Date

8-18-2022

Document Type

Thesis

Abstract

This study, as stated, is aimed to explore the perceptions and experiences of full-time undergraduate students of the university’s social media crisis communication. These students, the stakeholders of BSU, have followed Instagram accounts and have both accessed and been the audience of during the COVID-19 pandemic. Since the COVID-19 pandemic is a novel health crisis, the findings of this study have significance and can provide insights into effective crisis communication strategies that organizations and crisis communicators can implement in the current pandemic and future health crises. Experiences with different aspects during the pandemic such as participating in education online during the pandemic (Barzani & Jamil, 2021), as well as the emergency transition to online learning (Novikov, 2020). However, there is no literature on higher education social media as a means of stakeholder perception of an organization’s COVID-19 crisis communication efforts. This study fills this gap in the social media crisis communication literature, as the vast majority of crisis communication research is organization-centric and lacks stakeholder perspectives. This study will add to the knowledge of crisis communication by focusing on stakeholders who are directly impacted by a higher education institution’s communication. By understanding students’ perspectives, this study will provide a blueprint for strategic social media communication practices that universities and crisis communicators can employ during a health crisis.

Department

Communication Studies

Thesis Comittee

Dr. Lisa Bergson, Thesis Advisor
Dr. Thomasena Shaw, Committee Member
Dr. Yongjun Shin, Committee Member

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