Zach Vargas
Group: Mental Illness Stigma
Link to Group Page: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Ending-Mental-Illness-Stigma/1511709462419052?ref=aymt_homepage_panel
Participation Log and Annotations:
1) 10/26/14 | “Daily Challenge #3”
– I attempted to reach my audience on a more personal level by providing a link to a site that describes what to do if you believe you have someone close who is dealing with a mental illness. In this way the point was that for anyone who looks at at it would think that if they did indeed have someone who had a mental illness what they would do. Also the question at the beginning of the post was to get people curious enough to at least look at what the link was. There were no responses or likes.
2) 10/27/14 | Emblem
– I posted my group’s emblem today in hopes that people who saw it would associate our cause with this symbol. In this way it becomes a mental connection between mental illness and viewing the emblem. Also because the template is there, hopefully people see it as an opportunity to participate and use their own wording to create a different message that still has the underlying message of awareness communicated through the image that doesn’t change. There were no responses or likes, but hopefully a couple views at least.
3) 10/27/14 | “Test Your Mental Illness Knowledge”
– I posted a quiz to try and take a different angle on getting people to participate. I issued a challenge first in hopes of getting people to want to compete and participate. Competition. like in video games, is a good approach to take when wanting someone to at least participate. At the same time there is a part of that person that will connect to the subject material as they are immersing themselves in it. In taking my quiz, I hoped hat people would be exposed to that material and through the competition they would connect to it. Again no likes or responses.
4) 10/28/14 | “The Disease You Can’t See – Vicki”
– I posted a personal poem someone created about what having a mental illness is like. Songs, poems, and videos reach people more than research papers and statistics because they are emotional in design. A similar example would be the humane society videos asking for donations because the music and images of sad animals really grab people’s attention. Since the poem is created by a victim and the subject material is already somber and the way it is presented is not so structured, people find things like that easier to connect to since it’s an attention grabber. No likes or responses to this post.
5) 10/29/14 | “One Does Not Simply”
– Using a very popular meme I was hoping for people to be interested in the picture and so the message would stick more. This is an example of what we were hoping our emblem could become. The image grabs people’s attention because it is familiar and the message will stick more. Also then people are more inclined to share the image because it’s so popular and thus the message gets passed around more. No likes or responses for this post.
6) 10/29/14 | NAMI
– I posted our case study’s website because the organization is so large and people may recognize it. Because it’s recognized our webpage looks like it’s more connected. This post gives the opportunity for people to be a part of real life campaigns put on by a much larger organization. Just having that option should let the audience feel that their participation could possibly reach beyond the limits of the online social sphere and they are impacting the world around them and therefore they are more likely to at least take an extended look at the link. This post had no responses or likes.
7) 10/30/14 | “I Have Problems With Oppression and Stigma”
– This image is one I posted because the meme has potential of being shared among people and perhaps people will participate in maybe changing it. This meme is not known very well which presents an opportunity for people to make changes to it without the big risk of getting it “wrong”. People are less likely to involve themselves when there is no sacrifice but the subject material will not stick if they rely only on clicktivism. By taking out the risk of being judged for changing a super popular meme, people are not sacrificing much but are still participating meaning the underlying material is at least sticking somehow. There were no responses or likes for this post.
8) 10/30/14 | “Disability Thinking: Pop Culture Review”
– I posted a link to a review of the movie “Forrest Gump”. This movie is absolutely huge in terms of popularity, everyone knows what movie this is. This in itself is a huge attention grabber because so many people know this movie and so there’s the motivation to at least stop and look at what the link is talking about. Also the review itself talks a lot about mental illness stigma and how mental illness is represented in the movie. Knowing a different side of an already popular subject generates curiosity so once people ‘s attention is grabbed by the familiar topic they will also be drawn to read the entire review. Unfortunately no likes or responses to report.
9) 10/30/14 | “Absolutely Shocking!!”
– I hoped the above statement would generate interest among people so that they would click on the link. The exclamation statement is always associated with attention grabbing material and must reads. The material presented is short so there is no real sense of time sacrifice so people should be able to easily make it through before they decide that they’d rather not look. After grabbing attention, the material is quick to get through so this may be a step above clicktivism and just viewing the material at least should get people having that in the back of their minds. No responses or likes though, but hopefully there were some views.
10) 10/31/14 | TED Talks
– TED Talks is an extremely popular and well known organization. Their videos have a reputation of always being interesting and attention grabbing. This reputation alone is enough to guarantee that people will view the content because hey, it’s a TED Talks video. The post had no likes or responses but I know someone at least opened the link because the popularity of TED Talks is so large. Also people may believe more of our information on our page is worth looking at since we have provided a significantly popular mass media component.
A Word To the Wise 