Youth, Algorithms, and Corporate Reputation
Insights from Tiktok
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.62701/revsocial.v14.5535Keywords:
Corporate reputation, TikTok, Algorithmic visibility, Trust and authenticity, Collective narrativesAbstract
This article explores how corporate reputation is constructed on TikTok through socio-algorithmic and community-based processes. Drawing on qualitative data from interviews with young users and analyzed using NVivo, the study examines how reputation emerges at the intersection of algorithmic visibility, trust and authenticity, and collective narratives. The findings show that the algorithm plays a central role as a reputational mediator by shaping exposure to content beyond users’ prior interests, prompting reflexive forms of evaluation. Trust is not anchored in messages alone but in mediating devices such as advertising labels or influencer figures, which help users assess credibility within platform-specific cultural frameworks. Finally, reputation is shown to be collectively negotiated through shared narratives that circulate, stabilize, or contest meanings within algorithmically structured communities. Rather than being owned or controlled by brands or institutions, reputation on TikTok is produced through distributed practices of interpretation, repetition, and agency.
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Copyright (c) 2026 Pilar Lacasa, Nerea Rubio-López, Mitsuko Matsumoto, Alicia Hernando
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