POLITICAL OPINIONS OF US AND THEM AND THE INFLUENCE OF DIGITAL MEDIA - - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

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POLITICAL OPINIONS OF US AND THEM AND THE INFLUENCE OF DIGITAL MEDIA - - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

May 17, 2023 457 likes •695 views

POLITICAL OPINIONS OF US AND THEM AND THE INFLUENCE OF DIGITAL MEDIA USAGE Laura Burbach Andr Calero Valdez & Martina Ziefle 10 th International Conference on Social Computing and Social Media (SCSM 2018) 2 von 14 Motivation

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POLITICAL OPINIONS OF US AND THEM AND THE INFLUENCE OF DIGITAL MEDIA USAGE

Laura Burbach

André Calero Valdez & Martina Ziefle

10th International Conference on Social Computing and Social Media (SCSM 2018)

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Political Opinions of Us and Them and the Influence of Digital Media Usage | | Laura Burbach, M. A. | | 18.07.2018

Motivation

  • Polarization
  • risk for the stability of societies: perception of sub-groups with strong within-group

coherence and strong out-group rejection the perception of us vs. them

  • formed polarized opinions: increasingly difficult to find compromise
  • Spread and use of social media
  • within-group and out-group opinions
  • opinion of everyone everywhere
  • Filter bubble (Pariser) and feedback-loop
  • algorithms present more of what people like
  • believability of Fake News could increase
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Political Opinions of Us and Them and the Influence of Digital Media Usage | | Laura Burbach, M. A. | | 18.07.2018

Method – Online survey

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Political Opinions of Us and Them and the Influence of Digital Media Usage | | Laura Burbach, M. A. | | 18.07.2018

Method – Online survey

10 political goals liberal conservative Better social security system

  • poverty

+ gender equality + environmental protection + social justice + security & order + flexibility job market + national pride + support top performer + political stability

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Political Opinions of Us and Them and the Influence of Digital Media Usage | | Laura Burbach, M. A. | | 18.07.2018

Method – Online survey

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Political Opinions of Us and Them and the Influence of Digital Media Usage | | Laura Burbach, M. A. | | 18.07.2018

Method – Online survey

Voting left or right

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Political Opinions of Us and Them and the Influence of Digital Media Usage | | Laura Burbach, M. A. | | 18.07.2018

Method-Online survey

8 political

  • pinions

The leftwing parties plan to not coalize with the CDU and plan the downfall of our nation. The CDU should consider coalizing with the AFD. Agreement friends Agreement society All these complains lead nowhere. Nobody wants TTIP or CETA. If there is going to be a surge in right wing parties, it´s the leftwing governments fault. Where are all the womens‘ rights

  • rganizations now?

Women‘s dignity is being mistreated and nobody seems to care. I would really like to know what this is all good for. Is Germany an immigration country now? I don‘t want this subordination to foreigners.

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Political Opinions of Us and Them and the Influence of Digital Media Usage | | Laura Burbach, M. A. | | 18.07.2018

Method – Online survey

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Political Opinions of Us and Them and the Influence of Digital Media Usage | | Laura Burbach, M. A. | | 18.07.2018

Sample (N = 179)

Age: M = 28.5 years (SD = 9.4, min = 18, max = 67 years) Gender: 65% 35% Education: 2.20% secondary education with/without completed apprenticeship 7.14% middle mature 52.20% university degree 36.80% university entrance diploma

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Political Opinions of Us and Them and the Influence of Digital Media Usage | | Laura Burbach, M. A. | | 18.07.2018

Results Media usage frequency vs. source of political information

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Political Opinions of Us and Them and the Influence of Digital Media Usage | | Laura Burbach, M. A. | | 18.07.2018

Results – Evaluating opinions

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Political Opinions of Us and Them and the Influence of Digital Media Usage | | Laura Burbach, M. A. | | 18.07.2018

Results – Evaluating opinions

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Political Opinions of Us and Them and the Influence of Digital Media Usage | | Laura Burbach, M. A. | | 18.07.2018

Results – Evaluating opinions

We aim for a concrete goal. We fight for a society, with no kids in poverty, for self-determined peace, dignity, and social security, where we can construct a democratic

  • society. We need a different economic system: a

democratic socialism.

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Political Opinions of Us and Them and the Influence of Digital Media Usage | | Laura Burbach, M. A. | | 18.07.2018

Results – Evaluating opinions

All these complains lead nowhere. Nobody wants TTIP or

  • CETA. If there is going to be a surge in right wing parties,

it‘s the leftwing governments fault.

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Political Opinions of Us and Them and the Influence of Digital Media Usage | | Laura Burbach, M. A. | | 18.07.2018

Results – Agreement friends vs. others

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Political Opinions of Us and Them and the Influence of Digital Media Usage | | Laura Burbach, M. A. | | 18.07.2018

Results – Polarization

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Political Opinions of Us and Them and the Influence of Digital Media Usage | | Laura Burbach, M. A. | | 18.07.2018

Results – Which independent variables influences polarization?

(r = .22, p < .01)

(r = .23, p < .01)

polarization

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Political Opinions of Us and Them and the Influence of Digital Media Usage | | Laura Burbach, M. A. | | 18.07.2018

Key Results & Discussion

  • People perceive polarization

à people who use social media and facebook more often tend to see polarization more strongly

  • influencial: not the source of political information but the mere usage frequency of social

media à possibly subconscious exposure effect

  • similar to availability heuristic for risk judgements
  • frequency of public opinion forming is heavily biased towards the polarized states
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Political Opinions of Us and Them and the Influence of Digital Media Usage | | Laura Burbach, M. A. | | 18.07.2018

Key Results & Discussion

  • Motivational threshold for taking part in online discussions

à more polarized state in social media

  • Does the opinion space in social media really diverge from the opinions held by the

general public needs?

  • Do users actually compensate for this distortion cognitively?

Remaining questions:

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Political Opinions of Us and Them and the Influence of Digital Media Usage | | Laura Burbach, M. A. | | 18.07.2018

Key Results & Discussion

  • Highly dynamic opinion shifts (depending on beliefs about opinions)

àfeedback is unavoidable à opinion poll itself à opinion changes

  • perception of polarization most prevalent: topics with right-wing political agendas

à polarization is domain-specific, user dependent, and possibly not symmetrical

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Political Opinions of Us and Them and the Influence of Digital Media Usage | | Laura Burbach, M. A. | | 18.07.2018

Discussion – Limitations & Further Research

  • Sample
  • younger females with high education
  • age and education confound

☛ Future step: Translation to other social groups and other types of media?

  • Methodology
  • Opinions from real discussion on facebook, anonymized, real wording, reduced to

possibly singular topics/domains

  • some opinions did „crossload“ to other opinions

☛ Future steps: opinions stemming from more singular domains ☛Further studies: Translation of the findings to an improved understanding of opinion forming

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Thank you for your attention!

Any questions? Contact: Laura Burbach, M.A. Human-Computer Interaction Center (HCIC) RWTH Aachen University 52074 Aachen, Germany burbach@comm.rwth-aachen.de People perceive polarization and perceive it more strongly if they use social media more often More polarized state in social media, because people with more extreme opinions do post their opinion more often Polarization is domain-specific, user dependent, and possibly not symmetrical