This research aims to investigate the impact of social media influencer’s credibility dimensions (Trustworthiness, Attractiveness, and Expertise), in shaping consumer's behaviour (Purchasing intention of customers and customer's attitude towards the brand). This proposed theoretical framework is based on social learning theory and the theoretical implications of the previous literature which is related to social media influencer marketing. For this empirical study, the data has been collected from Pakistani consumers who are following social media influencers who share and endorse products related to the fashion industry. Data is collected from 149 individuals out of which 135 were valid respondents.  Results reveal that social media influencer's credibility dimension (Trustworthiness, Attractiveness, and Expertise) positively influence the customer’s attitude towards the brands as well as the purchase intentions of the customers. In addition, the study has significance for social media influencers in the fashion and style sector in terms of understanding the factors of followers' devotion to them and the noticeable effects of followers' allegiance on their behaviour. This study adds to the literature on social media influencer marketing by demonstrating the importance of follower’s perspective towards the social media influencers. Previous studies lack in providing the Pakistan perspective related to social media influencermarketing and this research attempts to fulfill that gap. Another important aspect of this study is that the pictures of influencers have been used to conduct this research.

Technological advancements and affordability enable voicing of social injustice, feelings of deprivation, and oppression. Spatial barriers no longer pose obstacles to connecting with like-minded (or dissimilar) others to define and refine ingroup and outgroup. Some scholars anticipate that the internet liberates the discussion of opinions, others claim social networking platforms play a role in the polarisation of the public by creating echo chambers. However, it is recognised that ideas, ideologies, and social movements spread across the internet at an unprecedented pace. Connecting with others with whom one shares deprivation in a support network offers a sense of belonging. Broad scholarly literature addresses opinion polarisation and potential radicalisation in online social media platforms. However, quantifying radicalisation trajectories in fringe online communities like the misogynist incels are still to be done. In this thesis I study the online presence of the incel community. Incels are mostly young men who feel stigmatised and need to hide their incel existence. Incels voice their feelings of deprivation of a relationship and sex with a willing partner. This unfulfilled masculinity and sense of entitlement to sex cause frustration and anger which are vented in online forums blaming primarily women and feminism. Calls for action to social change, even for violence is common. However, incels do not unanimously consider violence a solution, many demonstrate the tame side of the so-called blackpilled mindset, the acceptance of powerlessness, and nihilism. Regardless, some scholars view the community as potentially dangerous to society, labelling them as terrorists. This study investigates whether participating registered users of the Incels.is website display increasing tendency toward expressing utterances with the themes of misogyny, harassment, nihilism, and moral outrage in their posted messages, and whether users gradually become more aligned with the general perception of incels in previous scholarly work. In other words, this work tests whether active participation increases the frequency of utterances of misogyny, harassment, and moral outrage, thus demonstrating a radicalisation tendency or increased nihilism. To answer the research question, I first scraped the Incels.is website, and retained ~5.38M posts published over 4 years for analysis. Next, a subset of posts was manually labelled to train a supervised text classification model (BERT). Finally, the results of the classification task were complemented with Ordinary Least Squares regression (n = 4623). The analyses uncover temporal user-level radicalisation trajectories, and increased nihilism. More specifically, the duration of active participation (in days) and the number of posted messages positively predict the count of moral outrage, misogynistic, harassing, and nihilistic content.

This research analyzed three Latina social media celebrities’ self-presentations on Instagram and focused on whether or not the content they published potentially challenges or simply perpetuates stereotypical tropes of Latinas found in mainstream media. This qualitative study took an Ideological Critical approach through a textual analysis that was informed by Feminist Theory. More specifically the research focused on: What were Latina social media celebrities self-presentations on Instagram that characterize what a Latina is? How were Latina social media celebrities self-presentations different from or similar to, mainstream stereotypical tropes for Latinas? Lastly, how do the Latina social media celebrities’ self-presentations compare and contrast, what type of themes emerged?

The impact of international mobility and globalization on universities has led to a greater need for students. Thus, throughout students stay in their destinatio ncountry, prospective students access a variety of sources of information and make simultaneous decisions about where to travel; decision making is required at everystage of the travel process (pre-travel, during travel, and post travel). Previous to the advent of social media dominate traditional sources of information, such as print media, educational fairs and university websites. The social media websites such as social networking (Facebook, Google+, LinkedIn,), microblogging (Twitter,Tumblr), photo sharing (Snapchat, Instagram, Pinterest), Video sharing (YouTube,Facebook Live, Periscope, Vimeo) become an alternative source of university information as many young people and students engage, work and participate in this online community. The purpose of this thesis is to research the influence of social media on the decision-making process of Ethiopian educational tourists in Poland, as well as how other factors (such as others’ comments, replies, and tour reviews) influence the process of their travel decision making. The data collection tool was a survey that included demographic questions, closed ended questions, multiple choice questions, a rating scale (Likert 5 scale model), and a few open-ended questions. The survey questionnaire was completed by 137 international students. The study's findings indicate that social media has a sizable influence and role as a source of information for Ethiopian educational tourists in Poland at every stage of their travel decisionmaking process, and that other factors (such as others' comments, replies, and tourreviews) influenced their decision-making process as well. Overall, this study helps to gather insights into Ethiopian educational tourists' decision-making behavior in Poland. Due to the fact that the research will contribute cross-national knowledge about educational tourists' behavior during the travel decision-making process in a destination, it will have a significant impact on promoting domestic travel and tourism in Poland.

This study examines the intricate dynamics of online anonymity in the context of Fishbrain, a platform for fishing enthusiasts. By conducting semi-structured interviews with ten Fishbrain users, I scrutinized the experiences and understanding of online anonymity through a deductive thematic analysis approach. This research was further underpinned by a comprehensive platform analysis. Using Eklund et al.'s framework [15], I studied six themes that encompass both macro and micro-regulating structures that govern online anonymity. The research findings highlight the pivotal role of these structures, revealing that users frequently balance the advantages of disclosing personal information against potential risks. This study accentuates the need to consider a spectrum of factors—commercial, legal, and technological structures, alongside the factual, social group, and physical facets of anonymity—when investigating online anonymity. This research expands the existing body of knowledge on online anonymity and provides valuable insights for platforms like Fishbrain to better address their users' concerns and customize their features and policies effectively.