<p>This thesis is a comparative content analysis of the modern-day female protagonists represented in Disney’s newest and highest grossing film series, Frozen and Frozen II. As one of the few major media companies that have captivated a global audience, Disney has supplied fantasy princess narratives for over 80 years. With the new addition of Disney+, classic and modern princess films alike are now available for instant streaming. As the sample represents the newest films in the post-transitional wave of the Disney Princess line, this study aims to reveal what messages are being projected to young, impressionable audiences around the world. Between the third wave of feminism and rising conversations of gender roles and communication, Disney Princess films in particular have been the subject of many conversations and criticisms. Using content analysis methodology with each film, the data identifies gender roles, conflict resolution, and common themes between the six main characters: Elsa, Anna, Kristoff, Olaf, the King, and the Queen.</p>

This study examines the depth of audience engagement with six dimensions of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) via the Instagram platforms of pharmaceutical companies. Recent research on the relationship between CSR and health communication has established a robust link between both variables but created a gap on the level of audience engagement. Drawing on Voluntary Disclosure, Agenda Setting and Media System Dependency theories, this study finds that voluntary communication of CSR strategies has the maximum potential to set the agenda for audience engagement on social media. The remodeled digitization of the media has increased the level of media dependency making social media a tool to be leveraged for effective health communication. The results revealed that Community Volunteering had the strongest impact on total audience engagement and revealed that engagement is higher with image posts than video posts. This study is important for the burgeoning field of CSR in the healthcare industry.

Research relevant to the unique needs and experiences of racial/ethnic/cultural (REC) minority groups in social science literature is essential to the work of policymakers and clinical practitioners. However, the social sciences have traditionally failed to publish a sufficient number of articles that address these needs and experiences or even adequately report the racial and ethnic makeup of their samples. The purpose of this study is to provide an updated look at Marriage and Family Therapy (MFT) literature and how often sample participants’ ethnicity is reported, how frequently studies focus on ethnic issues or specific REC minority groups, which REC minority groups and topics receive the most attention in minority-focused studies, which REC minority groups and topics receive the most attention in funded studies, and how these trends have changed over time. Specifically, five journals (American Journal of Family Therapy, Family Process, Journal of Family Therapy, Journal of Marital and Family Therapy, and Contemporary Family Therapy) were selected for inclusion in the analysis and were examined inclusively from 2000-2017. Results and suggestions for future research are discussed.

This dissertation investigates the My Stealthy Freedom (MSF) movement, an online movement against mandatory hijab laws in Iran, building on two leading lead social movements' theories, political processes and framing processes theories. Study 1 explores the utility of a tactical approach for explaining the movement's pace of insurgency. I employ a conceptual repertoire focused upon the political process model's core concepts of tactical innovation and tactical adaptations, supplementing these older concepts with the more recently proposed concept of tactical freeze and a newly proposed concept of tactical hashtags that is of particular relevance to online movements. Study 2 focuses on extracting hidden patterns and emotional characteristics in the MSF movement by conducting a topic modeling study on the text appearing in the captions of the main account of the movement on Instagram. It was shown that the actions of Masih Alinejad, the founder of the movement, represented by her online activity and extracted by means of topic modeling, is directly affected by the sequence of important events happening in Iran concluding to a transformation of a social movement to political one. Study 3 models how social movements use social media in the formation of affective publics and apply this model to Instagram post data from the MSF movement. Thematic analysis applied to samples of posts and comments revealed six main themes, one of which, aggression, includes three subthemes related to verbal aggression and physical violence. As the level of aggression increased in Instagram videos, the level of aggression in the comments increased as well, and videos containing verbal aggression and physical violence had more likes and comments than did non-aggressive and non-violent videos. In the conclusion, I consider implications of the three studies for social movement framing research and research on emotions and social movements.

During the 2010s what could be described as a new “terror-wave” went through Europe, the Nordic countries included, and for a while it was the primary concern for many young Europeans. At the same period, an influx of right-wing parties has gained popularity, both within the European Union and on a national level.This arose the curiosity to investigate how the news coverage on some of the terror attacks differ based on the terrorist’s background. To explore this the thesis conducts a quantitative content analysis on 863 news articles from the four largest newspapers in Sweden. Six acts of terror committed in any of the Nordic countries during the 2010s were ultimately compared and analysed by coding the articles abductively, basing the codes on Entman’s theory of framing. To raise the validity of the study, an external validity was assessed using a representative sample of the Swedish newspapers landscape, and through conducting the coding twice with some space in between resulting in similar conclusions.The analysis demonstrates that there are obvious differences in the framing of the attack, the terrorist and the proposed measures when comparing the coverage of the acts of terror.

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Video game advertising is a major venue for game industry to promote its products. As a form of advertising, game advertising reflects national cultural values. It also manifests game cultural values which gamers are able to identify with. Millions of people, youth and children in particular, are being exposed to game advertising. Video game advertising may not only influence viewers' purchasing decisions, but has the potential to influence their attitudes and perceptions of important societal issues such as gender roles, violence and sex. However, few studies have examined the information content and messages of game advertising. The purpose of this study is to begin to fill the gap. This study examined the content of 1,021 print game advertisements in four popular game magazines published between December 2006 and May 2008 in China and the United States. The study was built on a variety of theoretical backgrounds and game studies. First, built on Resnik and Stern's (1977) classification of information cues and conceptual differences between advertising service and tangible products, the study found that Chinese game advertisements used more information cues than U.S game advertisements. Second, built on a variety of cross-cultural frameworks including Hofstede's ─ individualism vs. collectivism, Kluckhohn and Strodtbeck's human and nature relationship and time orientation, the study found that that U.S. game advertisements used more individualistic appeals, manipulation-of-nature appeals and future-time-orientation appeals than Chinese game advertisements. It was found that Chinese game advertisements used more collectivistic appeals, oneness-with-nature appeals and past-time-orientation appeals than U.S. game advertisements. Third, the study, on the basis of synthesizing game literature, examined gender representation, sex and violence, and major game cultural values in Chinese and U.S. game ads. The study found that in both Chinese and U.S game advertisements, males were more likely to be featured (83.5% in U.S. ads and 55.9% in Chinese ads) as primary characters than females (12.4% in U.S. ads and 42% in Chinese ads). Female characters were sexualized when presented. The study also found 29.8% of Chinese advertisements contained sexual content and only 4% of U.S. game advertisements contained sexual content. It was found violent content was common in U.S. game advertisements and 61% of U.S. game advertisements contained violent content. U.S. game advertisements contained more violent words than Chinese game advertisements. The study examined three online game cultural characteristics reflected in game ads. Compared with U.S. ads, Chinese game advertisements used more character progression, virtual item accumulation and socialization appeals. Limitations of the study and directions for future study are discussed.

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