L’influenceur sur les réseaux socionumériques : le substitut naturel du leader d’opinion ?

in Les cahiers de la SFSIC (2022), 17

Le « cas Raoult » ou la controverse médicale amplifiée par l’influence personnelle

in Communication (2022), 39(1),

The medical controversy stirred up by Professor Didier Raoult in France was an unprecedented communications challenge during the COVID-19 pandemic. In today’s supermediatized world, the traditional ... [more ▼]

The medical controversy stirred up by Professor Didier Raoult in France was an unprecedented communications challenge during the COVID-19 pandemic. In today’s supermediatized world, the traditional framework of scientific controversies has shifted to the social media space where divided opinions and heated disputes pave the way for “fake news” and “alternative facts.” The authors begin by breaking down Professor Raoult’s “direct” communication strategy. Next they compile all the interactions sparked by posts to the “Didier Raoult officiel” Facebook page over a three-month period. Then after examining the content shared by the pages users/followers, the authors identify certain elements of homophily within the groups observed [less ▲]

Les réseaux socionumériques : un mirage pour l’érudition

in Hermès la revue (2021), 87

Digital Social Networks : A Mirage for Scholarship Digital social networks constitute a mirage for scholarship. While a necessary condition of scholarly research is the availability of a diverse range of ... [more ▼]

Digital Social Networks : A Mirage for Scholarship Digital social networks constitute a mirage for scholarship. While a necessary condition of scholarly research is the availability of a diverse range of information, using digital social networks to gain access to sources can limit informational plurality. As a result of their homophilous functioning, there is not much interplay of content on social media. In concretizing, on a large scale, both the two-step flow of communication model and the figure of the opinion leader, online social media are platforms within which users-receivers get their information from other members of their own social networks. Receiving information through an opinion leader changes how it is grasped. Without the different facets of a piece of information, it is difficult to attain a scholarly perspective, because this requires in-depth study and a comparison of sources. Only the personal reconstruction of a variety of sources can restore the heterogeneity that scholarship demands. [less ▲]

La reformulation de la figure du leader d’opinion au prisme de la réception de l’information des jeunes adultes via les réseaux socionumériques

Doctoral thesis (2021)

Social-digital networks are linked to the user-receiver activity theorized by the Columbia school. In their model of two-step flow of communication, the Columbia researchers focused on non-digital social ... [more ▼]

Social-digital networks are linked to the user-receiver activity theorized by the Columbia school. In their model of two-step flow of communication, the Columbia researchers focused on non-digital social networks. The link between the media system and the social system that the Columbia school anticipated seems all the more relevant with the collect of information via social networks. Henceforth, the media must reckon with social networks and consequently with users-receivers. By sharing information, each user-receiver can become a short-term opinion leader by influencing their secondary groups and by arousing gratifications. The one-off act of sharing materializes this new filter which symbolizes the passage to the second step flow of communication. Sharing is therefore the circumstantial reification of personal influence which transforms the user-receiver into an opinion leader. In this 2.0 user-receiver model of the new media digital-social networks ecosystem, 2.0 opinion leaders can be compared to opinion sharers. 2.0 user-receivers are no longer only influenced by discussions led by opinion leaders within the groups to which they belong, but they are also influenced as soon as they receive information on social-digital networks by the filter operated by these same 2.0 opinion leaders. By mobilizing European and North American scientific literature, we wish to show the relevance of a canonical theoretical framework for the analysis of the uses and practices of social-digital networks through the prism of the reception of information from young adults. The goal of our approach is to link information (which is diffused by the media) to the communication of information (by users-receivers). In order to understand the situations of opinion influence at work in circulation and reception activities, the information filter processes will be studied by taking up the structural elements of the model proposed by the Columbia school ; in this model, those are the opinion leaders who are the real relays and filters of information. Our approach, both theoretically and methodologically, is a return to the original Columbia school literature. In accordance with this same literature, we aim to deploy an empirical social analysis steeped in both quantitative and qualitative methodology. We are interested in what "real people of everyday life" choose and do with media on social-digital networks, like the Columbia school which was interested in the people's choice and in particular in the part played by people in the flow of mass communications. The objective of this research is thus to transpose this Columbia model to the context of social-digital networks in order to update it and redefine, within it, the notion of opinion leader whose acceptance has been altered. Our contribution is therefore that of a social analysis of human communication of information via social-digital networks in the human and social sciences. [less ▲]

Reformulation de la figure du leader d’opinion dans la réception de l’information des jeunes via les réseaux sociaux numériques

in Actes des XIIIe Doctorales de la SFSIC (2019)

With digital social networks, the figure of the opinion leader of the two-tier communication model of the Columbia school needs to be reformulated. By mobilizing European and North American scientific ... [more ▼]

With digital social networks, the figure of the opinion leader of the two-tier communication model of the Columbia school needs to be reformulated. By mobilizing European and North American scientific literature, we wish to show the relevance of a historical theoretical framework for the analysis of the uses and practices of digital media in the reception of information from young people. In order to understand the situations of opinion influence at work in circulation and reception activities, information filtering processes will be studied. [less ▲]

Trois études sur la réception de l'information en ligne

in Joux, Alexandre; Pelissier, Maud (Eds.) L'information d'actualité au prisme des fake news (2018)