Entries by Luis M. Romero Rodríguez

Branded Content in Fashion Research: Bibliometric analysis by correlations

27 August, 2023 in , /by

Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) have revolutionized all human interactions, creating new spaces and platforms for consumption and entertainment. In that regard, marketing and advertising have had to adapt by refocusing existing tools, as well as creating new strategies to reach their target audiences. Among these emerging tools are the Branded Content, which combines the conventional advertising message with entertainment and ICT, to create emotional and entertainment links between the consumer and the brands. However, given the novelty of Branded Content as an object of academic study, this research seeks to make a mapping of the state of the art that serves as a starting point for the epistemological understanding of the phenomenon, as well as to know the different conceptual positions of the most cited authors of Branded Content, specifically in fashion marketing research. For this objective, a bibliometric analysis is performed through a strategy of co-occurrence and co-citation of Boolean operators from the Scopus database, using the BibExcel tool for frequency counting and VosViewer for the visualization of data and interaction maps. The results indicate that between 2016 and 2018 the co-citation keywords varied widely, from terms such as “content analysis” and “marketing” in 2016, to “fashion films” in 2018, which clearly shows that there is not yet an academic and possibly even a pragmatic consensus on the delimitations of Branded Content.

The Irresponsible Self-Regulation of Media in Spain: High-Grade Alcoholic Beverage Advertising in Sports Radio Programmes

27 August, 2023 in , /by

Media must behave ethically towards their audiences since the latter play a fundamental role in shaping reality and public opinion. In this sense, the conduct of all media must be based on social responsibility, with ethical values and in compliance with laws and regulations. The present study analyses the presence of advertising for high-alcoholic-content beverages in sports programs through mentions by the host radio stations or collaborators, taking into consideration that the European directive, as well as Spanish legislation, prohibits the broadcasting of this type of advertising through audio-visual media (television and radio) channels, particularly in sports programs. To this purpose, three stations have been selected for analysis (COPE, Cadena Ser and Onda Cero) according to their daily audience numbers as reported by the General Media Study (a total of 9,000,000 daily listeners). The study was carried out between January and December 2017. A total of 355 mentions of high-alcoholic-content beverages were found, being the figure of the host radio the one that made more this type of advertising. Likewise, this research shows that most mentions of alcoholic beverages occurred in the afternoon (16:00–19:59), with rum (55.8%) and herb liqueurs (36.6%) being the most frequently advertised. It is also important to note that COPE, a radio station that has been sanctioned by the Spanish CNMV for this type of advertising, is precisely the radio station that has the highest frequency of alcoholic beverage advertising in this study (91.8%), which is evidence of the failure of the media self-regulation system in Spain.

The notion of educommunication in intergovernamental organizations

26 August, 2023 in , /by

This research analyzes the notion that the main international organizations of multilateral character have on the concept of educommunication (media literacy), by means of the correlational extract and analysis of the content of interpretative base of 2.648 information units from 12 organizations, both regional and transcontinental, including the United Nations, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the Arab League, the International Organization of la Francophonie, the Community of Portuguese-speaking Countries and the Organization of Ibero-American States, African Union, European Union, League of Arab States, Commonwealth of Independent States, Organization of American States, Commonwealth of Latin American and Caribbean States, Union of South American Nations, Association of Southeast Asian Nations, Cooperation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf and Pacific Islands Forum. Regarding the main results, it is evident that 83% of the organizations analyzed, except in the Community of Portuguese Language Countries and in the African Union, the convergence of the educational and communicative context is specifically presented under the terminology “media education”, which influences the formulation of domestic policies through the proposal of incentives and restrictions that affect decision making at the governmental level, alluding to the continuous change and the dynamic construction of identity. 

Entrepreneurship competencies in energy sustainability MOOCs

26 August, 2023 in , /by

Massive open online courses (MOOCs) have been gaining popularity as non-formal lifelong learning educational platforms. However, they have been criticized for their low completion rate and low ability for networking. The purpose of this paper is to analyze how incorporating entrepreneurial competencies in MOOCs develops attributes of educational innovation and collaborative projects. The research followed a three-stage process: in the first stage, a comprehensive literature review was conducted to identify dimensions of entrepreneurial skills and attributes of educational innovation in MOOCs. In the second stage, a quantitative study was carried out based on the analysis of pre- and post-test surveys taken by a sample of 6,517 participants. In the last stage, the interaction analysis model/computer-mediated communication analysis model was applied through qualitative analysis, using the MAXQDA tool to identify if entrepreneurship opportunities were generated in the interactions within the discussion forums of the MOOCs.The results show that the analyzed MOOCs have an overall completion rate of 12.55%, above the average of the rates found in the literature review. However, only 14.29% of the participants expressed at least one opportunity to generate ventures related to the topics of energy in the discussion forums. This research could help instructional designers and universities to consider the inclusion of entrepreneurship issues in the design of MOOCs’ content and to encourage more activities that promote networking among participants to identify business potential from the educational materials. This research is one of the very few studies on entrepreneurship competencies in MOOCs to understand how the inclusion of issues related to entrepreneurship in MOOCs can generate a positive impact on participants.

Gamified Platform Framing for Entrepreneur Competencies

26 August, 2023 in , /by

The study aims to reveal the need to propose a digital network where entrepreneurs can disseminate their skills achieved beyond formal and normative education. The general objective is to design a gamification platform based on entrepreneurial skills. For this, the specific objectives are proposing a Delphi study to 15 experts obtaining a list of priority competencies in the profiles of entrepreneurs, then the second specific objective is integrating the selected competencies within an interface based on the use of game elements, resulting in a platform that displays the 5 priority competencies, learning through experience, motivation, spotting opportunities, working with others and valuing ideas with 5 game elements respectively, experience points, feedback, leaderboards, progress bar and badges. From the results obtained, it can be concluded that the model implemented will serve as a first precedent for the display of competencies, thus providing an alternative traceability to the skills achieved by entrepreneurial initiatives.

Media Competence in Spanish Secondary School Students. Assessing Instrumental and Critical Thinking Skills in Digital Contexts

26 August, 2023 in , /by

The ways in which young people communicate have changed in line with the impact of technologies. This change has been accompanied by growing differences between the young, and their “liquid” experience, and adults with their “solid” experience, and these shapes the state of the question that defines young people as digital natives. This work analyses Spanish adolescents’ level of media competence. The sample consisted of 672 students attending secondary schools in 10 provinces in Spain. The average age of the participants was 14. The study aims to show that, although today’s adolescents are described as the digital generation, and there is a widely held belief that they are digital natives, their level of media competence is low and there is need for fomenting greater literacy skills in this field. The “ad hoc” questionnaire yielded results that indicate an overall medium level of media competence, but a skills shortage in the dimensions relating to critical thinking, such as in reception and audience, production and programming processes, and ideology and values. The conclusions question the supposed superior competence of digital natives in media. This study underlines the need for a clear definition of the concept of media competence from a convergence perspective.

Media competencies of university professors and students. Comparison of levels in Spain, Portugal, Brazil and Venezuela

26 August, 2023 in , /by

Media competencies are a set of skills that every individual should possess in order to be able to consume and produce media and digital and information products in a critical and analytical way. This exploratory and comparative work analyses the level of media competence among 1,676 university students and 524 professors in Brazil, Spain, Portugal and Venezuela. One of the main results shows that the level of knowledge of technology and interaction — which is linked to digital competencies — does not depend solely on age, thus contradicting theories of digital natives and migrants. Our study also found that the general level of media competence is no better than medium to low when considering language, technology, interaction, production and dissemination, ideology and values, and aesthetics. These results point to the need to develop transversal actions for instructing both university professors and students in media competencies to face an ecosystem dominated by fake news and disinformation, as well as public policies directed at improving these skills among citizens at large.

Gamification in MOOCs: Engagement Application Test in Energy Sustainability Courses

26 August, 2023 in , /by

Massive open online courses (MOOCs) have triggered a sudden change in the educational scene. Its characteristics of being free, heterogeneous, multi-thematic, and fostering lifelong learning have completely changed the instructional design scene, allowing these innovations and new architectures of teaching and learning to be included. However, MOOCs have been criticized by the scientific community for their high dropout rates and low overall completion rates, which has called into question their effectiveness as a pedagogical tool. This paper analyzes how the application of gamification strategies in MOOCs on energy sustainability affects participants’ engagement and seeks to identify what types of interactive gamification media are more useful in generating interest and motivation in students. In order to do so, a mixed quasi-experimental method is used. A gamification board with challenges, badges, and leaderboards to a sample is used, and at the same time, this platform is analyzed using the integrated theoretical gamification model in e-learning environments. In the MOOCs where gamification strategies were applied, a global completion rate of 14.43% was obtained, while in those without gamification, 6.162% was obtained. Likewise, the degree of student engagement with respect to the completion rate of activities was much higher in the gamified platform (28.032%) than in the traditional design (13.252%). The results show that applying gamification strategies in MOOCs achieves a higher level of engagement and student motivation.

The University as a Common Pool Resource

26 August, 2023 in , /by

This book gathers the contributions of the Common Goods Research Group of the Salesian Polytechnic University, created in 2016 to deepen and identify the implications and possibilities of imagining the university as a “commons”. This option must be explained as the connection of the use of the commons – as understood by Elinor Ostrom in her work The Governance of the Commons. The Evolution of Collective Action Institutions (2011) – with the possibility of rethinking the university across the board is neither immediate nor coincidental and, at first glance, such a connection sounds strange in times when we assess relevance based on evidence accessible at first glance.

Decolonizing matrices in the communication to enter into a dialogue with the West

26 August, 2023 in , /by

This paper examines the premises of decolonization in the Communication Studies and practice that challenges the West civilization based on the critical thinking of precursors and contemporary intellectuals of Latin America. The principles and values of communication and life are recovered for the constitution of a study and the exercise of intercultural communication for well-living, evidencing the need for an alternative communication epistemology based on matrices formulated by authors such as Luis Ramiro Beltrán and Erick Torrico under the premise of “liberation communicology” against the progress-mercantilism and the modernity of communication. This approach focuses on the horizontality and the circularity of the communicative process, and above all in the recovery of its ontological and integral level in the study-knowledge and exercise of communication. Philosophy and the Amazon do not claim the annulment of the way of reasoning and the Western procedure, the embargo, the search for dialogue and respect for indigenous wisdom and community life. Consequently, unity in diversity is sought, understood as the comprehensive understanding of the thought of communicative communication, demonstrating the need to establish a dialogue of knowledge between indigenous wisdom and knowledge of the West, assuming as a challenge to urge to live in harmony between human beings and nature, where communication is the link for the study and practice of the culture of life.