Social media microblogs are extensively used to get news and other information. It brings the real challenge to distinguish that what particular information is credible. Especially when user ...authenticity is hidden, due to the microblog's anonymity feature. Low credibility content creates an imbalance in society. Therefore many research studies are conducted to assess automatic microblog's credibility but the majority of them offer different concepts of credibility and the problem seems unresolved. Credibility is multi-disciplinary, hence there is no generalized or accepted credibility concept with all its necessary and detailed constructs/components. Therefore, it is necessary to understand the complete anatomy of information credibility from different disciplines. It is accomplished here through an in-depth and organized study of all the problem dimensions for the identification of comprehensive and necessary credibility constructs. The framework is also proposed based on the identified constructs. It adheres to these constructs and presents their inter-relationships. It is believed that the framework would provide the necessary building blocks for implementing an effective automatic credibility assessment system. The framework is generic to social media and specifically implemented for microblogs. It is completely transformed up to features level, in the context of microblogs. Regarding automatic credibility assessment, it is proposed after detailed analysis that the attempt should be made for hybrid models combining feature-based and graph-based approaches. It is observed that quite a few surveys in the literature focus on some limited aspects of microblogs credibility but no literature survey and fundamental study exists that consolidates the work done. To understand the broader domain of credibility and consolidate the work in this area that can lead us to a suitable framework, we explored the existing literature from different disciplines for the said objectives. We categorized them along various dimensions, developed taxonomy, identified gaps and challenges, proposed a solution, developed a theory-driven framework with its transformation to microblogs, and suggested key areas of research.
Drawing on signalling theory, this study aims to fill a gap in knowledge by examining the effects of celebrity trust on advertising credibility, brand credibility and corporate credibility, both ...directly and based on the moderating variables of age, gender and ethnicity. The research has three objectives: (i) to explore the effects of celebrity trust on advertising credibility, brand credibility and corporate credibility; (ii) to explore the effects of celebrity trust on advertising credibility, brand credibility and corporate credibility, based on the moderating effects of consumer demographics; and (iii) to explore the effects of the other constructs on each other. A survey of 625 respondents was conducted in London. The results show that celebrity trust has a positive effect on both advertising credibility and brand credibility, and that these effects are moderated by consumers’ ethnicity, with no effects of age or gender. The significant implications for managers and researchers are highlighted.
The growth of Instagram continues, with the majority of its users being young women. This study investigates the impact of Instagram upon source credibility, consumer buying intention and social ...identification with different types of celebrities. In-depth interviews were conducted with 18 female Instagram users aged 18–30 to determine the extent to which Instagram influences their buying behaviour. The research findings show that celebrities on Instagram are influential in the purchase behaviour of young female users. However, non-traditional celebrities such as bloggers, YouTube personalities and ‘Instafamous’ profiles are more powerful, as participants regard them as more credible and are able to relate to these, rather than more traditional, celebrities. Female users are perceptively aware and prefer to follow Instagram profiles that intentionally portray positive images and provide encouraging reviews.
•Online celebrity endorsements are perceived to be credible and trustworthy when communicating marketing messages.•Personal experience of online celebrities enhances the credibility of their communication.•Female online celebrities are most influential, as these categories are more credible and relevant to young women.•No negative reviews regarding products are posted by users in order to maintain a positive online self-presentation.
It is observed that previous credibility assessment studies missed some important concepts of credibility. Their data was self-extracted and annotated only on the basis of basic human perception. ...Their decision was not explainable and led to dissatisfaction. The study attempted to accomplish all these objectives through an explainable and comprehensive credibility solution. The solution adheres to all necessary concepts of credibility presented in the microblog credibility framework and ranks the tweet from 0 to 5. The decision is also explainable to the user. The standard dataset is used with further credibility ranking, which is done by the experts using guided annotation. Despite the known trade-off that exists between accuracy and explainability, we have used all those models which produce high accuracy but our solution is also explainable. Light GBM performed the best. Results are also compared with baselines, which demonstrate that our method produced good results with an Acc. of 99.4.
This paper describes the research process – from planning to presentation, with the emphasis on credibility throughout the whole process – when the methodology of qualitative content analysis is ...chosen in a qualitative study. The groundwork for the credibility initiates when the planning of the study begins. External and internal resources have to be identified, and the researcher must consider his or her experience of the phenomenon to be studied in order to minimize any bias of his/her own influence. The purpose of content analysis is to organize and elicit meaning from the data collected and to draw realistic conclusions from it. The researcher must choose whether the analysis should be of a broad surface structure (a manifest analysis) or of a deep structure (a latent analysis). Four distinct main stages are described in this paper: the decontextualisation, the recontextualisation, the categorization, and the compilation. This description of qualitative content analysis offers one approach that shows how the general principles of the method can be used.
Fake or manipulated images propagated through the Web and social media have the capacity to deceive, emotionally distress, and influence public opinions and actions. Yet few studies have examined how ...individuals evaluate the authenticity of images that accompany online stories. This article details a 6-batch large-scale online experiment using Amazon Mechanical Turk that probes how people evaluate image credibility across online platforms. In each batch, participants were randomly assigned to 1 of 28 news-source mockups featuring a forged image, and they evaluated the credibility of the images based on several features. We found that participants’ Internet skills, photo-editing experience, and social media use were significant predictors of image credibility evaluation, while most social and heuristic cues of online credibility (e.g. source trustworthiness, bandwagon, intermediary trustworthiness) had no significant impact. Viewers’ attitude toward a depicted issue also positively influenced their credibility evaluation.
This study examines the effectiveness of brand endorsements in vlogs (video blogs) by assessing the role of audience participation, parasocial relationship, and valence toward vlog endorsements on ...the perceived credibility of the vlogger and brand attitudes. Four experimental conditions were created on Qualtrics based on a YouTube vlog where the endorser reviewed a few products. The data were collected using Mturk and analyzed with 203 usable responses. The findings indicate that audience participation in the vlog enhances para-social relationship with the vlogger, thus further fostering the vlogger's perceived credibility as an endorser. Additionally, the valence of the audience's attitudes toward vlog endorsements moderates the audience participation–parasocial relationship. The results show that vlogs with high levels of audience participation are more likely to increase the acceptance of the brand's endorsement via enhanced credibility perceptions among viewers. Hence, time should be spent choosing vloggers who are active in the online community. This study contributes to the understanding of the distinct characteristics of vlogs that specifically affect endorsement effectiveness. The focal role of parasocial relationship for message acceptance in the context of vlogs is also highlighted.
Research Summary
We used interviews with elite informants as a case study to illustrate the need to expand the discussion of transparency and replicability to qualitative methodology. An analysis of ...52 articles published in Strategic Management Journal revealed that none of them were sufficiently transparent to allow for exact replication, empirical replication, or conceptual replication. We offer 12 transparency criteria, and behaviorally‐anchored ratings scales to measure them, that can be used by authors as they plan and conduct qualitative research as well as by journal reviewers and editors when they evaluate the transparency of submitted manuscripts. We hope our article will serve as a catalyst for improving the degree of transparency and replicability of future qualitative research.
Managerial Summary
If organizations implement practices based on published research, will they produce results consistent with those reported in the articles? To answer this question, it is critical that published articles be transparent in terms of what has been done, why, and how. We investigated 52 articles published in Strategic Management Journal that reported interviewing elite informants (e.g., members of the top management team) and found that none of the articles were sufficiently transparent. These results lead to thorny questions about the trustworthiness of published research, but also important opportunities for future improvements about research transparency and replicability. We offer recommendations on 12 transparency criteria, and how to measure them, that can be used to evaluate past as well as future research using qualitative methods.
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