Shaping Predisposition Political Expression among Youth in Malaysia through Facebook

Abstract

The proliferation of information technology has led to a unique cyber world that paved the way to a borderless communication space between communities. The advent of social networking sites (SNS) such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkdIn, and others causes the spread of a belief or doctrine in the cyberworld without requiring the communities to interact face to face. The phenomenon has instigated varied reactions among the public especially youths who are using social media to express their political opinion. Therefore, this study seeks to examine Malaysian youths’ perception towards the national political climate through social media which is Facebook. The method of study is through field observation and in-depth interview with youths aged between 15 to 30 years old. This study utilises the Media Dependency System Theory introduced by Ball-Rokeach (1985). The study concludes that youths are predisposed to use Facebook as the stage for political expression. This finding is supported by the interview with the respondents that showed youths’ predisposition to use social media, frequency of news source, and events criteria as the reasons for them using Facebook as a political stage.

Keywords: Youth; Facebook; Media Dependency System Theory; political expression, social media