This study aims to investigate Chinese journalists’ role perception and career change within the prosperity period of social media from 2010 to 2013. Particularly, it examines how time change and social media use influenced these transformations. It is found that with the passage of time, both “professionalism” role and “advocate justice” role gained greater recognition among Chinese journalists. The “professionalism” role has become the most recognized role among Chinese journalists. Weibo use can positively predict “advocate justice” role than “professionalism” role, indicating that journalists with higher degree of social media use are more likely to be influenced by online public opinion. Journalists who work for online and print media have higher recognition of “professionalism” role than those who work for other types of media. Social media use can positively predict Chinese journalists’ expressions of their occupational struggle from the perspective of new media. This is particularly true for print journalists. In this four-year period, 16.8% of Chinese journalists chose to change their career, most of which jumped to new media outlets or related positions instead of entering another industry. Social media use is positively related to the possibility of career transition, while print journalists and TV journalists made such transition faster than others.