Monthly Archives: October 2019

Made From Scraps: Mini Accordion Books

Art, Paper Crafts, Tutorials, Upcycling, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

Many years ago, as one of my Mail Art projects, I used to fold two-inch wide pieces of paper into little accordion books and decorate them with rubber stamps and pieces of paper that I cut out from incoming Mail Art and decorated envelopes. I carved a rubber stamp with a little graphic of a Mail Box and the words “Bits of Mail” to stamp on the little book covers. Before sending them out, I dated and numbered them on the back. I saved one example for my archives and made a few color copies to use later as collage inspirations. While I was getting the color copies made, it came up in conversation with the copy center worker that one of the black and white machines had red toner in it. I made a lot of copies with the red toner because I knew I’d find uses for the copies later!

One of my original mini accordion books from 1998 with some color and red ink copies I made at the time for future collage work.
One of my original mini accordion books from 1998 with some color and red ink copies I made at the time for future collage work.

Some of my old collage papers along with my Mail Archives had been in storage unseen for 20 years or more. I’ve been getting some of them out lately as I move stuff. With fresh eyes, I’m getting some new ideas and inspiration for improving old ideas. I decided to take these old copies and make new versions of the mini accordion books.

First I cut up the copies that weren’t already in strips into two inch wide pieces, the same size as the originals. Then I folded them and glued one red ink copy to one color copy back to back to make longer books.

Old copies with color ink and red ink cut into two-inch strips, folded and glued to make mini accordion books.
Old copies with color ink and red ink cut into two-inch strips, folded and glued to make mini accordion books.

I had a large paper crafting stash by 1998 already because I started making collages in 1985 in my first college design class and I’ve been collecting interesting papers for collages ever since. In the intervening years, there are a lot more paper crafting supplies available and some of them are a lot more to my taste than what was available in the late 1990s. Back in the day I would have said I was a “weird” stamper not a “cute” stamper. I also enjoy sophisticated antique imagery and have a lot of papers from two of my favorite brands, Tim Holtz and 7 Gypsies, in my stash. I decided that the Tim Holtz idea-ology Correspondence paper pad was a good fit for this project and I glued some of the postal themed textures onto a selection of the blank pages of my books. The dominant colors in this series are red white and blue which looks good with the red toner ink on some of my papers and the postal motifs fit the “Bits of Mail” theme.

Next I went through I box of paper scraps that I keep for teaching a card class that I run from time to time on how to make greeting cards from little scraps, rubber stamps and stencils. I took out a selection of papers that I thought would make good backgrounds and glued them in a random fashion to every other page, leaving some blank.

Mini accordion books ready for adding content.
Mini accordion books ready for adding content.

There is an old trick that I learned in drawing class long ago to help get unstuck if you are facing a blank piece of paper with no ideas – draw a quick frame around your drawing area before you start. This helps because it’s less daunting to start drawing on a paper that you’ve made some marks on than a blank surface. I get the same creative boost from using scrap papers for perhaps a similar reason – there is already some content there, however sparse and random, and that is often all I need to get me going in a creative direction.

The little accordion books I’ve made are pictured above ready to add content. What kind of content would that be? There are lots of things I could do with these little books. I could write, draw, stamp or paste in words and/or images to make a finished artistic statement. I could use them as a storage and display folio for tiny works of art such as postage stamps, faux postage stamps or tiny photos and images. I could send them off into the Mail Art network as an “add and pass on” project. What would you make?

tiny books made by various artistsFor additional inspiration, here are some samples of tiny books made by other people that I’ve received through the mail over the years. People of any age and ability level can make tiny books. Why not try one?

Mass Communication Final Paper

Marketing, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

For our mass communication final, we were to choose two questions from a list of four and write at least a page and a half response to each question. I admit I was in more of a rush on this one than usual because of unavoidable personal circumstances and how long my first question response turned out to be. I took some risks because I didn’t have time to second-guess myself. I don’t yet know my grade. I found two typos after turning it in which I have corrected here. What will happen?

2. Summarize and critique Social Marketing. How do you see the theory’s characteristics? Provide examples.

Everett Rogers was a researcher who studied the flow of information and personal spheres of influence in the early 1960s. Rogers developed the information diffusion theory and innovation diffusion theory to explain how new ideas and technologies get distributed and adopted. He found a progression through several stages: first comes awareness, then utilization by early adopters. Opinion leaders observe the early adopters and try out the new innovations and concepts on their own. If they find the new ideas useful, the opinion leaders spread the news to opinion followers that they associate with. The last group to embrace the new innovations are the late adopters who try the new ways when they see that the majority of society has accepted them (Baran and Davis 277).

Information/diffusion theories assign some of the awareness role to the mass media, explaining that elites get the process started, then change agents whose job it is to promote actions and ideas along with early adopters who are active and knowledgeable media users take over information dissemination (Baran and Davis 278). Innovations that were not a good fit for the intended users were found to fail in the long term even if people could be persuaded to try them. A top-down approach was not satisfactory without some modifications (Baran and Davis 279).

Social marketing theory is a body of thought that deals with the promotion of practices or products that take the public good into account and are not primarily motivated by profit. To bring about desired effects in society, an information provider empowers agents with various forms of support to become opinion leaders to an active audience (Baran and Davis 279).

I belong to an organization that utilizes social marketing theory effectively – the St. Louis Master Gardener program. Our Master Gardeners spread knowledge and perform volunteer work to increase area residents’ pleasure in gardens and gardening and to provide horticultural information (St. Louis Master Gardeners “Welcome Gardeners”). How does the St. Louis Master Gardener program exemplify the seven key features of social marketing theory?

Step 1. The first requirement is to raise awareness (Baran and Davis 279). Master Gardeners sponsor horticulture related events and garden tours and send speakers out to other organizations (St. Louis Master Gardeners “Welcome Gardeners”). Members can purchase apparel with the organization’s logo to wear while performing public volunteer duties (St. Louis Master Gardeners “Master Gardener Merchandise”). The Master Gardener program also uses their web site and Facebook page to promote the organization (St. Louis Master Gardeners).

Step 2. Secondly, targeting is employed to reach those who are most susceptible to the message (Baran and Davis 280). The sponsoring organizations of the St. Louis Master Gardener Program, the University of Missouri Extension and Missouri Botanical Garden, are prominent in horticultural education. The University of Missouri Extension educates one million Missourians per year (University of Missouri Extension). Missouri Botanical Garden, also known as MOBOT, is a world leader in research and as a provider scientific plant information (Missouri Botanical Garden “Research”). MOBOT provided 121.7 million dollars to the St. Louis region’s economy in 2017 (Missouri Botanical Garden “Annual & Strategic Reports”) and is a highly rated destination for tourists (Attractions of America). Many of the public sites where Master Gardeners perform work attract audiences interested in plants, gardening, ecology and outdoor activities (St. Louis Master Gardeners “Master Gardeners in Action”).

Step 3. Messages must be repetitious and promoted through several media channels to be effective even among a targeted group (Baran and Davis 280). St. Louis Master Gardeners are required to volunteer a minimum of 40 hours and complete 10 hours of education annually to remain certified (St. Louis Master Gardeners “Become a Master Gardener”). According the St. Louis Master Gardeners annual report, in 2018 there were 346 active Master Gardeners who contributed a total of 38,100 volunteer hours and delivered 101 Speakers Bureau presentations (St. Louis Master Gardeners “Annual Report 2018” 5). That is a lot of opportunity to communicate with members of the public who are interested in gardening.

Step 4. Images and impressions of the desired behavior must be cultivated through attractive images that are easily recognizable and compelling (Baran and Davis 280). Since gardening is the most popular hobby in the US (Pearlstein and Gehringer 64) and people across many cultures find the sight of flowers pleasing (Hula and Flegr “Introduction”), there are abundant opportunities for the media and change agents to create seductive images and situations.

Step 5. Members of the intended audience must be interested enough to seek information (Baran and Davis 280). Master Gardeners are compelled by the program’s requirements to constantly add to their expertise (St. Louis Master Gardeners “Become a Master Gardener”). Gardening takes considerable knowledge to engage in successfully (Sweetser), so it’s not very difficult to get participants in the nation’s most popular hobby to seek and consume information. Gardening could even increase in popularity due to home trends that include maximizing use of outdoor space (Ballinger “What’s Hot: Trends in the Pipeline for 2018”), gardens that enhance wellness (Ballinger “Elements of a Residential Therapy Garden”), and the trend toward consuming more locally grown food (Ballinger “Agrihoods Feed Buyer Interest With Hip Amenities”).

Step 6. As the audience becomes more informed and engaged, influencing audience priorities and decision making are the next tasks according to social media theory (Baran and Davis 280). The media can be used to transmit messages to encourage the desired behavior and is usually more affordable than using change agents and opinion leaders (Baran and Davis 280). The St. Louis Master Gardener program has an advantage with access to a team of change agents and opinion leaders who volunteer their time and even pay for the tuition to become a Master Gardener (St. Louis Master Gardeners “Become a Master Gardener”).

Step 7. Finally, the audience is exposed to marketing techniques designed to stimulate action (Baran and Davis 280). The actions that the Master Gardener program wants to encourage in the general public are to engage in and enjoy gardening (St. Louis Master Gardeners “Welcome Gardeners”). As evidenced by the activities already mentioned, Master Gardeners provide a lot of free and low-cost advice to make gardening more successful and enjoyable to our audience. Some of the institutions that make use of Master Gardener services provide inspiration to the public with beautiful plantings (St. Louis Master Gardeners “Master Gardeners in Action”). The Master Gardener calendar of activities includes events such as plant sales, tours, holiday celebrations and classes about not only growing plants but using their harvested products (St. Louis Master Gardeners “STLMG Calendar”). Such activities help to stimulate interested persons into starting a garden or expanding their gardening activities.

Social marketing theorists try to make their information/innovation diffusion efforts more effective by requesting feedback from consumers and making changes during a campaign if necessary (Baran and Davis 281). They hope to avoid the pitfalls of information/innovation diffusion theory when applied to audiences that don’t want or don’t understand the innovations they are encouraged to adopt (Baran and Davis 278). Social marketing theory has several weaknesses, for example a campaign can fail to work as planned if there is no two-way communication between an early adopter and a party that resists the innovation (Baran and Davis 281).

I inadvertently found myself demonstrating some effective and ineffective aspects of information/innovation diffusion theory and social marketing theory when my husband and I started installing rainscaping features to prevent damage to our house and yard. As part of my Master Gardener continuing education, I attended a Project Clear presentation by the Metropolitan Sewer District, also known as MSD, on what homeowners can do to help MSD control flooding, sewer backups and poor water quality in our region (Hasenfratz). Social marketing theory assumes a benign information provider primarily interested in the general well-being of the community (Baran and Davis 279). In MSD’s case, if homeowners adopted the practices advocated by MSD, MSD would benefit by having some of the pressure taken off of them while society in general would also benefit by enduring less property damage, reducing some of its own costs and creating a healthier environment for humans and other species. I took on the role of opinion leader when I wrote about rainscaping on the Schnarr’s Hardware Company business blog and my husband and I became early adopters when we started installing rainscaping features (Baran and Davis 277). MSD was successful in convincing me to go through the social marketing theory steps all the way to Step 7, activation (Baran and Davis 279-280).

We encountered resistance to our innovation when our next-door neighbor decided that our rainscaping features were ugly when they were under construction and she called St. Louis County to complain. St. Louis County ordered us to undo our rainscaping but we decided to contest the order because we judged it to be uninformed and arbitrary, and we eventually prevailed (Winkelmann). Once back-and-forth communication with the County decision makers was established, events progressed quickly in our favor. I provided feedback about our experience to MSD so that they can make any changes they deem necessary for future success, as advocated by the hierarchy-of-effects model of social marketing theory (Baran and Davis 281). According to social marketing theorists, MSD might encounter less resistance to the innovations they are promoting by using Step 1 to raise general awareness and Step 4 to make the solutions look more attractive (Baran and Davis 279-280). Perhaps MSD could also use Step 5 to encourage information seeking by demonstrating how homeowners could solve more of their problems and save money with apparently still avant-garde rainscaping techniques (Baran and Davis 280).

4. Explain Cultivation Analysis. How do you see the theory? Be sure to include examples.

Cultivation Analysis is the theory that television presents a view that does not necessarily reflect reality, but because people believe it does, reality changes to conform to television (Baran and Davis 287). The originator of the theory, George Gerbner, worked on projects along with colleagues as they attempted to explain whether perceptions created by television create parallel realities in the lives of viewers (Baran and Davis 288). In the Violence Index they explored the effects of televised violence on real-life aggressive behavior. Their Cultural Indicators Project expanded the social issues studied beyond only violence (Baran and Davis 288).

One of the assumptions made by the researchers in the Cultural Indicators Project was that television has unique qualities that make it exceptionally dominant and worthy of study. Nearly all homes in the US are equipped with television. There are few barriers to the medium’s consumption. For most users, one is not required to be able to read, pay a lot of money, or leave the home to use it. Television combines sound with pictures and appeals to nearly all age groups (Baran and Davis 288-289).

The earliest critics of mass media, the mass society theorists, feared that media would usurp the role of social institutions they considered reassuring and stabilizing such as the family, education, the military, religion, business and politics (Baran and Davis 33). Research by Gerbner in 1990 seems to confirm earlier critics’ predictions. Television, a form of mass media not yet imagined by mass society thinkers, had come to replace the influence of real-life institutions, at least among heavy users (Baran and Davis 290).

In Post-World War II America, many citizens were learning new ways of living and attempting to conform to the ideal lifestyles displayed via the newly prevalent medium of television (Hine 9). Television sets enjoyed rapid adoption between 1950 and the middle of the decade, increasing from 3.1 million sets sold per year to 32 million (Heimann 5). Television sitcom families became role models for people seeking reassurance as they navigated a society that was very different from that of their parents (Hine 10).

Moving from the cities to the suburbs was trendy and caused people to become more isolated from each other as they lived with more actual space between homes and drove their own cars instead of using public transportation (Hine 23). Suburban dwellers were considered malleable and desirable by marketers in part because of their reliance on media for information instead of traditional social institutions such as the family (Hine 24). Media based authorities assumed a parental role as they advised the nation on how to manage and enjoy life (Hine 27).

Some designers of physical spaces recognized that a vision seen on a screen was something that many movie and television viewers wanted to experience for themselves. Architect Morris Lapidus designed outrageous buildings designed to appeal to tastes derived from Hollywood rather than elite classic architecture. Disneyland the theme park was a companion piece to Disneyland the TV show, and was deliberately designed to give visitors an experience that reflected the expectations developed through television viewing (Hine 150-152). The works of Walt Disney and Morris Lapidus are examples of yet another cultivation analysis premise that appears to be correct – Gerbner’s 3 Bs of Television, “the idea that television blurs, blends and bends reality” (Baran and Davis 290, 292).

Works Cited

Attractions of America. “Top 10 Tourist Attractions in St. Louis, Missouri.” AttractionsofAmerica.Com, 2012-2017, https://www.attractionsofamerica.com/attractions/top-10-tourist-attractions-in-st-louis-missouri.php. Accessed 15 October 2019.

Ballinger, Barbara. REALTOR Magazine, “Home & Design.” National Association of Realtors, 2019. magazine.realtor/home-and-design. Accessed 15 October 2019.

Baran, Stanley J. and Dennis K. Davis. Mass Communication Theory: Foundations, Ferment, and Future. Seventh Edition. CENGAGE Learning, 2015.

Hasenfratz, Carolyn. “MSD’s Project Clear and Our Local Water Issues.” Schnarr’s Hardware Company, 2017, schnarrsblog.com/msds-project-clear-and-our-local-water-issues/. Accessed 15 October 2019.

Heimann, Jim. The Golden Age of Advertising – the 50s. Taschen, 2005.

Hine, Thomas. Populuxe: From Tailfins and TV Dinners To Barbie Dolls and Fallout Shelters. MJF Books, 1986 and 1999.

Hula, Martin, and Jaroslav Flegr. “What flowers do we like? The influence of shape and color on the rating of flower beauty.” PeerJ vol. 4 e2106. 7 Jun. 2016, doi:10.7717/peerj.2106. Accessed 15 October 2019.

Missouri Botanical Garden. http://www.missouribotanicalgarden.org/plant-science/plant-science/research.aspx. Accessed 15 October 2019.

Pearlstein, Karen, and George Gehringer. “Indoors Out/Outdoors In.” Casual Living, vol. 51, no. 5, May 2011, pp. 64-66. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=bth&AN=60680069&site=ehost-live. Accessed 14 October 2019.

St. Louis Master Gardeners, 2018-2019, stlmg.org/. Accessed 15 October 2019.

Sweetser, Robin, “10 Tips For Beginner Gardeners: Things To Consider When Starting A
Vegetable Garden.” Yankee Publishing, Inc, 2019, www.almanac.com/news/gardening/gardening-advice/10-tips-beginner-gardeners. Accessed 15 October 2019.

University of Missouri Extension, “Pride Points.” Curators of the University of Missouri, 1993 to 2019, http://extension.missouri.edu/about/pride-points.aspx. Accessed 15 October 2019.

Winkelmann, Carolyn Hasenfratz. “Drainage Problems Are Bringing Tom and Me To Court.” Carolyn Hasenfratz Design, 2019, www.chasenfratz.com/wp/drainage-problems-are-bringing-tom-and-i-to-court/. Accessed 15 October 2019.

Further reading: If you like the topics I wrote about above, you might enjoy more resources that I found but did not use.

Gardening for Beginners: 11 Tips for a Successful Start

2018 Remodeling Impact Report: Outdoor Features

Human ethology

Play Review: The Lifespan of a Fact

Reviews and Commentary, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

lifespan_reviewOn October 17, 2019 I saw the play The Lifespan of a Fact at the Repertory Theatre of St. Louis. Have you ever wondered how much of the media that you consume contains truth? Have you ever pondered how you personally define “truth”? Do you ever examine your own views on what kind of media you consume and whether or not you have different standards and expectations for how it presents supposed facts depending on the genre? How many artistic liberties are permissible to take with factual events in order to create a message that you think has merit? If you have ever thought about such matters or generally enjoy the kind of play that sparks discussions among your theatre-going party, I think you will love The Lifespan of a Fact.

There are three characters in the play, a writer, a magazine editor and a fact checker. They battle with each other as they negotiate what kind of finished product will end up in the magazine according to personal and industry standards of ethics. Will the finished product serve high art or the interests of the readers, the community, the advertisers or publishers? Can a compromise be reached? What would you decide if you were the editor?

Even though the play deals with serious issues and will give you a lot to think about, this production will not test your endurance or attention span. It’s not long enough to require an intermission and is fast-moving and entertaining with humorous and emotionally touching passages. Even though one could obviously apply the ideas in the play to current political situations, there are no overt partisan political references so it’s safe to invite your conservative or liberal friends – all should have a good time.  The Lifespan of a Fact is showing through November 10, 2019.

Link to Repertory Theatre box office: 
http://www.repstl.org/events/detail/the-lifespan-of-a-fact

The Spiral of Silence Theory

Marketing, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

DISCLAIMER: The following is graduate student work. I’m uploading it after grading from the Professor but no corrections were made.

The Spiral of Silence Theory

In 1963, Bernard Cohen identified a mass media phenomenon called agenda-setting, a theory which posits that the media has an influence over what topics people think are important even if it has limited control over the content of those thoughts (Baran and Davis 264). Research in 1972 by Maxwell E. McCombs and Donald Shaw appeared to confirm the theory while later researchers expanded on the nature of agenda-setting and amount of interchange between the media and the intended audience (Baran and Davis 264-268). Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann originated the spiral-of-silence theory which argues that people will be more reluctant to express their views if they believe those views are in the minority. This self-censorship results in views that are perceived as less popular gradually disappearing from public debate (Baran and Davis 268).

In 1973, Noelle-Neumann examined what caused the media to possess this agenda-setting power. In her view, one factor is that the media is readily available for consumption. Another reason is that there is a cumulative effect – the messages cross content formats and types of media and are repeated over time. Thirdly, there is a lack of diversity among the opinions of journalists that tends to lead to homogeneity of topics presented to the public (Baran and Davis 268-269). Other researchers have continued to criticize, test and analyze the spiral of silence theory (Baran and Davis 269).

During the 20th Century, information tended to flow in a top-down manner from the elites to the masses. In the present time, we still use legacy media such as printed materials and electronic media. The category of actors that would have relied on such “old media” to distribute their messages, such as activist groups, governments, organizations and companies, are still using those legacy channels along with the newer decentralized web-based platforms. Additionally, we are producing user-generated content in the form of blogs and social media posts that compete for time and attention alongside the more elite content sources (Poulakidakos 373). The line between production and consumption has been considerably blurred (Poulakidakos 377).

Individual media users make decisions to determine when it is safe or desirable to express an opinion in the public sphere (Poulakidakos 374). Users do monitor whether their opinion is in the majority or minority and take the effect on their online and real-life relationships into consideration before deciding what to share (Poulakidakos 374). A 2011 study by Andrew Hayes and associates examined the effect of opinion polls and found that they do have a greater influence on people who suffer more fear of social isolation (Baran and Davis 269). There is a tendency for some individuals polled to tell the researchers what they think they want to hear rather than their true opinion (Gearhart and Zhgang 38). This behavior suggests that some people who think they are conforming to their fellow citizens to gain social acceptance are really conforming to the perceived opinions of the poll takers instead.

What factors make people more willing to take the risk of expressing their opinion? Awareness of a wider variety of opinions helps – with more diverse points of view available for consumption, there is less fear of social exclusion for expressing an opinion, helping to break the spiral of silence effect (Poulakidakos 375). Minority opinion holders are more willing to speak out on issues that they hold very firmly and believe are of high importance (Gearhart and Zhgang 39). People are more willing to express their true opinions in forums where they are not required to reveal their real-life identity (Gearhart and Zhgang 39). Less popular opinions are more likely to be expressed when people perceive that their view is gaining momentum (Gearhart and Zhgang 48).

Research by Gerarhart and Zhang shows that the perception that the media is in line with the user’s opinions has only a limited effect on the willingness of people to post truthfully about their thoughts. The perceived opinion of other members of the person’s nation had very little effect (Gearhart and Zhgang 44-46). In other words, the opinions of real-life friends and family carry a lot more weight with individuals than the media or the general public (Gearhart and Zhgang 50).

Even if the intended effect is not very significant, some appear to feel that any advantage is worth pursuing when the stakes are high, such as they are in the case of a major election. It is estimated that 1.4 billion USD was spent on digital advertising in the 2016 US Presidential election (Madrigal). A Pew research study shows that with over a year to go before the next Presidential election, 46% of social media users are already fatigued by the amount of political content they are exposed to (Anderson and Quinn). Our current culture is increasingly tolerant of incivility and some of the political content and behavior goes beyond mere propaganda, taking the form of online shaming, bullying and offline terrorism. Vitriol is not only directed at candidates but also their supporters (Gordon). On our own Webster University Campus in 2019, wearing a candidate’s t-shirt or having a candidate’s bumper sticker on a car has resulted in attempted property damage, vituperative verbal insults, and physical assault (Farrah). It is possible to be attacked even when not engaging in public political speech based solely on identity (Gordon). In 2015, a man was allegedly beaten on public transportation in St. Louis for declining to state a political opinion when asked (Associated Press). The Southern Poverty Law Center reported in 2016 that there were 10 active hate groups in the St. Louis area that “target others based on perceived membership in a class of people” (Moffit).

Studies cited earlier in this paper have found that the opinion climate in a particular environment does have some effect on open opinion expression. In the case of political views, can the majority consensus in a social media platform, such as Facebook, accurately predict voting behavior? According to a study by Mihee Kim, if an individual is not strongly committed to a political point of view, not only is such a person unlikely to express an opinion in a hostile environment, that person is less likely to vote at all. People strongly partisan to a certain point of view were also less forthcoming with opinions in a hostile environment, but rather than reducing political participation in the real world as the less committed did, they increased their activities in a direction opposite of what they perceived as the majority view (Kim 700). As a result, those actors attempting to sway voters in their preferred political direction by making it seem as though the voters’ own opinions are unpopular are likely to get the opposite outcome than was intended.

The nature of new media results in users having more choices of what content to consume and more individualized control over what they prefer to consume (Poulakidakos 374). If our nation has lost its’ tolerance for the open debate that allows ideas to be heard and judged on their merits, then we will continue to make important decisions about the future of our country with only the opinions from our own self-selected sphere of influence to guide us (Poulakidakos 374).

Works Cited

Anderson, Monica and Dennis Quinn. “46% of U.S. social media users say they are ‘worn out’ by political posts and discussions.” Pew Research Center, 2019, www.pewresearch.org/…/46-of-u-s-social-media-users…/. Accessed 4 October 2019.

Associated Press. “FBI investigates possible hate crime cases in St. Louis.” CBS Interactive Inc., 2015, www.cbsnews.com/…/fbi-begins-investigations-into…/. Accessed 4 October 2019.

Baran, Stanley J. and Dennis K. Davis. Mass Communication Theory: Foundations, Ferment, and Future. Seventh Edition. CENGAGE Learning, 2015.

Farrah, Kristen. “Republicans fear prejudice on campus.” Webster Journal, 2019, websterjournal.com/…/republicans-fear-prejudice-on…/. Accessed 4 October 2019.

Gearhart, Sherice, and Weiwu Zhang. “Same Spiral, Different Day? Testing the Spiral of Silence across Issue Types.” Communication Research, vol. 45, no. 1, Feb. 2018, pp. 34-54. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1177/0093650215616456. Accessed 2 October 2019.

Gordon, Sherri. “How to Handle Political Bullying on Facebook.” Dotdash, 2019, www.verywellmind.com/how-to-handle-political-bullying…. Accessed 4 October 2019.

Kim, Mihee. “Facebook’s Spiral of Silence and Participation: The Role of Political Expression on Facebook and Partisan Strength in Political Participation.” CyberPsychology, Behavior & Social Networking, vol. 19, no. 12, Dec. 2016, pp. 696-702. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1089/cyber.2016.0137. Accessed 2 October 2019.

Madrigal, Alexis C. “What Facebook Did to American Democracy And why it was so hard to see it coming.” The Atlantic, 2017, www.theatlantic.com/…/2017/10/what-facebook-did/542502/. Accessed 4 October 2019.

Moffit, Kelly. “10 hate groups in the St. Louis area: Defining and discussing what they stand for today.” St. Louis Public Radio, 2016, https://news.stlpublicradio.org/…/10-hate-groups-st…. Accessed 4 October 2019.

Poulakidakos, Stamatis, et al. “Post-Truth, Propaganda and the Transformation of the Spiral of Silence.” International Journal of Media & Cultural Politics, vol. 14, no. 3, Sept. 2018, pp. 367-382. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1386/macp.14.3.367_1. Accessed 2 October 2019.

Further reading: Here are some links to things I didn’t use or cite but might be interesting to read if you like this topic!

Democracy vs. Republic

The Power to Influence

12 Devious Tricks People Use To Manipulate You

Facebook Says it Doesn’t Try to Influence How People Vote

“Feminazis,” “libtards,” “snowflakes,” and “racists”: Trolling and the Spiral of Silence effect in women, LGBTQIA communities, and disability populations before and after the 2016 election

Effects of the “Spiral of Silence” in Digital Media

Spiral of Silence, and the Election Half of us Saw Coming

The only true winners of this election are trolls

A Comparison Between Emotional Abuse and Saul Alinsky’s “Rules for Radicals”