Navegações em infográficos webjornalísticos: um olhar desde a recepção

Abstract

This research talks about the reception of webjournalistic infographics. The main goal is to investigate and understand the uses, the appropriations and the meanings produced by users of these journalistic products. Three mediations are also considered: media/journalism/ infographics competences; technological competences; cultural competences – knowledge and practices considering the subjects addressed by the infographics. After a historical review of the journalistic use of the infographic language, we define parameters to identify the so-called webjournalistic infographics: products based on the image + text binomial, which tell a news story, usually in a news site, and present elements such as hypertextuality, interactivity and multimediality. The reception, in turn, is seen as a place from where it is possible to understand the whole communication process, not as a step in a movement that goes from transmitter to receiver. On the web, the reception has specific characteristics such as immersion, exploration and intervention of the user in the digital environment. The user is someone who produces and appropriates media products according to socio-cultural references – globalization, mediatization and consumption practices. To understand the users of webjournalistic infographics, it was necessary to elaborate a methodological arrangement based on interviews with the subjects and on the observation of their navigations by the infographics. We tried to apprehend, thus, ways to navigate and the meanings produced by the users, considering their relationship with the media, with technology and with the subjects addressed in each infographic. We noticed that interest in the stories, as well as in multimediatic and/or textual resources, are configured by the mediations observed in the research. We also found that users tend to follow the schematic logic of the infographics, even though they identify the possibility of a non-sequential navigation.