Teaching Global Competence in a Digital Age: Twitter and Instagram as Potential Tools for the Internationalization of American Curriculum

• In Event: Technology and Learning

Abstract

Despite high levels of global connectivity in the 21st century, American citizens are
significantly unaware of global affairs. The Department of Education named social media as a
viable option for improving the internationalization of classroom curricula, yet minimal research exists to quantitatively support such a claim. What little research does exist has exclusively investigated Facebook, while no research has looked into the viability of other popular social media platforms, such as Twitter or Instagram. Through an experimental design, this paper probed how the presentation of textually-based (Twitter) and visually-based (Instagram) messages affect American college students’ recall of digital information pertaining to global
affairs. It also investigated how communicator credibility effects how college students consume globally related information. Results showed that participants were most responsive to visually based information published by professional news outlets. Such findings help to better understand the relatively under-investigated digital intersection of international communication in American education.

Author

• Phillip C Arceneaux, University of Florida