Social Responsibility and Corporate Webpages:

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Social Responsibility and Corporate Webpages
Self-Presentation or Agenda-Setting?

• By Stuart L. Esrock Greg B. Leichty (1998)

Presented by Maureen Duffy
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Overview

• This studys application to agenda-setting

• Discussion of the study

• Evaluation of the study

• Questions for further thought

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Agenda Setting Pre-1994
Corporate/Political Agendas
Media Agenda
?
Public Agenda
Policy Agenda
Actual Events
4
Agenda Setting Post 1994?
Corporate/Political Agendas
Corporate Websites
Media Agenda
?
?
Public Agenda
Policy Agenda
Actual Events
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Purpose of the Study

• To discover how large corporations are making use
  of the web to
• present themselves as socially responsible
  citizens
• to advance their own policy positions.
• Are they using the web for self- presentation or
  agenda-setting?

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Method

• Researchers took a random sample of 100 companies
  using the Fortune 500 companies as a sampling
  frame.

• Visited the 100 companies websites to see what
  kind of social responsibility messages they had
  (which of the 13 different social responsibility
  content areas did they address?)

• Other attributes were noted for each company as
  well

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Research Questions

• What social responsibility issues are addressed
  the most?

• How are corporate social responsibility issues
  addressed?

• How are corporate web pages used to discuss
  public policy issues?

• Do websites with site maps and search engines
  cover more social responsibility issues than
  websites without these features?

• Does the companys industry type affect the
  amount and the type of social issues it
  addresses? (no-harm or good deeds issues?)

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Research Results
Social Responsibility

• 82 of the websites examined had messages on
  social responsibility items.

• The top three social responsibility content areas
  were Community/Civic Involvement (60),
  Ecology/Environment (52), and Education (52).

• Social responsibility index correlated with
  organizational revenue, but not significantly
  with industry rank.

• Only 27 of sites has a direct button/link on
  homepage to social responsibility materials.

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Research Results
Social Responsibility

• News releases (52), reports/annual reports
  (33), and links to other sites (33) were the
  most common methods of communication about social
  responsibility.

• Corporations that scored high on the social
  responsibility index also employed a large number
  of communication methods about social
  responsibility.

• Webpages that had site maps (46) and/or a search
  engine (47) also had more social responsibility
  materials.

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Research Results
Social Responsibility

• There were no significant differences between the
  six industry types examined on the social
  responsibility index.

• Technology and environmentally-oriented firms
  (paper, oil, chemicals, etc) tended to have a
  greater number of no-harm materials on their
  webpage.

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Research Results
Agenda-Setting

• Only 27 of the websites that were studied had
  editorials, commentaries, issue statements, or
  position papers that related to public policy.

• Only 7 of the sites had third-party
  opinion/commentary on public policy-related issues

• Only 4 of corporate websites had tools to
  monitor public opinion (comment boards, on-line
  polls).

• 80 had email links for questions/comments from
  site visitors but none of these mentioned
  opinions on public issues or provided links to
  public affairs departments.

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Discussion

• What social responsibility issues are addressed
  the most?

• How are corporate social responsibility issues
  addressed?

• How are corporate web pages used to discuss
  public policy issues?

• Do websites with site maps and search engines
  cover more social responsibility issues than
  websites without these features?

• Does the companys industry type affect the
  amount and the type of social issues it
  addresses? (no-harm or good deeds issues?)

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Limitations of Study

• Conducted in 1997 time-bound
• Limited sampling frame
• Social responsibility coding system did not
  account for the quality/quantity of social
  responsibility materials
• These companies can talk the talk on their
  websites, but do they walk the walk and actually
  promote social responsibility?

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Conclusion

• It seems as if the sample of corporations studied
  used their websites for self-presentation rather
  than agenda-setting.
• As the web develops as a medium, further studies
  should be done to see whether or not corporations
  begin to fully utilize its potential to help set
  public and policy agendas.

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Questions

• How does Agenda-Setting function in environments
  where the public agenda may not affect policy
  agenda as strongly?

• How does Agenda-Setting function when corporate
  and/orpolitical groups own and control the
  media? (ex. AOL-Time Warner owns CNN GE owns
  NBC Viacom owns CBS Disney owns ABC etc. etc.)

• How could the interaction that the web provides
  affect the relationship between
  corporate/political agenda, public agenda, and
  policy agenda?

• How could the circumvention around the media that
  the web provides affect the relationship between
  the public agenda and the media agenda?

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More Questions

• If the internet becomes a medium through which
  the public can interact with others to determine
  agendas, how will the socio-economic background
  of internet users affect public agenda? Will it
  affect it at all?

• How accurately does agenda-setting theory
  accurately represent the way things work in real
  life? For example

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Agenda Setting Reality?
Lobbyists Money


Corporate/Political Agendas
Corporate Websites
Media Agenda
?
?
Actual Events
Public Agenda
Policy Agenda