Communication Professor Explores Digital Influencers’ Impact on Democracy With Emmy Award-Winning Broadcaster

 Jess Rauchberg, Ph.D., an internationally recognized expert on social media platforms, creator economies and digital cultures, discussed how the influencer industry is shaping our elections, our politics, and democracy with Steve Adubato, author, speaker and Emmy Award-winning broadcaster of PBS Think Tank.

They reflected on the popularity of social media and the influencer market today, and the significance of how that impacts on more traditional journalists and the media industry.

“It's not that people don't want to find information and they're not seeking that information out, but instead of turning to traditional sources such as news, print journalism or broadcast journalism or radio, they're now turning increasingly to social media platforms to find that information,” noted Rauchberg, assistant professor of communication technologies, Department of Communication Media and the Arts, in the College of Human Development, Culture, and Media. “So, as we saw in the 2024 election, it's not the news, but influencers who have podcasts or logs that are shaping how voters are choosing the ways they want to participate in an election. I think we're going to be seeing a lot more of that moving forward.”

The conversation gravitated to the influencer market and the phenomenon of powerful influencers — many with millions of followers — who do not present other points of view or appear to have equivalent guardrails in place as do legacy media, particularly in public broadcasting.

Rauchberg said:

Scholars of social media and journalism and media workers in traditional or legacy fields such as journalism are wrestling with that question. Podcasts hosts like Joe Rogan aren't trained as journalists. They might have a background in communications, but they're more centered on the entertainment aspect. We're seeing people are turning to influencers as sources of news, and there's now a conflation between media that's put out there for entertainment or enjoyable listening and information sharing that you might get from watching a broadcast on PBS or another network.

The interview concluded with a discussion of whether the influencer industry will continue to expand its hold on the public or whether it’s a passing phenomenon. Rauchberg referred to her current research collaboration with Cornell University’s Communication Professor Brooke Erin Duffy, Ph.D., and the possibility of now witnessing an influencer tipping point.

“For a decade, we didn't take influencers seriously, but now we are encountering the fact that they're shaping our elections; they're shaping our politics. It's no longer just about shopping or entertainment, it's about how we participate in a democracy,” Rauchberg stated, adding, “I think we need to pay more attention to influencers, and also we need to pay more attention to journalists who are actively working to provide accurate, truthful information about the implications of when we turn to influencers for not just entertainment, but also politics.”

Some of Rauchberg’s scholarship is supported by a Microsoft Research Grant. Her work highlights marginality, visibility and cultural production on social media platforms, focusing on inequalities in the influencer industry. An award-winning researcher, her writing and service has been recognized by the National Communication Association, the International Communication Association, Console-ing Passions and other leading professional organizations in communication and media studies. She is a founding member of the Content Creator Scholars Network and a global member of the TikTok Cultures Research Network. In 2023, she partnered with Microsoft Research New England to co-facilitate a workshop on generative artificial intelligence and the creator economy.  More information is available on her website.

This episode of PBS Think Tank with Steve Adubato can be viewed here. 

Categories: Arts and Culture, Nation and World