Rethinking the social relevance of mass communication in the era of digital communication

Abstract

In recent times, there has been a remarkable change in the world regarding how news and information are circulated through digital technologies. This article assessed the social relevance of mass communication in the digital communication era. This study was anchored on the technological determinism theory. A survey research design was adopted for data collection. A sample size of 385 was drawn at random from the population of 3,267,837. It was found that (66.8%) respondents said that mass communication is efficient in the digital communication era, (48.8%) respondents said that mass communication is effective because of their news localization in this digital communication era, (66.8%) respondents maintained that digital communication has influence in news reporting because of its global reach in this digital communication era, (27.6%) respondents said that mass communication has the pace for wide reach in this digital communication era, and (26.3%) respondents, which is the majority, said that digital technologies aid mass communication to carry out investigations in this digital communication era. Some of the recommendations are: Journalists should always be abreast of news events in society and not report stale news. Journalists should also get breaking news from social media and other digital or virtual-enabled platforms and carry out investigations for more details before reporting the news. Media houses should strive to employ staff with more skills on how to explore virtual or digital technologies to enable them to be updated with events.