Getting news from social media influencers and from digital legacy news outlets and print legacy news outlets in seven countries: The “more-and-more” phenomenon and the new opinion leadership

Abstract

Legacy news consumption was found to be a predictor of getting news from social media influencers (SMIs) among respondents in seven nationally representative samples in Arab countries (N = 5,166). Getting news from SMIs does not seem to be an “alternative” for persons disenchanted with legacy media; SMI news use may, itself, be a form of legacy news consumption. The results provide strong evidence of the more-and-more phenomenon first identified by Lazarsfeld et al.