The Positives and Negatives of Twitter

Identify the Population and Purpose of the Study

The use of social media has become a part and parcel of the student college experience since most of them are able to open up and feel free to disclose crucial information via the social media (Billings et al, 2015). The study was purposed to investigate how student-athletes use the Twitter and how they respond to other tweets by their fellow athletes. The article addresses the use of Twitter in the sports communication among the student-athletes in the California University whereby some interviews were conducted among 30 student-athletes. 

Identify the research question(s).

1. Why were the student-athletes chosen for this study?
2. How do the student-athletes use the Twitter?
3. What inspirations do the student-athletes report for using Twitter?
4. How do the student-athletes identify critical tweets?
5. How do critical tweets affect student-athlete?
6. How do student-athlete respond to critical tweets?

Interpret The Results Of The Study.

How Are Reliability And Validity Discussed?

The use of the Twitter to pass on information was found to be an effective tool since almost all the college students have an experience in using the tool and most of them are on social media every time hence the information is easily spread. The use of Twitter by the student-athletes is highly monitored hence only the appropriate messages are tweeted. Student-athletes respond to critical tweets in various ways which provide a basis for comparison of how the information tweeted was perceived hence drawing some quality conclusions. 

Are There Limitations?

Yes. The research used a sample which comprised of the student-athletes from only one university hence different results could be obtained if the students were from different universities which could affect the accuracy of the research analysis. In Taşkıran noted that even if a careful attention is paid on the accomplices and the analysis of the data if the information is garnered from a small sample it may have some defects. Another drawback is that the data are cross-sectional and the way the student-athletes use Twitter and respond to tweets may differ as time goes by. Some student-athletes also choose to ignore the tweets hence getting the opinion of the majority becomes a problem. The research was also gender-biased since it concentrated more on the four major sporting activities which limited the number of female student-athletes.  

Was The Research Question Answered?

The research question was answered and realized that the student-athlete used the Twitter for various reasons which included keeping in contact with others by viewing what their friends are doing and keep them connected to friends and family whom they are separated. Twitter also enables them to communicate with the followers to encourage and motivate them especially the younger athletes (In Taşkıran & In Yilmaz, 2015).  It also helps them to access information concerning games like the game performance of the various teams. They are also able to find out what other people are saying about them pertaining the games.

What Did The Researcher Find In The Study?

The use of social media has increased and become a powerful tool in the sporting activities and Twitter is the most dominant platform.  Most student-athletes preferred using Twitter since it has the best platforms for social media and they use it to obtain information from followers by imploring them to gather information and give feedback to them and keep social connections. As much as the student-athletes use the Twitter to send information to family and friends, most of them use Twitter as an information accumulator rather than information disperser which creates a discrepancy from the other peer groups. 

What implications are there for further study?

The use of Twitter is still at its infancy stage and there is a need to draw comparisons of its use with other platforms like the Facebook to ensure that its increased use is not based on the fact that is a new platform and people are just eager to know its advantages over the other platforms. There is a need to do a research on the use of Twitter by student-athletes from other universities and other institutions to get a proper comparison for a quality conclusion. 

References

Billings, A. C., Butterworth, M. L., & Turman, P. D. (2015). Communication and sport: 

Surveying the field. Los Angeles: SAGE Publications. Press.

In Taşkıran, N. O., & In Yilmaz, R. (2015). Handbook of research on effective advertising  strategies in the social media age. Press.