Garrett M. Steede (author), Courtney Meyers (author), Nan Li (author), Erica Irlbeck (author), Sherice Gearhart (author), and Texas Tech University; University of Minnesota - Twin Cities
Format:
Journal article
Publication Date:
2018
Published:
USA
Location:
Agricultural Communications Documentation Center, Funk Library, University of Illinois Box: 149 Document Number: D10103
Article 4; pgs. 1-16, On January 1, 2017, the final rule of the Veterinary Feed Directive (VFD) was put into place requiring
antibiotics approved for both humans and animals to be discontinued for growth promotion. This change was
brought on by the role growth promoters in livestock production play in the development of antibiotic
resistance. Antibiotic resistance increases the costs associated with human health care by increasing the length
of stays in the hospital and requiring more intensive medical care for patients. The purpose of this study was to
explore sentiment and characteristics of social media content and the characteristics of the key influencers
whose opinions had the greatest amount of reach on social media in regard to antibiotic use in livestock and
antibiotic resistance. Nuvi, a social media monitoring program, provided sentiment for each tweet and coded
64.8% of the content (n = 129) as negative compared to 38.2% (n = 76) humans coded as negative. The
contrast between human coders and Nuvi indicates there could be discrepancies between how Nuvi codes
content and the way a human might interpret the content. No key influencer discussed antibiotic use in
livestock positively. Findings suggest agricultural communicators should not rely completely on the output
from sentiment analysis programs to evaluate how the public discusses issues related to agriculture,
particularly controversial issues. Further, agricultural communications practitioners should prioritize
monitoring the content shared by key influencers in an effort to better understand the content being shared by
the most influential users. Recommendations for future research are provided.
16 pages, via online journal article, This study examined the online content of interdisciplinary agricultural center webpages. Content modification dates, mission statements, and content were determined through a content analysis. Many of the websites did not mention a modification date for the content, while many websites had outdated content mostly older than six months. More than two-thirds of the websites provided PDFs that visitor could download to learn more about topics, by many of the websites lacked any media element that was being coded. Additionally, many websites did not use multiple forms of media. More than half of the websites were coded as lacking any social media content or plugins, but out of the websites that did include social media content, Facebook was the most prevalent. The commonalities between the center’s mission displayed on the website and the content theme were analyzed and chi-square tests provided the degree of association. A significant association existed and an alignment between communication strategies and missions of the centers was concluded, which is important when organizations communicate about agricultural science as indicated by previous literature. It is recommended that centers communicate via their websites in a timely manner and allow modification times to be seen to viewers to show their information is up-to-date. Website media content should also be diversified and communicators of these centers should explore the unique communication opportunities provided by social media. Future research should explore the target audience of interdisciplinary agricultural centers and should analyze the messages centers are using to communicate with those audiences.
15 pages, via online journal article, Okja is a fictional Netflix original film that was released in 2017. Okja features a “super pig” that is owned by the large, agricultural company Mirando Corporation. Okja is raised by a young girl, Mija, and her grandfather in the South Korean mountains. The film climaxes when Mija and the Animal Liberation Front (ALF) narrowly save Okja and a smuggled piglet from the slaughter process. The purpose of this study was to understand how college students responded to the film. The viewers of this film included students who were majoring in a field within the agricultural college (COA) at Texas Tech University as well as students who were majoring in a field outside of agriculture (NCOA). Emergent themes from this focus group study identified the film as overdramatized and that the film misrepresented food production. Previous knowledge and experiences impacted how viewers perceived the film with COA students indicating that Okja was portrayed more like a pet than as a food animal. Both COA and NCOA students indicated that their food purchasing decisions would not be affected by viewing the film. Findings suggested that entertainment films may not be an effective method for changing public opinion of agriculture and food production. Transparency in agriculture through real-life and real-time activities in a documentary style may serve a greater role in improving public opinion of food and agricultural production practices and industries.Findings from this study serve as an indicator of the role entertainment films play in swaying public opinion of food and agriculture.
