes are subject to processes of motivated reasoning, specifically selective judgment and selective perception. Political memes' visuals, or lack thereof, did not play a significant role in these differences. Finding the memes to be funny, affinity for political humor, and participants' meme use moderated some of these outcomes. The results of this study suggest that political internet memes are a distinct internet meme genre, with characteristics operating in line with other humorous political media, and should be studied for effects separately or as distinguished from non-political memes. The results of this study also indicate that user-generated media like political internet memes are an important influence in today's media environment, and have implications for other forms of political outcomes, including concerns about opinion polarization, civic discourse, and the public sphere. The study presents one method for conducting quantitative research with internet memes, including generating a sample from existing internet memes, and for considering political memes' effects as media. Suggestions for future research building on this work are offered.
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    The impact of message type and format on consumers' food quality perceptions and decision-making in online grocery purchasing
    (Colorado State University. Libraries, 2021) Tilak, Elizabeth Frances, author; Abrams, Katie, advisor; Anderson, Ashley A., committee member; Graham, Dan J., committee member; Long, Marilee, committee member; Mueller, Megan, committee member
    According to the Total Food Quality Model (TFQM), consumers evaluate many food messages and cues in order to assess food quality during the food purchase decision-making process. Consumers couple food cues with their own knowledge, interests, skills, memories, and values in an iterative process as they assess food quality. The presentations of food cues and messages are important in this food quality assessment process for a number of reasons. First of all, the type of food messages can impact this process. Sensory messages elicit a different impact on food quality decisions than do health-related food messages. Secondly, the presentation format of food messages can impact consumer attention to messages, in addition to the resulting attitude and willingness-to-purchase products in online purchasing decisions. When products are presented in an online format, consumers are restricted in their abilities to fully assess a product's physical, general, and abstract characteristics compared to when shopping in a brick-and-mortar store. These product characteristics of tangibility are limited in the online format; minimal tangibility can negatively increase consumer uncertainty, increase perceived risk, and decrease willingness-to-purchase online products. Presentation formats that enhance media richness, including increasing vividness and interactivity, have been shown to support tangibility and minimize consumer uncertainty and perceived risk, and strengthen attitudes. In the online grocery purchasing environment, low levels of media richness are employed; food product presentation is limited to static photos, price, size, and minimal ingredient and nutrition information. Finally, online food messages and presentation format may impact food quality decision-making. This could impact evaluations of healthful foods in the online venue in order to support increased positive attitude and willingness-to-purchase these foods. The following research experiment is an online within-subject design study in which factors of message type and message format are manipulated in six different treatment conditions. A total of 242 subjects participated in the study from a sample population of undergraduate college students. A one-way repeated measures analysis model was used to measure main effects of the message treatment conditions. Potential interactive effects of health interest and knowledge were included in the model. Results showed that no main effects were observed among any of the message treatment conditions. No interactive effects were observed from any of the potential covariates, including health interest and knowledge. It is concluded that the message type and message formats displayed in this study were not effective in impacting variations in participant attitude and willingness-to-purchase the food products in the online grocery simulation. Future research should investigate aspects of online food specific message types and degrees of media rich presentations that may positively impact participant food quality choice factors, particularly for foods that are encouraged for public health benefit.