Reciprocity as a Key Concept for Social Media and Society

Abstract

The concept of reciprocity, particularly in the pro-social sense of mutually beneficial exchange, presents an opportunity befitting the start of a new journal on social media. Namely, how might a concept of social exchange help us understand a mediascape increasingly dominated by social exchange—where the sharing, receiving, and recirculating of information “gifts” is central to the very social and technical frameworks on which these media function? In essence, what might reciprocity, analyzed more purposefully, reveal about social media and society? The case of “reciprocal journalism” briefly described here is but one of many avenues for studying social (media) interactions and their implications, whether positive or negative.