Needs and Interests
Identifying Information Sources for Generation Z Nomads
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Unursaikhan Tugj, Tianbao Wu
All forms of human communication are rapidly transitioning to digital. Due to the influence of information technology, the mindset and consumption level of modern youth around the world are becoming similar. In this age of universal digitalization, they can find and listen to the information they like anywhere. However, depending on their age and mentality, the sources of information and the content of the information they choose are relatively different from those of other generations. Mongolians, who have a nomadic culture, have become immersed in a diverse flow of information under the influence of globalization. Through this research, we have discovered how this affects their lives, especially which media and information content the nomadic youth of the generation Z choose more. In doing so, we have compared the information needs of Mongolian youth of the generation Z who are nomadic herders in Mongolia, which has the same nomadic lifestyle, and in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region of China.
Digital Transformation: Illuminating the Value of Podcast Conversations for Journalism Studies and Practice
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Kirsten Diprose
The digital news world is changing the practice of journalism in unexpected ways. In mainstream media, news stories are often framed around two opposing views where traditional ideals of ‘balance’, ‘objectivity’ and ‘fairness’ are prioritised in journalism practice. However, with rising rates of news avoidance, and decreasing trust in mainstream news outlets, this paper argues the need to explore the value of a conversational approach to news as a way of enhancing journalistic legitimacy and promoting quality civic discourse in the changing digital era. Specifically, this paper argues legacy media can learn from the medium of podcasting in its less formal and conversational style of news content. The research draws on an extensive cross-disciplinary literature review about the role and practice of conversation over time, including in journalism. It argues journalism scholars increasingly position ‘conversation’ as audience or social media engagement rather than a form of journalism practice that can be adopted in the same way reporters learn the craft of conducting an ‘interview’. I propose six key elements of conversation that may guide journalism practice and suggest the medium of podcasting – with its intimate, conversational tone -is the ideal platform to develop the art of conversation for journalism. This is especially salient, given the increasing popularity of podcasting as a news medium. However, there is still no clear definition on what qualifies as a news podcast or recognised ethical framework. This research illuminates how podcasting and conversation is broadening our definition of news and journalism practice.
Sensing Survival: The Rhetoricity and Affective Potentialities of #DopamineDécor in Crip Worldmaking
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Talia Kibsey, Cora Butcher Spellman
#DopamineDécor is a popular digital trend that rejects prescribed aesthetics to, instead, emphasize individual tastes and prioritize pleasure. This aesthetic, whereby collecting and curating eclectic objects to foster ambiences of joy, nostalgia, and other positive affects in the homespace is greatly assisted by, and present in, digital publics. Dopamine Décor—encompassing home design as well as social media content and engagement—is not just a passing trend, but a popular international phenomenon that significantly influences the creation and consumption of media and goods and reflects cultural attitudes towards visuality, space, and aesthetics. It also serves as an illustrative case of blended paradigms whereby mental health and disability are understood through both a medical/neuroscientific lens (of dopamine deficiency) and a cultural lens (built environment). Drawing from interdisciplinary fields such as communication and media studies and critical, feminist, queer, (ie. crip) theory and methodology, our analysis treats #DopamineDécor as a rich case study for understanding how people envision and craft more survivable words through use of (digital) aesthetic practices including self-fashioning, homemaking, media consumption, and personal media production. We forward a rhetorical understanding of #DopamineDécor, examining its agencies, exigencies, audiences, characteristics, ethical nuances, and effects. The digital aesthetic functions as a tool for identity-fashioning, community-building, world-making, care, and well-being, especially used among crip, queer, and neurodivergent people participating. Altogether, this presentation elucidates Dopamine Décor’s complex rhetoricities and potentialities as a mode for interpellating, styling, and sustaining critical (affective) publics.
Are We Cognitive Extensions of Digital Media?: Distribution, Prediction, and Agnotology
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Witold Wachowski
This paper demonstrates the value that cognitive concepts can bring to agnotology applied to the study of digital media. Agnotology, the study of the cultural production of ignorance, can be hastily identified with one of its themes: unjustified prejudices against advanced technologies. Advanced digital techniques have been with us for a long time, for better or worse. However, technophilic enthusiasm obscures the other side. Philosophers of cognitive science are sometimes too hasty in defining digital media as our cognitive extensions. With great caution, one should consider the possibility that ordinary technology users are also cognitively limited. In the “best” case, they are the individuals from whom AI learns. In other cases, they are the cognitive and executive extensions of socio-technical systems (for the benefit of commercial, political, or other interests). Although agnology identifies social networks of cognitive limitations, studying the mechanisms responsible for these limitations requires cognitive science. I argue that the concept of distributed cognition (DCog) and the predictive processing perspective (PP) provide such possibilities. DCog analyzes human-technological interaction systems as distributed cognitive systems. In these systems, humans are not always cognitive centers, but rather components, alongside artifacts, with which they process internal and external cognitive representations. PP treats the brain as a predictive machine that strives to minimize cognitive uncertainty through two types of reasoning: perceptual and active, which sometimes results in cognitive limitations. Using the example of the conspiracy theories supported be digital media, I demonstrate the usefulness of both approaches.
