The New Symbol of Political Awareness: Social Media Catalyst

Impact of Social Media on Political Awareness

The New Symbol of Political Awareness: Social Media Catalyst

Raizza P. Corpuz

Abstract: This paper is about the new paradigm of social media in the epochal turning point in

today’s’ time and how it is connected to the development of society in political perspective. The

purpose was to examined the use of social media by Filipino especially the young generation and

how it it’s juxtaposed with the development of political awareness in terms of different facets in

our society by the impact of social media usage. The research explored the relation of social

media used as a channel or tool or medium for awareness that brought change to one perceptive

stance in the realm of verity. This research suggests that the use of social media is one facet of

developmental awareness to the new horizon of our generation and the virtual community sets

forth an action through their involvement and freedom towards speaking one’s heart and mind in

the realm of temporal now.

Keyword: Social media, political awareness

1. Introduction

The new paradigm of social media in contemporary epoch serves as new medium for

change and development. Social media as a tool to help Filipino youth today to be politically

aware, in using the modes of social media as a medium to connect to the virtual community it

serves as a new way to be totally knowledgeable to what is happening in our country. The

generation today is the generation of cyber netizens were every mode inclined to technology,

internet based is totally inclined to their existence, their everyday living surrounds with the

virtual community that helps them to be engage and learn the language of human spirit. Towards

the changing environment technology becomes the necessity of man, social networking system

becomes a need not only wants for each and every individual. Social media plays a pivotal role

in everyday lives because of the need to belong. It definitely changes the holistic array of

Raizza P. Corpuz, February 26, 2014 ©


political attention to our country. It helps Filipinos to shape their mind towards their capacity to

engage and to their own way of extending knowledgeable capacity to connect through their

emotive and cognitive means. According to Center for European studies the three social

networking sites determine the engagement and awareness of the user towards one own

individuality through the external sphere of themselves. The research conducted to enliven the

enigmatic comportment of social media towards the development of epistemic range of the

students in tertiary level on how they use social media especially Facebook, YouTube and

Twitter. The three social networking sites used based on the survey conducted out of one

hundred participants it was the top three highest marking usages for all the participants who

enjoined to answer the queries on the survey conducted.

It also varies with Facebook is the Internet’s leading online community. Most consider

Facebook as the very image of social media. The basic idea is to offer each registered user the

chance to create a user profile with pictures and to keep in touch with their so-called “friends”, or

contacts they link to on the site. Facebook wasn’t the first of its kind: similar services already

existed in the late 1990s, but the way Harvard university student Mark Zuckenberg linked a

person’s photograph and profile to others and created a way to share thoughts, pictures and links

was completely new. It was easy for users to adapt to it. Facebook was first available in February

2004 to Harvard students. Within one year, Facebook was used in almost all American schools,

and was opened for public use in 2006. Facebook came to Finland in 2007, and at the time of

writing, it has 1.5 million Finns registered as users. The worldwide fascination with Facebook is

based on the possibility it offers to be in contact with people whose e-mail addresses and phone

numbers have changed or become outdated. But an even more important feature of Facebook is

the chance to create networks: Facebook’s activity is based solely on communities. Being on

Facebook isn’t just limited to information within a group of friends. Through groups, users can

form new networks. A user’s posting, in the form of text, pictures or both, can receive feedback

from other users in the form of the ”Like” button, and the option to make their own comments.

They can also forward the posting to their own Facebook contacts using the “Share” option. One

popular feature Facebook supports is community pages for common interests. Many political

candidates create a page for themselves, and when a user clicks on the “Like” button, that user


indicates that they would like to receive updates each time the candidate adds something to

Facebook.

The Filipinos are known to be one of the highest percentage users of social media.

According to Social Baker Statistics, there are now 30 million Facebook users, 43 % of it is male

and the other 46 % are female. The Statistical range is the following:

Philippine Facebook User by Age

40% are young adults aged 18 – 24

15% are teenagers aged 13 -17

11% are more mature adults aged 35 – 44

A smaller percent of Filipino Facebook users belong to the older market:

5% are aged 45 – 54

2% are aged 55 – 64

1% are those aged 65 and above

Profiling the country’s Facebook users by gender gives us the following data:

46% are female

43% are male

Twitter is a free, Internet-based micro blogging service, on which users can send short,

140-character messages to each other. Its use is based on quick exchanges of thoughts and

information between friends, acquaintances, and all the users of the Twitter platform. Twitter

messages are most commonly called “tweets”. These tweets form a current of messages that are

followed in chronological order from a computer screen or some other screen, like that of a cell

phone. A sort of keyword called a “hash tag” can be added to tweets to connect the current

message to some other message, making it easier to follow the messages. In conversations


concerning society, Twitter can be an interesting vessel, because its messaging form is very

compact. In short messages, there is no opportunity to justify a point of view or cite sources, and

because of this, political messaging and conversation can be more heated and critical here than

on other social media platforms. Despite this, Twitter can be used for active political discussion.

Twitter can also be used to steer the user to more detailed content elsewhere, through web links

or other references. However, studies on the use of Twitter to influence voting behaviour

highlight only small groups of “super users”.

YouTube is the Internet’s leading video service. It began operating in 2005, and grew very

quickly, with 50 million visits to the site just by the end of the same year. In 2010, there were

already more than 2 billion visits to You- Tube every day. The basic idea behind YouTube is that

users upload videos to the site and at the same time, watch and comment on what they see. Based

on the number of viewers, the most popular videos on YouTube are music videos, entertainment

programmers, and news videos, but there are also some user-made videos about personal

problems that have found quite a large audience. YouTube is also an important channel for

parliamentary and regional election candidates, with a much lower cost than TV commercials.

YouTube users have so far been more inclined towards entertainment than politics, and because

of this, the most watched political content has been satirical “mash-ups”, where a video

recording is mixed with a diff rent audio recording, changing the message and meaning of the

video. Also popular are secretly-filmed slip-ups and witty remarks made by politicians. The

contents of satirical TV shows are also popular.

According to Drexler, (2003) the future of technology is in some ways easy to predict.

Computers will become faster, materials will become stronger, and medicine will cure more

diseases. It would appear that technological revolutions are among the most consequential things

that happen to humanity, perhaps exceeded in their impact only by more gradual, non‐revolutionary technological developments.

Technological change is in large part responsible for the evolution of such basic

parameters of the human condition as the size of the world population, life expectancy, education

levels, material standards of living, and the nature of work, communication, health care, war, and

the effects of human activities on the natural environment. Other aspects of society and our


individual lives are also influenced by technology in many direct and indirect ways, including

governance, entertainment, human relationships, and our views on morality, cosmology, and

human nature. One does not have to embrace any strong form of technological determinism or be

a historical materialist to acknowledge that technological capability through its complex

interactions with individuals, institutions, cultures, and the environment is a key determinant of

the ground rules within which the game of human civilization is played out at any given point in

time.

Social media are new information network and information technology using a form of

communication utilising interactive and user-produced content, and interpersonal relationships

are created and maintained. Typical social media network services could be content sharing, web

communities, and Internet forums.

Statement of the Problem

1. How would social media practice become a tool for political awareness?

2. Does the use of social media serve as a symbol to develop change in our country?

Methodology

This study followed Basic Qualitative Research in revealing the experiences of social media

user in the realm of its role. This approach allows us to probe further into the contextual area of

social media usage as a tool for the development of political awareness in our country. Basic

Qualitative research distinct from the different study such as Narrative, Phenomenology,

Grounded Theory, Case Study and Ethnography (Creswell, 2007). Basic Qualitative research

involves an interpretative, naturalistic approach to the world (Cresswel, 2007). The main

rationale of Basic Qualitative Research is to understand how people make sense of their lives and

experiences (Merriam, 2009, p.23). I used this approach because I want to understand the

relational aspect of social media to the virtual community as the extension of the societal and

communal awareness. I choose a basic qualitative study because the topic needs to be explored.

'By this, I mean that theories need to be developed and it is because there is a need to present a

detailed view of the topic. A basic qualitative research involved an order to study persons in their


ordinary setting. This involves going out to the situation or field of study, gaining access, and

gathering material. If participants are removed from their setting, it leads to contrived findings

that are out of context (Creswell, 1997). This approach allows not to a mere objective definition

of what the social media as its ordinary context but how the relational array of the technological

revolution becomes a medium for change and development. In particular I followed the Generic

Approach in doing Qualitative Research because I wanted to understand the use of social media

in determining different ways of its use to the individual especially the user of Facebook,

YouTube and Twitter. The one hundred participants in this study selected based on convenience,

the tertiary level both male and female of LPU Cavite.

I collected the data through the basic ways of the generic techniques of qualitative

comportment, through interviews, observations, and document analysis researcher can collect

data (Merriam 2009). I prepared a data through a depth interview guide, which allowed each

participant to narrate and share their experiences. I also conducted in depth scrutiny in

documentation through reflective analysis. The technique that I manage to engage is to determine

first what is the most used social media most often use and in accordance to the interview the

utmost number of usage is through Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. I engaged myself in

interpreting each answer of the participants in this study and identified the recurring patterns or

ideas that have in the same thought and characterized it in one qualitative data. Merriam (1999)

characterises qualitative research as understanding the meaning people have constructed in

which the researcher is the primary instrument for data collection and analysis. It usually

involves fieldwork as primarily employing an inductive research strategy focussing on process,

meaning and understanding resulting in a richly descriptive product.

Related Literature

Social Media, Social Network and Communication

This review highlights a fundamental paradigm that is related to social media and the new

paradigm shift of its usage in achieving the goal. The best way to define social media is to break

it down. Media is an instrument on communication, like a newspaper or a radio, so social media

would be a social instrument of communication. We use theory to provide general principles for

explaining the data (Miller, 1986). Theories also suggest directions for research because of the


questions they raise. These theories are symbolic interaction, social exchange theory, gender

theory and family systems theory. Symbolic Interaction is a theory that looks at how people

interact. Communication is the key factors in these interactions. We communicate with each

other with more than words. We communicate through symbols. Symbols include not only words

but also intonations, gestures, movements and so on. When we interact with people, we do more

than simply react to them. We interpret or define their actions. Social Media is not about

different websites, but people, (Holloman 2012). With all the talk you hear about the Facebook,

Twitter YouTube, LinkedIn, Google and other social places online, it wouldn’t be too much of a

surprise to think that social media is all about Facebook, Twitter and the like.

Social Media is not about the tools and the channels- the software or the technology.

It’s all about what people do with the technology (Holloman 2012, p. 4). Social media is a

collective term that describes the means of communicating and engaging with people. It’s

something many people see as evolutionary, if not revolutionary, in helping people connect with

each other in ways that are genuine, authentic and natural. Social media means change in the

way everyone understands how organization works. It often means change in the ways people

relate to and connect with others, inside and outside the organizations. Despite the volume of

research, the debate about media effects -- whether it can be shown empirically that the specific

mass media messages, typically those transmitted by television, have specific, often detrimental

effects, on the audiences who are exposed to them -- remains unresolv mnbed. This is partly

because the debate is more about the epistemological limitations of social science research than it

is about the media in particular, and partly because the debate is motivated more by a public and

governmental agenda of education, censorship and regulation (Rowland, 1983) than by an

academic agenda concerning media theory (Roberts & Bachen, 1981)

The New Community

According to Waters, (2010) these web-based networking services are re-defining

“community” and what it means to be a part of one, because they can encompass a much broader

range of relationships that just your immediate family, friends, and co-workers. They allow you

to add old classmates, distant relatives, and los-lost is compadres to your current circle of

friends. People who haven’t seen each other in decades are re-connecting today on social


networks. And they’re not restricted by geography, so friends and family strewn across time

zones can interact as though they live on the same block. Although most members tend to use

their networks to enhance existing associations, this is a place where new social connections,

both personal and professional, are made. Like any community, social networks post codes of

conduct that include basic courtesies we would extend to each other in any civilized social

environment

Staying Connected to Family and Friends

One reason people are flocking to social networks is that their busy schedule lives far-

flung families have made it difficult, if not impossible; to stay meaningfully connected with all

the people they love. It’s a modern combination of too few hours and too many miles that has put

a historic strain on our family ties. Social networks create an online space for nurturing those

connections. Access to the web isn’t yet universal, but just about anyone can find a terminal with

a browser and an internet connection, so a social network makes sense as a family touchstone

(Waters 2010).

Socializing and Facebook (www.facebook.com)

People use social networks to socialize. It’s easy to forget that social networks, at their

core, are about people hanging out with each other. Facebook was founded in 2006; this is the

largest social networking in the world today with more nearly 500 million members (Waters

2010).

Facebook was founded in February 2004 in Harvard University and only acting as the

University OSN site before opened the site to general public in 2006 (Urista, Dong, & Day,

2009). Facebook functions by allowing users to select one or more ―networks‖ to which they

will belong, such as a specific high school or university, a geographical area or city, or a

company. Facebook can also serve as a source of leisure due to the availability of games and

applications (Kolek & Saunders, 2008). There are a number of ways for users to communicate

with one another on Facebook. Users can send private messages to other individuals. This

capability is similar to emailing (Pempek, Yermolayeva & Calvert, 2009). Messages may also

only be sent to one recipient at a time (Golder, Wilkinson, Huberman, 2007). Face book’s ember


also can make use of the Wall function. A Wall is a space on the profile, somewhat like a notice

board or a public forum where users can post short messages or add photographs, music or video

clips to share information (Ross et al., 2009; West, Lewis, & Currie, 2009). Facebook users can

comment on their friends ‘messages, photographs and videos. Instant messaging is a text-based

communication tool that allows dyadic synchronous interaction between two individuals,

although there some systems that support multiparty chat (Nardi, Whittaker, & Bradner, 2000).

The Emerging Role of Social Media in Political and Regime Change by Rita Safranek

Lyotard's account, the computer age has transformed knowledge into information, that is,

coded messages within a system of transmission and communication. The transitions of different

new inventions are challenge to humanities but on how it is use that is the contribution to society.

Social media is typically defined as web-based tools that enable users to easily share

information, collaborate, and communicate with one another, Patti Shank (2008). In

contemporary epoch it is then playing a pivotal role, it is part of the day today existence. Living

in a virtual community in today`s time is inevitable, the fast changing development in the realm

of our society is part of changes. It is changes that succumb to both ideal and real way of

demonstrating the antinomy of living towards the demand of the contemporary challenges.

Social media networks have created a phenomenon on the internet that has gained

popularity over the last decade. People use social media sites such as Facebook, Twitter, and

MySpace to create and sustain relationships with others (Boyd & Ellison, 2007).

Based on the article provided it is definitely a demonstration of what is the role of social

media, what is the positive implications and negative result that it divulge. In how Safranek

explicate this is through the different contemporary happenings around the globe specifically to

Middle East, North Africa and Asia. It is very clear that the writer gave exemplification to the

emerging role of social media both as a tool and as social justification of change in the societal

notion. The social media and regime of change is his focal stance that substantively explicate the

different events occurred and the connection of social media to each. The vital facet of social

media in the diverse events holds the scrutiny on the article.


Safranek focused on three social media tools such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.

The article elaborated the role of the internet to the social happenings. Then she believes that

Part of the attraction of these “big three” social media services and independent blogging is that

the average person, with little or no advanced computer skills, can have good success using

them; content can be created and accessed with as little as a Smartphone; and it can be easily

intertwined. Links to videos posted on YouTube can be embedded in blogs, Facebook, and

Twitter. A Twitter post can appear on a Facebook page. In other words, large numbers of people

can be easily and inexpensively contacted via a variety of services. "Social media also lowers

traditional socio-economic barriers to commanding the spotlight. You don’t have to “be

somebody” to “be somebody” on social media".

Text messaging, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and the Internet have given rise to a

reservoir of political energy that posits a new relationship between the new media technologies,

politics, and public life” (Giroux). These digital technologies influence the formation and

activities of civil society groups: mobs, movements, and civil society organizations. While mass

popular protests are by no means a new phenomenon, digital tools are facilitating their formation

(Etling et al 38).

I will scrutinize and explicate it through dividing posits the writer demonstrated. There is

political unrest and Social Media, the Philippines in 2001, the impeachment trial of former

President Joseph Estrada, activists, with the help of forwarded text messages, were able to

organize a protest at a major crossroads in Manila. Over the next few days, over a million people

arrived. “The public’s ability to coordinate such a massive and rapid response – close to seven

million text messages were sent that week – so alarmed the country’s legislators that they re-

versed course and allowed the evidence to be presented. ... The event marked the first time that

social media had helped force out a national leader” (Shirkey). On January 20, 2011, Estrada re-

signed. Moldova in 2009, Activists used Facebook, Live Journal (an electronic diary ser-

vice/social network), and Twitter to organize protests and bring attention to the political unrest

in the former Soviet republic. Word had been spreading rapidly via Twitter and other online

networking services. Although the protestors failed to prompt a change of leadership or a new


election, they got the world to focus on a small, remote country, and digital activism became

recognized as a source of political power (Amin).

There are different events that the writer explicated about the role of social media and the

regime of change around the globe that mirrors how social media plays as a medium to set

forward one’s aim and aspiration of change. But it simply denotes that its effectiveness depends

on how people inside the state use social media as a means rather than an end to its goal and

purpose. There are some negative array that social media implies based on the article, the two

arguments about the idea that social media will make a difference in national politics. The firs

this threat the tool are themselves ineffective and the second is that they produce as much harm

to democratization as good because repressive governments are becoming better at using these

tools in suppress dissent. Facebook and Twitter have their place in social change, but real

revolutions take place in the street. Social media always comes with a catch: It is designed to do

the very thing that isn’t particularly helpful in high-risk situation.

According to Castells in his conceptualization that the new political movement is

applicable to Arab countries where religions and ethnic divides previously prevented networking

because many of the Arab countries banned the creation of political parties and limited to the

right to associate or create civil rights groups. This meant that there was a little space where

religious, ethnic and cultural groups could meet and interact. But social media has helped such

groups discover one another and break the psychological barrier of fear between them.

New media can have an impact firstly to transform individuals and give them new

competencies that empower politics. Secondly the way that the new media draws external

attention from citizens and governments outside the country or region to the place that is

experiencing protest or conflict.

Thus, the important role of emerging social media to promote change and political regime

constitutes an antinomy that can serve as a means towards achieving its end to demonstrate

development in the government.

There are three uses of social media in accordance to this article.


1. Efficient and cheap way to give information

2. Conveys to members the highly motivating realizations that they have big numbers

3. Efficient way to transfer skills and information.

Some people’s everyday experience is that technology changes too fast from their

comfort (Green, 2010). The technology that fast moving and fast changing the same as time with

its infinite value, reminding us that each and every new invention is neither good nor bad on how

we view and look at it towards its need. Everything guide to social media is innovative book in

terms of how the author Waters explicate his ideals on how social media works, its usage and

influence to the users. It can help the reader to enliven the many quandaries towards the new

media in our tempo spatial world. There are different approach and exemplification the author

elaborated.

The New Community

According to Waters, (2010) these web-based networking services are re-defining

“community” and what it means to be a part of one, because they can encompass a much broader

range of relationships that just your immediate family, friends, and co-workers. They allow you

to add old classmates, distant relatives, and los-lost is compadres to your current circle of

friends. People who haven’t seen each other in decades are re-connecting today on social

networks. And they’re not restricted by geography, so friends and family strewn across time

zones can interact as though they live on the same block. Although most members tend to use

their networks to enhance existing associations, this is a place where new social connections,

both personal and professional, are made. Like any community, social networks post codes of

conduct that include basic courtesies we would extend to each other in any civilized social

environment.

What is a Virtual World?

A virtual world is a three-dimensional computer environment designed to stimulate the

fundamental aspects of the real world, to mimic real life. There’s an up and a down in a virtual

world, a forward and a backward, a sky above and a land below. It’s true that a visitor to a virtual


world might be able to fly around in that sky, but it’s still a sky ruled by sky physics. Visitors

(the flightless ones) must open doors, navigate stairs, and look both ways before crossing the

street. Virtual worlds can be elaborately realized environments, with detailed towns and cities,

roads and rivers, shops and theatres.

Virtual worlds fit under the social media umbrella because of the critical role social

networking plays in many if these environments, but also because the users of these computer-

generated environments create a lot of content in the form of educational displays, user-planned

tours, in world games, and blogs, not to mention clothing, tools and amenities for other users

(Waters 2010, p 189-190).

Social Media Marketing Explodes

Facebook has nearly 500 million members and twitter has moved beyond its 10 billion

tweets. Even though much of the worst hype around social media marketing is already

dwindling, the audiences made available for marketing campaigns by social networks and other

social media services will just keep getting better.

Social media is transforming the way companies communicate with their customers, and

that’s nor a fad, but a trend. The big social networking players are sorting out the market. Niche

players are emerging. Users have already seen the nascent rules of social media marketing

surfacing and establishing guideposts.

Social Networking Becomes a Business Tool

Chatter is an example of something called an “internal social media platform”, which

allows companies to take advantage of the collaboration potential of a social network.

Companies like Jive, blueKiwi, Remindo, and even Microsoft’s SharePoint support these kinds

of services. NASA has one called “Spacebook”. And others are beginning to appear.

Mobility and New Devices

Social Media are going to be appearing on a growing number of mobile devices. There

are already numerous iPhone, Blackberry, and Android social media apps.


Mobile phones have become the new computing platform, and for some social media,

such as location sharing, they’re essential. For microblogs, such as Twitter, Tumblr, and Jaiku,

mobile devices are almost preferred platform. Facebook has reported that 25 percent of its users,

or about 100 million people, access the social network primarily through mobile devices.

Sonia Livingstone’s theory on the New Media supports the study in determining the

power of social media in relationship, in communication, in the individuality of a person and in

the society. Sonia Livingstone (2003), studies on children’s relationship to new media

environment. It is significant to find out that social media is a tool in establishing social

awareness to the community in today’s epoch.

According to Waters (2010), there are top ten things everyone should know about social

media and one of these is that social media and social networks are not synonymous terms.

Social media is the umbrella term for a range of online content that includes blogs, wikis, photo

sharing services, bookmarking sites, and social networks, such as Facebook and MySpace. Social

media is at the intersection of communities and tools. It gives people the ability to connect with

each other across the planet, free from the tyranny of geography. It lets people communicate via

the written and spoken word, but also gives them the opportunities to go beyond that with that.

Social media is giving every human being in modern society the tools to communicate and form

communities in ways never seen before (Waters, 2010).

Social media means an umbrella term for all user generated content. It includes blogs,

wikis, social networks, location sharing, social bookmarking, social news, photo and video

sharing, and virtual worlds. Social network- a web based service through which people interact

socially, creating a kind of online community. E.g. face book and MySpace. It is an umbrella

term for all user content generated by users of those applications, and the services that make both

accessible to just about anyone with a web browser. These include social networking, (Facebook,

MySpace, LinkedIn), wikis (WebPages for collaboration), blogs (personal online diaries), video

and photo-sharing, (YouTube, flickr, web shots) social bookmarking (delicious, dig), online

reviews (yelp, opinions), and virtual worlds (second life, world of war craft) Waters, (2010).


Social media fulfils different communication needs for different users. Interactions via

the computer facilitate communication by allowing users to keep in touch with family and

friends in a convenient way, to learn about social events, and to find out about activities of other

users. The gratification received from this social information helped users feel that they were a

part of a peer network of knowing what was going on about events and activities (Quan-Haase,

2010).

Social Media, Social Network and Communication

This review highlights a fundamental paradigm that is related to social media and

extending networks. The best way to define social media is to break it down. Media is an

instrument on communication, like a newspaper or a radio, so social media would be a social

instrument of communication. We use theory to provide general principles for explaining the

data (Miller, 1986). Theories also suggest directions for research because of the questions they

raise. These theories are symbolic interaction, social exchange theory, gender theory and family

systems theory. Symbolic Interaction is a theory that looks at how people interact.

Communication is the key factors in these interactions. We communicate with each other with

more than words. We communicate through symbols. Symbols include not only words but also

intonations, gestures, movements and so on. When we interact with people, we do more than

simply react to them. We interpret or define their actions.

Social Media is not about different websites, but people, (Holloman 2012). With all the

talk you hear about the Facebook, Twitter YouTube, LinkedIn, Google and other social places

online, it wouldn’t be too much of a surprise to think that social media is all about Facebook,

Twitter and the like.

Social Media is not about the tools and the channels- the software or the technology.

It’s all about what people do with the technology (Holloman 2012, p. 4). Social media is a

collective term that describes the means of communicating and engaging with people. It’s

something many people see as evolutionary, if not revolutionary, in helping people connect with

each other in ways that are genuine, authentic and natural.


Social media means change in the way everyone understands how organization works.

It often means change in the ways people relate to and connect with others, inside and outside the

organizations. Despite the volume of research, the debate about media effects whether it can be

shown empirically that the specific mass media messages, typically those transmitted by

television, have specific, often detrimental effects, on the audiences who are exposed to them --

remains unresolved. This is partly because the debate is more about the epistemological

limitations of social science research than it is about the media in particular, and partly because

the debate is motivated more by a public and governmental agenda of education, censorship and

regulation (Rowland, 1983) than by an academic agenda concerning media theory (Roberts &

Bachen, 1981)

Augmented Reality is real technology that superimposes computer images and some

audio over the real world in real time.

Thus, Social Media today plays a vital role in a community where we are all form part of,

as a country possessing liberty we are capable of leading ourselves to change, innovate and

invent a new paradigm of development in societal facet. The ability to interact with the symbols

of technology reminds us that the genuine potentiality of man involves innovation towards the

changing time in contemporary world.

Development in a country the same as ours reminded us that we should be in lieu with the

demands of generation, allowing us to be part of social change, letting ourselves to be inside the

progressive array and succumbing the grace of life in the realm of the world that technology is

for people to use in upgrading the way of life. We should remove doubts in trusting what the

world can offer to us better realize its use and make it as a tool for the social change in our

country especially the influence of social media to our daily lives. In this medium whether it is a

technology that elevate innocence and ignorance but if we will scrutinize its use, it can help us to

establish the sociological, economical, political and cultural aspect of how Filipinos use social

media to promote change in status quo.

Results and Discussion

1. How would social media use turn out to be a tool for political awareness?


Political awareness is the political participation towards political engagement in the

perceptive analysis of this study. According to Himelboim, (2012) interpersonal informational

trust and openness are used to predict three aspects of use of the Internet for political

communication purposes perceptions of online activities as a valid form of political participation,

media use for purposes of political information, and interest in behaviours related to political

discourse. Social media platforms, however, next to serving entertainment and social

surveillance needs (boyd & Ellison, 2007; Lampe, Ellison & Steinfield, 2006), provide spaces

where individuals share political opinions and information (Pew, 2009a, 2011). Social media

spaces include SNS, discussion forums and blogs, where individuals meet, share, and discuss a

wide range of issues (Kapla & Haenlein, 2010). Whereas social media spaces can be exclusively

used for unidirectional information flow, studies show they also serve social interaction needs,

which require some level of information or opinion interaction (Papacharissi & Mendelson,

2008; Sweetser & Weaver Lariscy, 2007).

Advances in information technology (IT) are bringing about changes in contemporary society

that pose new situations requiring interconnectivity (Roy, Samovar, Porter and Daniel, 2013). It

is a way to demarcate the realm of reality but the fruitful equilibrium of both ideal and real

stance in the field of information especially towards a new adaptive measure of being aware. The

verity of internet lies within the changing environment. It is not only the medium used to develop

the different perspective on the use of social media helps the study to substantiate the claim the

social media has an impact to political awareness of the young generation in this moment in

time. The tertiary level students in Lyceum of the Philippine University-Cavite firmly affirm that

it has an impact on their political awareness that is happening to our country. Based on the

surveys and interviews conducted Political awareness tackles a variation of perspectives, there

are distinct point of view on how they understand politics and awareness. There are (100) one

hundred participants engaged in the study all are tertiary level students from first year to fourth

year in LPU-C, there are fifty males ( 50 ) and fifty (50) females who answered the survey.

Both male and female believes that among the choices of social networking sites Facebook is

the leading social media sites that has the highest number of users with seventy eight (78)

participants followed by YouTube with fifty one (51) students used and lastly Twitter with (43)

forty-three users. All of them replied that they used social media as a means to communicate and


to be aware to what is happening in our country, it serves as the most convenient way to acquire

data’s because it is easier to use because of their mobile phone they can easily access to

Facebook that posted news and current events that is happening to our country. Almost seventy

percent (70 %) accept as true that social media helps them to be aware on what is happening to

our country, sixty percent (60%) affirmed that social media serves a as a tool for change in our

present government. Among one hundred participants (100) there are fifty-eight answered Yes

that social media is a tool to change the status quo on our government and twenty participants

(20) doesn’t believe in such. Seventy percent (70%) based on the tabulated answer firmly

affirmed that they accept social media as a means towards political awareness while 30% doesn’t

agree on such. Sixty eight (68) participants also agreed that social media especially Facebook is a

tool for dissemination of information to demonstrate assembly and gatherings in the street the

same as what happened on One million march in Luneta. Lastly, they agree that social media can

help to improve our country societal condition especially in political array because of political

awareness the number of participants agreed upon are (70%) percent while the (30%) percent

still believes in the traditional activism of rally rather than silent activism on the social media.

According to the survey and interview conducted the virtual community serves as a tool

for political awareness among the youth today. Their generation serves as netizens who is not

passive anymore to what is happening around us especially to the political aspect that is visibly

demandable to be aware and part of because it can afflict all communal facets of one nation.

Virtual Community is a new developmental community that extends social activism in a silent

mode, the communal array that is a bridge to exercising both freedom and acquisition of change.

The very essential facet of social media is how it used by many Filipinos to seek truth and

justice, to promote assemblies that can enliven the shield of oneness towards changing the status

quo. It is a tool that empowers the individual people to deliver the different sides of the story. It

is a tool that symbolizes the avant garde of sign in the realm of true Filipino identity.

There are different assortments that social media can offer to the user, and one of the

benefits that social media can offer to humanity is the power to influence and to reinvent the

momentarily setting. According to Hjorth 2011,

Personal political identities are constructed through political action and the appropriation of political symbols on SNS. However, positive


though these developments may be in Bennett’s terms, the mixing of SNS, politics, and identity construction is unproblematic. Many respondents in the focus groups remain sceptical about how much impact this solidarity and online political discourse can have in the offline world.

In the Second People Power Revolution, which led to the ouster of

President Joseph Estrada, mobile phones became both a symbol and a

tool of democracy, and texting was prominent in the political

application of communications networks (Pertierra et al. 2002;

Rheingold 2002; Rafael 2003; Pertierra 2006).

There are different political events that shaped the mind of the Filipinos towards the

implication of social media to develop change in the status quo. The text brigades using the new

media through texting they also use internet messaging that demonstrate d the Edsa revolt during

the historical change in polity that regime. The facets sought to explicate the different scenario in

the Philippine politics and it was then supported by different scholars in Political awareness and

political development in societal and communal array.

According to Toivo, (N.D) Social media and societal communication have eight central

changes. Social media has changed the way people communicate. This section deals with eight

key changes it has produced. Engaging with social media is a communal activity, so it’s

important to understand that influencing social media is a much more diverse and difficult task

than working with traditional media. These eight central stages supported the different

perspective of the participants that I interviewed and the stances that resulted to almost in

compatibility of the study conducted by Toivo, social media new power of political influence.

The first change specific to social media is the (1) anonymity of its agents, which means

that those who write and comment often use nicknames or aliases. Even though anonymity

provides an opportunity to comment on delicate issues, it can also sometimes lead to “flame

wars” and avoiding responsibility. Use of the writer’s real name makes the message stand out

(for example, in the “Letters to the Editor” in newspapers), since the author wants to be

identified as owning that comment. Those who communicate need to be able to appear with their

own names.


The secrecy can be inclined to the way Filipino wants to expose the Political anomalies

that is happening to our country especially what happened in the recent case of Napoles it was

first posted on the Social Media. During the hottest issue that bomb the whole nation about the

PDAF Scandal of our government there are many personas that used aliases, symbols and

unknown just to protect them and just to flaunt and share what they know on the net by helping

the investigation but also protecting themselves. The caption that posted on the net last 2013 was

entitled “An open letter to Janet Napoles that was the beginning of the hot topics about the

picture posted with the two senators Bong Revilla and Jinggoy Estrada. As rappler, one of the

social media site online news added a caption on the picture Janet Napoles rubbing elbows with

local politicians implicated in Pork Barrel Scam. Taken from (http://www.rappler.com) this was

through Face book that the news, abruptly spread towards the online community.

The second change is the (2) richness and diversity of information social media provide.

Users are no longer dependent on a single source for their news and other data any more, but can

flue several different media side by side. The modus operandi can be thought of as remediation,

where media use, modify and reorganise contents gathered from other media. Also connected to

this changed information environment is the fact that it is not possible to participate in every

conversation.

In just one click on the net and simply browsing the Face book every single happening

around the globe can easily be captured. The very convenient and easiest way to know is through

the help of social media and as I conducted the interview many believes that the very source of

new information is not anymore the old media which is the television but the internet especially

Face book, out of (100) one hundred participants 85 of them accept as true that Face book,

YouTube and Twitter help them to outsource the richness of the information the new media

community offers.

The third change is (3) omnipresence – there are no longer any isolated places or hiding holes.

The private and public lives of society’s most influential figures have merged and become public

space. Many politicians has had to face the fact that a phrase taken out of context or a joke they

told during a private conversation has been recorded by outsiders and quickly made public on the

Internet.


There are different ways, modes and methods to engage and use the new media. In both

negative and positive posits many politicians are using the internet and social media to connect

with the people.

The fourth change is (4) speed. News and information are spread more quickly than ever before,

and the demand for speed can also lead to reports without any confirmation. William Davidow,

an engineer and technology investor, describes the current era using the term “over connected”:

we are too oft en and too quickly in contact and can’t process new information adequately due to

haste. He cites the example of the modern stock exchange that has become a particularly fickle

monster due to computerisation and automation.

There are different ways that social media used to a fast changing developmental process

in the users life and one of those facets include the speed of information. Through the use of

social media the information set forth the world can easily be transferred through the users. In

just a click away those who was interviewed believes that fast changing effect delivers the users

to know more what is happening around the globe especially in our country and most especially

the political happenings as given exemplification was the One Million March and silent activism

regarding PDAF issues.

The fifth change is the (5) multitude of roles that users assume, and their relationships to

each other. The lack of a clear hierarchy is characteristic of social media. A good example is the

online encyclopaedia, Wikipedia, which doesn’t really have a main editor, but an army of tens of

thousands of writers, inspectors, and editors. So, if inaccuracies are found, to whom at Wikipedia

should complaints be directed? The e answer to this: don’t complain! Instead, supplement the

article in question and correct perceived mistakes alone.

There are different advertisements sought to extend how Internet world can change the

way people live, “Google anak google” one line that pertains to how fast we can seek and

retrieved information through the use of Wikipedia, Google and some search engine by simpky

typing the words or lines and can easily grasp what they want to know especially the historical

background, the theories or even in just a simple meaning of the word.


The sixth change is the move from (6) objectivity to subjectivity. For example, in the United

States, some of the so called traditional mainstream media have abandoned the promotion of

equality and pluralism. One case observed across different social media platforms has been the

rumour that the current president of the United States, Barack Obama, is a Muslim. Over 20% of

Americans still believe that Obama is a Muslim, even though this false information has been

repeatedly refuted.

The object in itself is the Computer or the new media used of social media through

internet connections but still the perceptive analysis of human being is still the important facet of

the developing realm of its usage. How the users perceive and accept the usage of social media

helps them to be subjective on how one can understand the reasons and essence of it especially

the social preference of political awareness. On the basis sought to define and describe the used

of social media especially the three chosen social media, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube it

simply denotes that it helps the user to be informative and aware on the things that happens

around.

The seventh change is the new (7) ability to combine different kinds of recorded information

in very flexible ways.

Social media isn’t just text, pictures, audio, video, and animation, but all of these

combined. With today’s compact cameras, sound recorders, laptop computers and other mobile

devices, combined with affordable soft ware, one can easily create and edit impressive

presentations.

The eighth change is the (8) near absence of traditional methods of regulation. A government

can attempt to restrict the content of social media, but traditional censorship cannot keep up with

ever-changing web pages. China and Saudi Arabia, for example, tightly control their citizens’

use of the Internet and social media. On the other hand, it is technically difficult to interfere in

even in the most radical web-distributed propaganda.

In our country the very controversial Cyber Crime law was then decided to be constitutional

and towards the accepted phenomena of internet used our government is doing their principal


role to eliminate the unethical usage of it and develop laws that can promote the principle

foundation of change through technological revolution without harm.

There are three major factors for the use of social media that play a pivotal role for Filipino

user especially for tertiary level student of LPU-Cavite.

1. information sharing (receiving/providing information and generating ideas)

2. sharing for educational purposes (for learning, problem solving and sharing school work)

3. social purposes (retrieving personal information about others or themselves, chatting,

making appointments and generally keeping in touch)

That is the result of ideology and hegemony that creatively indulge with the virtual

community on the cyber space and extending the social awareness towards exchanging

information, sharing and being part of disseminating the different topics especially what is

happening to our society. It doesn’t necessarily for leisure purpose only but engaging through

time using the internet makes them aware and opens their mind to reality locally and

internationally. The space which travels us into the past, we can journey to other countries with

just one click; we can reinvent the societal facet that needs to develop through our submission in

the virtual community.

Based on the research conducted the different answers varies on how each participants view

the use of Social Media, how it helps them to engage and interconnect with the people around the

globe. The internet serves as an extension of their everyday living, the internet helps them to be

aware and realize their being towards the world and towards their community. It help them to be

involved at the same time it develops their sense of response to the evolving community of

change. The virtual community helps them realize the essentiality of their capacity to be engaged

and to be part of the political arena. The participants explicated that nowadays it is already a sin

not to know and not to be aware to what is happening to our country especially through the help

of social media, that in just one click everything is possible to see and read, to know how the

social, political and economic community changes does. Towards the rapid news interplays with

different social networking sites especially the role of Facebook to the young generation


substantiate my claim that truly social media helps to demonstrate change in their political

mindfulness, their being conscious helps them to be involved and engage in their simplest ways

possible. The simple comments, shares and likes help them to be heard, it is not simply an echo

that needs to be heard but truly the voice of one towards the total responsive ideologies. In a

reflective analysis of the interview conducted and through surveys the participants completed

their qualitative remarks on how social media helps them to be aware in the political aspect in

virtual community.

2. Does the use of social media serve as a symbol to develop change in our country?

McLuhan, (1999) tells us that a “message” is, “the change of scale or pace or pattern”

that a new invention or innovation “introduces into human affairs.” Note that it is not the content

or use of the innovation, but the change in inter-personal dynamics that the innovation brings

with it. Thus, the message of theatrical production is not the musical or the play being produced,

but perhaps the change in tourism that the production may encourage.

As McLuhan sees it-in the simplest terms, here is his theory step by step: People adapt to their

environment, whatever it is, with a certain balance of the five senses: sight, hearing, touch, smell,

and taste. If something steps up the intensity of one sense, hearing for example, the other senses

will change intensity too, to try to regain a balance. The same as the symbol used through the

social media as a means to enliven the ideology of the user it demonstrated that towards the

usage of it. The same as the use of the new media it explicated that it becomes a symbol that

people use to the transfer of political enlightenment. According to one of the most influential

theories of political representation, the Responsible Party Model, citizens are only effectively

represented in parliament and government if they are able to (1) articulate their policy

preferences; (2) discriminate between political parties and their programmes, and (3) select the

party most likely to implement their desired preferences. Empirical research from the 1950s

demonstrated that citizens are often uninformed about politics and party programmes and do not

have an opinion of their own on important issues. This suggests that political representation is

likely to be biased in favour of citizens with higher education and incomes.

Whether this is indeed the case critically depends on being able to determine, in a valid

and reliable manner, how much citizens know about politics and to evaluate the consequences of


low levels of political knowledge for democratic regimes. The impact of the channel of

communication is a symbol for developmental awareness of one individual netizens towards the

new paradigm of technological revolution in this contemporary epoch. Political participation

towards political engagement is a political awareness in the perceptive analysis of this study.

1. Knowledge and understanding about becoming informed citizens2. Developing their modes of empirical knowledge3. Developing the political knowledge and political behaviours in using social media

Facebook

YouTube SOCIAL MEDIA

Twitter

In the use of social media as a tool for engagement in developing the impact of its use

social media became a common interest in the metaphor of its symbolism. The idea of the self

towards the other that it is more centripetal, cyclical pattern as a medium and informative ways

to deliver change the political awareness, engagement, and participation from the ideal facet

towards reality, social media is a tool towards its user from the transfer of thoughts there is a

change in perspective and there is an action and awareness.

Perception

Political Participation

Political Information

Political Discourse


Through perceptive use of social media the user becomes aware through the occurrence

of events around the virtual community, the political participation sought through sharing,

commentaries, likes and even dislikes of the posts from the three major social media in

Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. The political information helps to deliver a political discourse

that result to political dimensional catalyst that symbolizes change in the objectifying role of

social media through its subjective range use by the netizens.

Conclusion

The idea of individualism from communalism is the ideology set forth in explaining how

social media becomes an essential piece of study in contemporary time. The right to belong

SOCIAL MEDIA

FACEBOOK YOUTUBETWITTER

MEDIUM/ TOOL

SOCIAL AWARENESS

POLITICAL AWARENESS


within the community of technological revolution were internet is not only a wants but a need,

the wisdom to belong towards the virtual community until the verity of realistic mode.

At least five major features are easy to identify:

1. Social networking and social interaction

2. Participation

3. The use of different providers (e.g. search engines, blog spaces, etc.)

4. Openness

5. Collaboration (between both users and user groups)

In contemporary Philippine development the use of social media in contemporary issue

plays pivotal remarks because technology used by Filipinos and it serves as a medium and tool

for developing one’s awareness to the objectifying principle of reality. Social media and online

political communication is an interpersonal awareness. This study suggests how Filipino

especially the young generation netizens uses social media in political participation, from

traditional to contemporary way of thinking political interest. Awareness engagement

development of one’s thinking towards the evolving change to societal-political perspective.

According to Sharma 2012, Political Awareness maybe defined as the extent to which the

public is aware of the politics prevalent in the society. Politically aware society possesses the

following characteristics, “foundation and contemporary knowledge of politics, access to elite

opinion, forum to discuss individual opinion”

Public integrity maybe defined as the extent to which the public is able to look at the long

term and societal implications of a political action thereby ignoring the short term personal gains.

Public attitude determines the extent of integrity with which public is able to evaluate and take

actions having a political aim. I differentiate between public attitude as either “good” or “bad”.


Professor Simon Baddeley, 2012 adds the perspective of how social media and public

attitude affect the movement of the public from one quadrant to another. By acting as source of

sharing and discussing information social media essentially increases the political awareness of

the public thereby moving the public towards the quadrants lying in the high political awareness

half.

According to Emad, N.D there is four dimensions of political awareness have been

recognized: foundational knowledge of politics, factual contemporary knowledge, historical fact

knowledge, and access to the elite opinion. This was then clearly shown to the study provided

that social media serves as medium or a tool for a catalyst way that extended to each individual

netizens especially for the tertiary students who was then interviewed. It is very clear that

through internet usage it is a helpful way to be politically aware especially in contemporary

epoch.

References:

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Journals:

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Journal of Computer Mediated Communication, Ellison Michigan State University

What is Social Media (Social-Media-for-Informal Learning) N. D

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http://www.utwente.nl/gw/vandijk/research/network_society/network_society_plaatje/d_castells_review_castells_net.pdf

The New Symbol of Political Awareness: Social Media Catalyst

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