Social Media’s Effects on the Citizens during the Covid Lockdown in Shanghai

DOI

10.2991/978-2-494069-89-3_74How to use a DOI?

Keywords

Social Media; Covid-19; The Lockdown of Shanghai

Abstract

This research paper examines how the use of content platforms such as social media, influenced citizens during the lockdown in Shanghai. Since social media were the channels that could connect people who were unable to go out, studying the properties and default settings of social media in this particular situation is useful to better understand the roles social media play in society. To elaborately illustrate the influence of social media on the residents of Shanghai, this research paper utilizes several theories, including the Uses and Gratifications Research, Social Network Theory, The Strength of Weak Ties, Bi-polar Communication Theory, and the conception of media literacy, organic solidarity, and digital inequality to support the claim of this research paper. Meanwhile, in order to better support the main argument, this research paper also utilizes interviews and related data. This paper indicates that during the lockdown of Shanghai, social media provided a platform that could fulfill residents’ needs for safety and social interaction, and due to the existence of social media platforms, citizens who live close to each other built up small communities to sustain their lives better. However, due to the difference in social media literacy among various people, the inequality gap between residents in Shanghai has enlarged to a certain degree. It is significant to analyze the power of social media since social media has become one of the most imperative tools for the development of society, especially during Covid-19.

Copyright

© 2022 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

Download article (PDF)

TY  - CONF
AU  - Zihan Yu
PY  - 2022
DA  - 2022/12/30
TI  - Social Media’s Effects on the Citizens during the Covid Lockdown in Shanghai
BT  - Proceedings of the 2022 5th International Conference on Humanities Education and Social Sciences (ICHESS 2022)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 626
EP  - 632
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-2-494069-89-3_74
DO  - 10.2991/978-2-494069-89-3_74
ID  - Yu2022
ER  -