Twitter as second screen in political debates on television Analysis of hashtag #L6Nrajoyyrivera

Abstract

New technologies have promoted the incorporation of new actors to the massive diffusion of contents that struggle with the traditional mass media to gain a space in the frames of reference that the citizens use to interpret the reality. However, far from being two antagonistic forces, there is complementarity. This work studies the relationship between the contents that are generated in a political television debate and the conversations that circulate around it by the social network Twitter. For this, the scope of the hashtag # L6Nrajoyyrivera used in­ the program La Sexta Noche in its edition of August 20, 2015 is analyzed. This point coincides with a moment of broad political activity as a consequence of the uncertainty about the formation of Government in Spain after two electoral processes in a period of six months. The result highlights the importance of Twitter as a second screen and as a channel to expand the dissemination of television content, especially when the main actors of the program participate directly in the social conversation. Nevertheless, this greater activity in the digital environment does not suppose a higher quality in the debate.