Really Social Disaster: An Examination of Photo Sharing on Twitter During the #SCFlood

In the open marketplace of visuals where the most valued photographs “rise to the top” via tweets, likes, and retweets rather than being dictated by professionals, the study of what makes an image go really social is merited. One occurrence during which professional photojournalism and nonprofessional photography truly coexist, intermingle, and blur is that of a natural disaster. A body of research exists that has examined the visual framing of disasters, but none has addressed how these differently framed photos go social online or by whom. In this study, 1,078 Twitter photos shared by professional media outlets and nonprofessional tweeters were examined to see what portrayals of photos are elevated in the network. Established frames and new frames were examined: depictions of people, emotional hierarchy, novelty, victims, ordinary people, uniforms, emergency professionals, valence, pragmatic, human interest, and political. The results add empirical evidence to the different ways that professional members of media and other visual sharers understand, visually communicate, and react to disaster and add to the visual framing literature an element of really social visual framing.

[1]  Alexander C. McFarlane,et al.  Definitions and Concepts in Disaster Research. , 2006 .

[2]  S. Moriarty,et al.  An Antiseptic War: Were News Magazine Images of the Gulf War Too Soft? , 1995 .

[3]  Carolyn Yaschur Shooting the Shooter: How Experience Level Affects Photojournalistic Coverage of a Breaking News Event , 2012 .

[4]  N. Dahmen,et al.  Redefining Iconicity: A Five-Year Study of Visual Themes of Hurricane Katrina , 2012 .

[5]  Zvi Reich,et al.  Out of the frame: A longitudinal perspective on digitization and professional photojournalism , 2016, New Media Soc..

[6]  W. Schulz News Structure and People's Awareness of Political Events , 1982 .

[7]  Ryan J. Thomas,et al.  Locating The Journalism in Citizen Photojournalism , 2015 .

[8]  Michael MacCambridge The Franchise: A History of Sports Illustrated Magazine , 1997 .

[9]  Kenneth Kobre,et al.  Photojournalism: The Professionals' Approach , 1980 .

[10]  Gestures of seeing: Amateur photographers in the news , 2015 .

[11]  Seeing Katrina: Perspectives of Judgement in a Cultural/Natural Disaster , 2007 .

[12]  H. D. Burgh Making Journalists: Diverse Models, Global Issues , 2006 .

[13]  Karla K. Gower,et al.  Framing effect on the public's response to crisis: Human interest frame and crisis type influencing responsibility and blame , 2006 .

[14]  Lessons from Virginia Tech: Exploring Disparities & Commonalities Between Visual Coverage in U.S. Newspapers & Victims' Families' Perceptions , 2010 .

[15]  A. Tversky,et al.  Choices, Values, and Frames , 2000 .

[16]  Zvi Reich,et al.  Textual DNA , 2014 .

[17]  Comparing Visual Framing in Newspapers: Hurricane Katrina versus Tsunami , 2009 .

[18]  J. Fudge,et al.  Portrayals of Dominance: Local Newspaper Coverage of a Natural Disaster , 2011 .

[19]  Doris A. Graber,et al.  Seeing is remembering: How visuals contribute to learning from television news , 1990 .

[20]  K. Kobré Positive/Negative: Editing for intimacy , 1999 .

[21]  Pamela J. Shoemaker,et al.  Deviance as a Predictor of Newsworthiness: Coverage of International Events in the U.S. Media , 1987 .

[22]  Laura A. Gallagher,et al.  Message framing with respect to decisions about vaccination: the roles of frame valence, frame method and perceived risk. , 2007, British journal of psychology.

[23]  Lulu Rodriguez,et al.  Visual Representations of Genetic Engineering and Genetically Modified Organisms in the Online Media , 2012 .

[24]  Photojournalists' and Photo Editors' Attitudes and Perceptions: The Visual Coverage of 9/11 and the Afghan War , 2005 .

[25]  Shahira S Fahmy,et al.  Picturing a journey of protest or a journey of harmony? Comparing the visual framing of the 2008 Olympic torch relay in the US versus the Chinese press , 2013 .

[26]  Andrew L. Mendelson Effects of Novelty in News Photographs on Attention and Memory , 2001 .

[27]  The State of News Photography: The Lives and Livelihoods of Photojournalists in the Digital Age , 2015 .

[28]  N. Dahmen Images of Resilience: The Case for Visual Restorative Narrative , 2016 .

[29]  JinKyu Lee,et al.  Web 2.0 Emergency Applications: How Useful Can Twitter be for Emergency Response? , 2009 .

[30]  B. Zelizer Journalism's "Last" Stand: Wirephoto and the Discourse of Resistance. , 1995 .

[31]  Dietram A. Scheufele,et al.  News Framing Theory and Research , 2009, Media Effects.

[32]  Laura M. Arpan,et al.  News Coverage of Social Protests and the Effects of Photographs and Prior Attitudes , 2006 .

[33]  Wilson Lowrey,et al.  Word People vs. Picture People: Normative Differences and Strategies for Control Over Work Among Newsroom Subgroups , 2002 .

[34]  H. Boomgaarden,et al.  Valenced news frames and public support for the EU: Linking content analyses and experimental data , 2003 .

[35]  Fredrik Meyer,et al.  Representation theory , 2015 .

[36]  Shahira S Fahmy,et al.  What Katrina Revealed: A Visual Analysis of the Hurricane Coverage by News Wires and U.S. Newspapers , 2007 .

[37]  Stephen D. Reese,et al.  Mediating the Message in the 21st Century: A Media Sociology Perspective , 2013 .

[38]  Wilson Lowrey Media Dependency During a Large-Scale Social Disruption: The Case of September 11 , 2004 .