Social Media and Youth Critical Action: A Photovoice Project Examining the Ways Online Experiences Shape Critical Action for 12 Adolescent Organizers

BACKGROUND

Social media has played an essential role in numerous youth-led social movements over the past decade and is ubiquitous to various forms of youth sociopolitical action (e.g. popular education, organizing, mutual aid, influencing public officials, etc.). Critical action, or actions taken to challenge systems of oppression, can serve as a protective and promotive factor for socially marginalized youth. It is important to better understand the complex relationship between social media and sociopolitical action of youth under 18, as they are disenfranchised from conventional forms of civic participation and increasingly have less trust in institutional forms of political participation. Thus, we are seeing an increasing prevalence of extrainstitutional approaches to social change from younger generations. However, the relationship between social media and critical action is only vaguely understood. This Youth Participatory Action Research project is guided by the research question: How do experiences online shape youth experience with critical action?

METHODS

The YPAR collective (youth ages 13-19 with diverse sociopolitical experiences) utilized the photovoice, survey, semi-structured interview, observational, and transcribed dialogue data. For the visual data, we analyzed the images’ production, reception, and content. Written text, survey data and transcripts were analyzed using a line-by-line grounded theory approach to stay as close to the young co-researchers’ words as possible. For second-order coding, an adult researcher brought a basic qualitative map of in-vivo codes to each participant-researcher. We discussed which codes were speaking to similar ideas and which codes seemed to be in conflict or contradiction with one another. Youth researchers and the facilitator analyzed their codes in dyads. Then we used cross-case comparison to draw out additional insights across the different “sites” of youth experiences. We looked for patterns, as well as differences or deviations in interpretations. After this was done with each co-researcher, the facilitator designed a workshop where the youth could double-check that any summaries or interpretations were accurate.

RESULTS

Youth researchers collected and analyzed 143 images, screenshots, and videos of how social media facilitates critical sociopolitical action. Some highlights include ways that social media helped them influence local political systems and structures, helped them develop a sense of “togetherness” and see their actions as part of broader/interconnected social struggles and increase the accessibility of organizing spaces for youth. They also examined the ways that social media magnifies conflict in organizing spaces, can lead to the tokenization or exploitation of youth activist labor, can lead to burnout, and increase the risks that youth take. The youth researchers outline key insights from each of these themes and discuss how they navigate the tensions, conflicts, and contradictions of this ambivalent relationship.

CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS

With a better understanding of social media’s relationship to youth sociopolitical action, we can better integrate social media as a protective and promotive tool in various youth learning contexts while also working to mitigate the adverse effects of social media on youth organizing. This supports the healthy development of youth and simultaneously helps build stronger intergenerational social movements.