Candidates for Accreditation in Public Relations: Role Enactment and the Social Media Synapse

Public relations roles have been studied for decades and around the world, but no research published to date examines the role enactment of practitioners who choose to sit for professional certification in public relations. This survey finds that Accreditationtrack professionals (N = 150) align with the general-population practitioner in some respects, such as role enactment and gender, but differ in others, such as experience and role enactment. In determining how social media use integrates into the roles literature, the data here support a 3-factor solution, with a social media synapse enactment factor standing alone