Tourism in crisis: A qualitative content analysis of SeaWorld's Twitter response to Blackfish

<p>Released on July 19, 2013, the documentary Blackfish highlighted the mistreatment of dangerous sea-life and the lack of employee training at the aquatic zoological theme park SeaWorld. Considering the immense reputational damage suffered by SeaWorld, this study uses qualitative content analysis to examine SeaWorld’s Twitter (twitter.com) response to the Blackfish crisis. An inductive method of coding highlights overall themes present in SeaWorld’s tweets while the deductive method of coding utilizes Benoit’s (1997) image repair theory to determine how this tourism organization utilizes Twitter as a medium of image restoration. The results prompt suggestions for clarifying image repair theory as well as the use of social media in crisis response.</p>

Name thesis:degree_name

Master of Arts (MA)

Level thesis:degree_level

Open Access Thesis

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Communication, Media and Theatre Arts

Year dc:date.available

2015

Author dc:creator

• Marek, Nicholas E

Contributors dc:contributor

• Nick Romerhausen
• Doris Fields
• Dennis Patrick

• Blackfish
• Crisis communication
• Image Restoration
• Qualitative content analysis
• Seaworld
• Twitter
• Arts and Humanities
• Theatre and Performance Studies

Repository record dc:identifier

https://commons.emich.edu/theses/852

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:commons.emich.edu:theses-2222