The world has 3.96 active social media users, thirty-one percent of whom are within the ages of 18 to 24. Their constant feed of information from non-traditional news sources has drastically changed the dynamic of how politics is displayed to young voters, creating a generation of hyperpolitcal and civically involved youth unlike one that has been seen in years previous. In comparison to previous generations tuning into the nightly news, the average American now spends a little under eight hours a day on social media as of 2022. Therefore, the use of social media to sway young voters is on the rise.
The accessibility of social media allows for avenues of information far more effective than campaign advertising through rallies and commercials. Posting campaign information on social media platforms has no cost and can reach a far greater audience than other methods of campaigning. Thus, social media use has become more popular among politicians and is being utilized more. For example, lawmakers created around 35,000 more Facebook posts and nearly 74,000 more tweets in 2020 than in 2016.
While increasing engagement with young voters, social media is also often blamed for increased polarization. “Echo chambers” are described, as peoples social media pages tend to amplify their own beliefs while remaining devoid of any opposing arguments. After the events of January 6th, Facebook was given the most scrutiny as thousands of posts and searches relating to “QAnon” were brought to light. A December 2020 poll by NPR and Ipsos found that 17 percent of Americans believed that the core falsehood of QAnon — that “a group of Satan-worshiping elites who run a child sex ring are trying to control our politics and media” — was true. Social media allows these alternative right political groups, like QAnon, to share their false information to young voters, ultimately shaping their political stance and voting practices.
Among the younger population, social media has become increasingly a place to express political opinion with other users and where campaign information can reach a widespread audience all over the U.S and the world. Although social media has become a great space for sharing political identities and ideas among its users, it has caused a bias towards ideas and ideologies that are more popular. Some political ideologies that have become more acceptable and popular will have more visibility online, while other ideologies have far less visibility.
sources:
https://circle.tufts.edu/latest-research/five-takeaways-social-media-and-youth-vote-2018
https://sproutsocial.com/insights/social-media-vs-traditional-media/
Costa, E. (2016). The wider world: Politics, the visible and the invisible. In Social Media in Southeast Turkey (1st ed., Vol. 3, pp. 128–162). UCL Press. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctt1g69z14.10
This was a great post, and it was nice to see all of the quantifiable statistics involved with the polarization that is occurring as a result of Social Media. I agree the most with your assessment of Social Media’s ability to create “echo chambers” that increase polarization and encourage the spread of disinformation and fringe type ideas, as I have seen a lot of this occurring myself. Many individuals I knew well when I was younger went down the “alt-right pipeline” and have now proscribed to many of what I would refer to as ultra-nationalist and white supremacist beliefs directly as a result of the social media circles they began to frequent. This ended up with them having an incredibly warped idea of politics as well as other QANON-type opinions that you mentioned in your post. Speaking with them, I realized how many of their opinions came directly as a result of the echo chambers they had been online, and they were incredibly taken aback when I shared mine own as they thought very differently of people who proscribe to my political persuasion.
It is incredbly easy to fall into these types of groups and circles online and not even realize it, as they have a presence on all sorts of social media. Fringe type political spheres I’ve personally found remind to cults almost in a way they attempt to draw in mostly younger individuals with a more malleable mindset, and then slowly takes them more and more to the extremes of their beliefs. It is definitely somewhere where these social media companies need to take more responsibility for as this kind of rapid polarization can be devastating to democracy.
Hi Zachary! This was a really interesting post – thank you for sharing. I think your point about social media functioning as “echo chambers” that Abbas also referenced is really important, as people can and do easily self-select into groups where the people who are participating in that group generally share the same views. Another part of social media that your post made me think about is the way online trolls also can have an influence on social media politics. Trolls thrive off of sensationalization, and they want to take the most extreme stance in order to get the most interaction on a particular platform. This also means that extreme views get a lot more attention and are more visible online than they might actually be in the real world, which gets to the point you make in your last paragraph. I was also thinking about how anonymity online allows people to think that they aren’t interacting with other real people, and that they have a barrier that protects them from real-world consequences. Yet, the effects that these individuals have are certainly impacting the real-world, especially on people or programs that aren’t able to distinguish between trolls and genuine comments. I can’t think of a viable way for social media platforms to be able to de-incentivize sensationalism, unfortunately. Do you see a solution? It seems like people on their own time will have to actively choose not to engage with sensationalist media, though that seems extremely unlikely.
Hi Zachary, I found your argument on the duality of social media in terms of increasing political participation but also in terms of potentially increasing polarization to be particularly compelling and to resonate with the personal experiences of myself and my peers. I agree with your assessment that youths are spending more time on social media and are being exposed to an unprecedented volume of political content. It has now become commonplace for young people to use their social media accounts in order to engage in activism / to discuss current events. While this democratic engagement can certainly be positive, your blog post points to the very real dangers of this increased access to information. The “echo-chamber” you describe contributes to polarization. An already intensely polarized climate produces hyper-partisan websites/ spaces on the internet, and, as hyperpartisans, we are naturally drawn to such sources that align with our beliefs. I think it is important to consider how the flood of information impacts governmental accountability. Pomerantsev’s article discusses how governments often generate social media (often through bots) activity for the purpose of distraction rather than engagement. This has serious repercussions on our ability to discern the truth and to act accordingly; for example, Ferraz and Finan demonstrate that voters dislike corruption but often lack the information they need to punish these politicians. It can be very time consuming for voters to distinguish between credible and non-credible information/ sources in this climate. The increase in disinformation amplifies these accountability challenges and fosters polarization. I appreciate how your post identifies increasing youth social media engagement as a double-edged sword, and I think this will continue to be a central debate in regard to American democracy as technology continues to improve and social media usage likely intensifies.