The present master thesis is analysing the impact of digitalization and social networks on the design of headlines, synopses, and readers' responses to journalistic articles. It is focusing on the question which linguistic and stylistic features stand out most often and how they influence the reader's decision to click on the article or to comment, like, and share. Using a qualitative linguistic-stylistic method, 18 journalistic articles on three Slovenian journalistic portals (24ur.com, Žurnal24, and Delo) on Facebook are being examined, dealing with the linguistic characteristics of headlines and synopses. Content analysis is studying readers' responses; to further understand the linguistic characteristics of publications on readers' responses, a reception analysis is being used, emphasising the interpretation of content. The aim of the research is to determine how often elements such as sensationalism, personalization, emotional intensity, and clickbait appear in headlines and synopses. The results show that readers often react to a journalistic article in the form of a like or a comment based on the title and synopsis, and clicking on the article for more information is often not necessary. Topics that allow for identification or an emotional response, such as sports achievements or deaths news, trigger the most response. However, articles with click-bait titles do not necessarily achieve a greater response. Title and synopsis are key and often the only elements that the reader encounters, and they determine how the article will be received.
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