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Nov 24, 2024
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Week 2: What do people (need to) know about politics? Why do individuals become
politically informed?
Questions to consider ahead of class:
• What does it mean to be politically knowledgeable?
• How knowledgeable/what knowledge do people need to make sensible political
choices? Are citizens sufficiently informed?
• What active and passive factors best explain why different types of people become
politically knowledgeable (or not)?
• What could be done to increase citizen demand for political information? Does it
depend on whether motivations come from intrinsic interest or strategic
incentives?
• What are the consequences of citizens obtaining information “secondhand”
through a two-step communication flow?
Barabas, Jason, Jennifer Jerit, William Pollock, and Carlisle Rainey. 2014. “The
question(s) of political knowledge.” American Political Science Review 108(4):840-855.
●
Main Idea: There are two theoretically relevant dimensions to studying how political knowledge
impacts public opinion and political behavior: 1) Temporal dimension: corresponds to the time
when a fact was established. 2) Topical Dimension: relates to whether the fact is policy-specific
or general.
●
The two relevant dimensions yield four distinct types of knowledge questions.
●
The study considers whether the mechanisms for becoming informed such as ability, opportunity,
and motivation, operate differently across four types of questions.
○
Important points:
■
The study provides a framework for understanding how the content or type of
questions affects observed levels of knowledge.
■
■
Static facts: concrete truths, always true like the president serves one term that’s
4 years long
■
Surveillance facts: stuff that’s happening in the news today
■
Static policy facts
●
Delves into the complexities and nuances of measuring political knowledge in public opinion
research. The main idea of the paper is to critically examine the various methods and questions
used to assess political knowledge and to highlight the implications of different approaches for
our understanding of citizen competence and political behavior.
●
The authors argue that political knowledge is a multifaceted concept and that different questions
or measures can yield different results in terms of citizens' political knowledge levels. They
emphasize that the choice of questions and the framing of those questions can significantly
impact the assessment of political knowledge.
●
Furthermore, the paper suggests that the traditional approach to measuring political knowledge,
which relies on factual questions about government institutions and policies, may not capture the
full extent of citizens' political competence. The authors introduce the concept of "systematic
knowledge," which goes beyond factual information and includes citizens' ability to make
connections and understand the broader political landscape.
●
The paper highlights that the measurement of political knowledge is not a straightforward task
and that different question formulations can lead to different conclusions about citizens' political
competence. It also introduces the idea of systematic knowledge as a more comprehensive way to
assess political understanding, emphasizing that political knowledge is not just about facts but
also about citizens' ability to navigate and make sense of the political world.
Lazarsfeld, Paul F., Bernard Berelson, and Hazel Gaudet. 1944. The People’s Choice:
How the Voter Makes Up His Mind in a Presidential Campaign. Columbia University
Press. Pages 13-18.
●
Main idea: To explore the complex process through which voters make decisions during a
presidential campaign.
●
The authors conducted a detailed study during the 1940 presidential election, focusing on the
impact of media, interpersonal communication, and personal characteristics on voters' choices.
They argued that voters are not passive receivers of information but are influenced by a network
of interpersonal relationships and selective exposure to media. The book highlights the
importance of word-of-mouth communication and the role of opinion leaders in shaping voters'
preferences.
●
Emphasizes that voters are influenced by a combination of personal interactions and media
exposure when making decisions in a presidential campaign, challenging the simplistic notion of
a purely rational and independent electorate.
●
Notable arguments:
○
Two-Step Flow of Communication: The authors argue that the process of political
communication is not a simple, direct transmission from media to individuals. Instead,
they propose the two-step flow model, where information first reaches opinion leaders
who then influence and mediate the information's diffusion to the broader public.
○
Selective Exposure: They emphasize that voters are selective in their exposure to media
and tend to choose sources that align with their preexisting beliefs and opinions. This
selective exposure has a significant impact on the formation of their political attitudes and
preferences.
○
Opinion Leaders: Lazarsfeld and his co-authors highlight the role of opinion leaders or
influential individuals in shaping public opinion. These opinion leaders are considered
intermediaries who play a crucial role in transmitting political information and
influencing the choices of others.
○
Word-of-Mouth Communication: The authors argue that interpersonal communication,
particularly word-of-mouth discussions among voters, is a vital factor in shaping political
attitudes and decisions. Conversations with friends, family, and acquaintances often have
a more significant impact than direct exposure to media.
○
Personal Characteristics and Social Structure: Lazarsfeld and his colleagues stress the
importance of personal characteristics and social structure in understanding how voters
make decisions. Factors such as education, social class, and demographic attributes can
influence an individual's receptivity to political messages and their ultimate voting
choices.
○
Long-Term Effects of Campaigns: They suggest that the effects of political campaigns are
not short-lived but have long-term consequences. Political messages and interactions
during campaigns can influence voters' attitudes and behaviors beyond the immediate
election cycle.
○
Challenging the Hypodermic Needle Model: The book challenges the simplistic
"hypodermic needle" model of media effects, which posits that media directly injects
messages into passive audiences. Instead, it emphasizes the interactive and selective
nature of media consumption.
Prior, Markus. 2005. “News vs. Entertainment: How Increasing Media Choice Widens Gaps in
Political Knowledge and Turnout.” American Journal of Political Science 49(3):577-592.
●
Main idea: Examines the impact of media choice on political knowledge and voter turnout. The
main idea of this paper is to investigate how the proliferation of media options and the shift
towards entertainment-focused content affect individuals' political engagement.
●
Prior argues that as media choices expand, people are more likely to select content that aligns
with their preexisting political views and preferences. This selective exposure to media results in
information and knowledge gaps between individuals with different political orientations.
●
Those who engage with politically oriented news media tend to become more informed and
politically active, while those who opt for entertainment-focused content remain less politically
informed and engaged.
●
Furthermore, the paper suggests that this growing gap in political knowledge and engagement has
consequences for voter turnout. Individuals who are well-informed and politically active are more
likely to vote, while those who are less informed and disengaged are less likely to participate in
the electoral process.
●
In summary, Markus Prior's paper highlights how the increasing availability of media choices can
lead to divergent levels of political knowledge and participation, with some individuals becoming
more engaged due to exposure to political news, while others become less informed and less
likely to vote as they consume entertainment-focused media content.
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Baum, Matthew A., and Angela S. Jamison. 2006. “The Oprah effect: How soft news helps inattentive
citizens vote consistently.” Journal of Politics 68(4):946-959.
●
Main Idea: explores the influence of soft news, particularly Oprah Winfrey's book
recommendations and discussions, on the political behavior of inattentive citizens. The main idea
of this paper is to investigate whether exposure to soft news, in the form of Oprah's book club,
can have a positive impact on the political engagement and voting behavior of individuals who
are generally disengaged from traditional political news.
●
The authors argue that many citizens are politically inattentive and often do not follow traditional
news sources closely. However, they posit that soft news, in this case, Oprah's book club
selections that occasionally touch on political and social issues, can serve as a bridge to connect
these inattentive citizens to political issues and encourage them to vote more consistently.
●
Baum and Jamison conducted empirical research to demonstrate that Oprah's book club had a
measurable impact on inattentive citizens' political knowledge and voting behavior. They found
that when Oprah recommended books with political content, readers were more likely to engage
with these political issues and become more consistent voters.
●
In summary, the paper suggests that soft news, such as Oprah's book club, can play a significant
role in mobilizing inattentive citizens to become more politically engaged and vote consistently
by providing them with accessible and relatable content that touches on political and social issues.
Marshall, John. 2019. “Signaling sophistication: How social expectations can increase political
information acquisition.” Journal of Politics 81(1):167-186. [You can skip the technical “Model” and
“Equilibrium and comparative statics” subsections.]
●
Main Idea: explores the concept of signaling sophistication in the context of political information
acquisition. The main idea of the paper is to examine how individuals may be motivated to
acquire political knowledge based on social expectations and perceptions of being seen as
informed or sophisticated by their peers.
●
Marshall argues that individuals often seek to signal their sophistication or competence to their
social circles, and this can extend to the realm of politics. When people believe that their peers or
social groups value political knowledge and sophistication, they are more inclined to actively
seek out and acquire political information. This behavior is driven by the desire to conform to
social expectations and maintain a positive social identity.
●
The paper suggests that social norms and expectations play a significant role in motivating
individuals to become politically informed, even if their primary motivation is not an intrinsic
interest in politics. People may engage in political information acquisition to fit in, gain social
approval, or be perceived as knowledgeable by their peers.
●
In summary, Marshall's paper highlights how social expectations and the desire to signal
sophistication within social groups can incentivize individuals to actively acquire political
information, contributing to a more politically engaged and informed citizenry.
Week 3: How do individuals process information and form beliefs?
Questions to consider ahead of class:
●
When, if ever, do citizens rationally process political information? Is it possible to differentiate
between rational and behavioral models of information processing?
●
When do individuals accept new information as reliable and incorporate it into their perspective
on politics? Has this changed in a more polarized world?
●
If citizens are subject to behavioral biases, such as motivated reasoning, how could this be
counteracted and what are the implications for political choices?
Zaller, John. 1992. The Nature and Origins of Mass Opinion. Cambridge University
Press. Chapter 3: How Citizens Acquire Information and Convert it to Public Opinion.
●
Main Idea: How citizens learn about matters beyond their immediate experience and how they
convert the information they acquire into opinions. The RAS (Recieve-Accept-Sample) outlines
how opinion statements are the outcome of a process in which people receive new information,
decide whether to accept it, and then sample at the moment of answering questions. The RAS
model arguest that the probability that a person will support or oppose a given policy depends on
the mix of positive and negative consideration available in the person’s mind at the moment of
answering a question about it.
○
The Model: A1. Reception Axiom: The greater a person’s level of cognitive engagement
with an issue, the more likely he or she is to be exposed to and comprehend political
messages concerning that issue.
■
Essentially, the reception of politically relevant communications, whatever their
origin, is positively associated with intellectual engagement with a given issue.
○
A2: Resistance Axiom: People tend to resist arguments that are inconsistent with their
political predispositions, but they do so only to the extent that they possess the contextual
information necessary to perceive a relationship between the message and their
predispositions.
■
Political inattentive persons will often be unaware of the implications of the
persuasive communications they encounter, and so often end up ‘mistakenly’
accepting them.
■
Some individuals will entirely ignore factors like “source credibility” and instead
base their attitudes on the quality of persuasive information that they have been
given.
○
A3: Accessibility Axiom: The more recently a consideration has been called to mind or
thought about, the less time it takes to retrieve that consideration or related considerations
from memory and bring them to the top of the head for use.
○
A4: Response Axiom: individuals answer survey questions by averaging across the
considerations that are immediately salient or accessible to them.
■
Responding at the “top of their head”
■
Abandons the notion that individuals typically possess preformed attitudes that
they simply reveal when asked by a pollster to do so and instead adopts the view
that people possess numerous, frequently inconsistent “considerations” relating to
each issues and base survey responses on whichever of them is at the “top of the
head”.
●
Key Points:
○
Definitions:
■
Consideration: defined as any reason that might induce an individual to decide a
political issue one way or another. A compound of cognition and affect.
■
Two types of political messages:
●
1) Persuasive messages: are arguments or images providing a reason for
taking a position or point of view. If accepted by an individual, they
become considerations. Doesn’t have to be coldly rational— can hark
emotion, be subtle, etc.
●
2) Cueing messages: carried in elite discourse, consist of “contextual
information” about the ideological or partisan implications of a
persuasive message; perceive relationships between persuasive messages
vs their political predispositions.
○
People who score higher on tests of political knowledge are substantially more stable in
their attitude reports than people who score low on political awareness. However, people
who describe themselves at highly interested in politics are not significantly more table
than persons who express little political interest.
○
Political interest is a strong correlate of voter turnout, slightly stronger than political
knowledge, so while affective engagement can be important unless coupled with
intellectual engagement, it appears to have only limited effects on opinion per se.
○
The 1987 NES pilot study was conducted to investigate how individuals gather
information and form opinions on political issues, especially during election campaigns.
It aimed to understand the dynamics of opinion formation in the context of real-world
politics.
■
Findings: The study's findings helped support Zaller's theories. It demonstrated
that individuals often rely on cognitive shortcuts, such as party identification and
existing attitudes, to form opinions on political issues. The longitudinal data
allowed researchers to observe how changing information environments and
campaign events influenced opinion changes over time.
Hill, Seth J. 2017. “Learning together slowly: Bayesian learning about political facts.”
Journal of Politics 79(4):1403-1418.
●
Main Idea: Concept of Bayesian learning and how individuals gradually acquire political
information and update their beliefs. Delves into the process of how individuals acquire and
update their political beliefs within a Bayesian framework. It emphasizes that this learning is
often gradual, influenced by confirmation bias, and shaped by specific examples and social
interactions.
○
The result of his experiment suggests that citizens do not learn political information as
perfect Bayesians. They are cautious in responding to signals delivered and are modestly
biased in response to signals by consistency with their initial beliefs.
○
Nonetheless, subjects are capable of learning in the appropriate direction about
partisan-relevant facts and appear to learn in a similar fashion about political and
non-political facts.
○
Citizens learn together slowly about political facts.
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●
Citizens learn and update their political beliefs in a democratic context, specifically focusing on
their ability to objectively evaluate political outcomes. Traditional models of accountability
assume that citizens update their beliefs using Bayes' Rule when confronted with new
information. However, empirical observations suggest that individuals often exhibit bias and
motivated reasoning in processing political information.
●
He presents an experimental design to measure how individuals learn about political facts
compared to non-political facts and how closely their learning aligns with Bayesian principles.
Subjects in the experiment receive noisy signals about political facts over multiple rounds, and
their beliefs are elicited with incentives, minimizing biases due to partisan motivations. The
results indicate that individuals do update their political beliefs in the right direction, even though
they do so cautiously and with some bias. Notably, this bias does not lead to polarization among
subjects.
●
Key Points:
○
Bayesian Learning: The article introduces the concept of Bayesian learning, which is a
probabilistic framework for updating beliefs based on new information. It emphasizes
that individuals use Bayesian reasoning when learning about political facts.
○
Gradual Learning: Hill argues that learning about political facts is often a slow and
incremental process. People do not instantly and completely revise their beliefs when
presented with new information. Instead, they update their beliefs in a gradual and
probabilistic manner.
○
Confirmation Bias: Individuals tend to place more weight on information that confirms
their existing beliefs and may be more resistant to information that contradicts those
beliefs.
○
Example-Based Learning: Hill suggests that people often rely on specific examples or
anecdotes to inform their political beliefs. These examples serve as Bayesian evidence,
and individuals update their beliefs by incorporating these examples into their knowledge
base.
○
Social Learning: The article also explores how social interactions and discussions with
others can influence Bayesian learning. Individuals may update their beliefs based on
information shared by peers or experts, and this social learning process can affect the
pace and direction of belief updates.
○
Policy Implications: Hill discusses the policy implications of Bayesian learning in the
context of political campaigns, policymaking, and public opinion. Understanding how
individuals learn about political facts can help policymakers and political actors tailor
their communication strategies.
Taber, Charles S., and Milton Lodge. 2006. “Motivated skepticism in the evaluation of
political beliefs.” American Journal of Political Science 50(3):755-769.
●
Main Idea: Proposes a model of motivated skepticism that helps explain when and why citizens
are biased information processors. Citizens are prone to overly accommodating supportive
evidence while dismissing out-of-hand evidence that challenges their prior attitudes.
●
How individuals tend to be selectively skeptical when evaluating information that challenges their
preexisting political beliefs. It underscores the idea that individuals are not impartial evaluators of
political information. Instead, they tend to be selectively skeptical, being more critical of
information that challenges their beliefs while accepting information that aligns with them. This
phenomenon has significant implications for political polarization and the way individuals
process and respond to political information. The participants may have tried to be evenhanded,
●
but they found it impossible to be fair-minded.
●
Key Points:
○
Motivated Reasoning: The authors introduce the concept of "motivated reasoning," which
suggests that individuals are not purely objective when evaluating political information.
Instead, they often engage in reasoning that is motivated by their existing beliefs and
preferences.
○
Selective Skepticism: Taber and Lodge argue that people exhibit "selective skepticism."
This means that individuals are more critical and skeptical of information that contradicts
their preexisting beliefs, while being less critical of information that aligns with their
beliefs.
○
Confirmation Bias: The paper highlights the confirmation bias, where people tend to seek
out and accept information that supports their existing views, and they scrutinize and
reject information that challenges those views.
○
Empirical Evidence: Taber and Lodge present empirical evidence from a series of
experiments to support their hypothesis. They show that individuals are more likely to
critically evaluate and reject information that goes against their political beliefs, while
being less critical of information that confirms their beliefs.
○
Motivated Skepticism Across the Political Spectrum: The authors argue that motivated
skepticism is not limited to any particular political ideology. Both liberals and
conservatives exhibit this tendency when confronted with information that challenges
their beliefs.
○
Implications for Political Polarization: The paper discusses how motivated skepticism
contributes to political polarization. When people are selectively skeptical and resist
information that contradicts their views, it can lead to the reinforcement of partisan
divisions and make it challenging to bridge political divides.
○
Information Processing Strategies: Taber and Lodge also explore different information
processing strategies that people use to protect their preexisting beliefs. They discuss
elements like discounting, biased assimilation, and the backfire effect, which all play a
role in how individuals handle conflicting political information.
○
Skepticism and Attitude Protection: One perspective suggests that individuals' resistance
to changing their beliefs in the face of new information may be rational. It argues that
individuals have invested time and cognitive resources in forming their attitudes, making
those attitudes valuable possessions. These carefully constructed attitudes are seen as
trustworthy and deserving of protection, especially when new information appears
dubious or is perceived as coming from political opponents. In this view, skepticism is a
rational response to attitude-relevant information.
○
Bayesian Updating and Independence: Another perspective emphasizes the need for
independence between prior beliefs and new evidence, as required by Bayesian updating.
It argues that distorting new information to always support one's priors or manipulating
the information stream to avoid any threat to one's priors is irrational. While some
individuals may exhibit extreme bias in processing information to protect their beliefs,
even less extreme forms of bias can be observed among those with strong prior attitudes.
The article acknowledges that individuals with weak and uninformed attitudes show less
bias in processing political arguments, but this does not necessarily indicate a
normatively secure democracy.
○
The article acknowledges the complexity of the rationality argument and suggests that
finding the boundary between rational skepticism and irrational bias is challenging.
While empirical research can explore the conditions under which persuasion occurs, it
may not be able to determine the conditions under which it should occur, which is a
critical normative question.
○
In summary, the article grapples with the tension between skepticism and bias in the
processing of political information. It raises important questions about the rationality of
motivated reasoning in a democracy and highlights the difficulty of establishing clear
boundaries between rationality and bias in the context of attitude formation and
information processing.
Alt, James E., David D. Lassen, and John Marshall. 2016. “Credible sources and
sophisticated voters: When does new information induce economic voting?” Journal of
Politics 78(2):327-343.
●
Main Idea: Examines the conditions under which new economic information influences voters'
decisions in democratic elections. The study investigates the role of credible sources and voter
sophistication in determining whether economic information affects voting behavior.
●
Key Points:
○
Credible Sources: The study emphasizes the importance of the source of economic
information. It suggests that information from credible and reliable sources is more likely
to influence voters' decisions. Credibility is a critical factor in determining whether voters
take economic information seriously.
○
Voter Sophistication: Voter sophistication plays a significant role in this context.
Sophisticated voters are more discerning and better equipped to evaluate the credibility of
economic information. They are more likely to incorporate new economic information
into their voting decisions.
○
Timing of Information: The study examines the timing of the economic information's
release. It suggests that voters may be more responsive to economic information when it
is released closer to the election because it is more salient and relevant at that time.
○
Empirical Analysis: The researchers use empirical data and statistical methods to test
their hypotheses. They analyze real-world election data to understand the impact of
economic information and its interaction with source credibility and voter sophistication
on electoral outcomes.
○
Conditional Effects: The study finds that the effects of economic information on voting
behavior are conditional. It depends on the interplay between credible sources, voter
sophistication, and the timing of the information. In some cases, economic information
can lead to economic voting (where voters base their decisions on economic issues),
while in other cases, it may not have a significant impact.
○
Policy Implications: The research has implications for policymakers and political
campaigns. It suggests that the timing and credibility of economic messages can influence
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their effectiveness in swaying voters. Understanding the conditions under which voters
are more likely to respond to economic information can help political actors tailor their
strategies.
Week 5, 10/4 – Non-partisan information and accountability
Fearon, James D. 1999. “Electoral accountability and the control of politicians: selecting good types
versus sanctioning poor performance.” In Democracy, Accountability, and Representation, edited by
Adam Przeworski, Susan C. Stokes, and Bernard Manin, Cambridge University Press. Chapter 2.
Dunning, Thad, Guy Grossman, Macartan Humphreys, Susan Hyde, Craig McIntosh, Gareth Nellis,
Claire L. Adida, Eric Arias, Clara Bicalho, Taylor C. Boas, Mark T. Buntaine, Simon Chauchard, Anirvan
Chowdhury, Jessica Gottlieb, F. Daniel Hidalgo, Marcus Holmlund, Ryan Jablonski, Eric Kramon,
Horacio Larreguy, Malte Lierl, John Marshall, Gwyneth McClendon, Marcus A. Melo, Daniel L. Nielson,
Paula M. Pickering, Melina R. Platas, Pablo Querubín, Pia Raffler, and Neelanjan Sircar. 2019. “Voter
information campaigns and political accountability: Cumulative findings from a preregistered
meta-analysis of coordinated trials.” Science Advances 5(7):eaaw2612.
Snyder Jr., James M., and David Strömberg. 2010. “Press Coverage and Political Accountability.” Journal
of Political Economy 118(2):355-408.
Durante, Ruben, and Ekaterina Zhuravskaya. 2018. “Attack when the world is not watching? US news
and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.” Journal of Political Economy 126(3):1085-1133.
Questions to consider ahead of class:
●
Are voters capable of using information to hold politicians to account/select politicians who
match their interests?
●
How does the information environment shape how politicians act in office?
●
In what situations does accountability work well? How can we make it work better?
Week 6, 10/11 – Does partisan media move citizens?
Broockman, David, and Joshua Kalla. 2023. “Consuming cross-cutting media causes learning and
moderates attitudes: A field experiment with Fox News viewers.” Working paper.
Adena, Maja, Ruben Enikolopov, Maria Petrova, Veronica Santarosa, and Ekaterina Zhuravskaya. 2015.
“Radio and the Rise of the Nazis in Prewar Germany.” Quarterly Journal of Economics
130(4):1885-1939.
Conroy-Krutz, Jeffrey, and Devra C. Moehler. 2015. “Moderation from Bias: A Field Experiment on
Partisan Media in a New Democracy.” Journal of Politics 77(2):575-587.
Main Idea: They theorize that partisan media may cause moderation in post-liberalization settings because
low political sophistication and shifting political landscapes may discourage partisan-motivated
reasoning. They argue that partisan media can moderate by exposing citizens to alternate perspectives as
opposed to the popular belief that partisan media is one cause for polarization in newly liberalized
regimes.
●
Found no effect of like-minded media on polarization but significant evidence of moderation
from cross-cutting broadcasts, indicating that rival arguments persuaded subjects.
●
Partisan broadcasts also encouraged displays of national identity over partisan identity.
●
Extreme position-taking is unlikely in response to partisan media in postliberalization settings
because individuals typically lack the inclination or tools to engage in counterargument so they
accept discordant messages.
●
Evaluating different exposures (like-minded exposure, media favoring own side, and
cross-cutting exposure, content challenging preferences)
●
Drivers played randomly assigned programs. There were four conditions: pro-government,
pro-opposition, or neutral political talk radio, or a no-radio control. Upon completing their
commute, 1,200 subjects from 228 tro-tros were interviewed.
●
No difference in attitudinal extremity between subjects exposed to like-minded media and those
not exposed to radio.
●
Instead, found that exposure to cross-cutting broadcasts begets partisan ambivalence and
encourages displays of national over partisan affinities.
●
Partisan media provokes reconsideration of initial positions.
●
Implications:
○
Theories do not consider how the effects of partisan media on polarization vary
contextually— doesn’t consider responses in settings where system level factors such as
institutional flux and weak educational infrastructrues might make motivated reasoning
less likely than in advanced democracies like the U.S.
●
Biased media is believed to exacerbate partisan cleavages which could foster antidemocratic
elites, weak economic performance, and violence.
○
Observers tend to focus on extreme cases where violence coincides with indecent
broadcasts.
●
“According to this perspective, partisan media polarize because the reinforcing effects of
like-minded exposure are larger than any persuading powers of cross-cutting expo-sure, and/or
cross-cutting exposure provokes counterargument and intensifies biases. Importantly, this reaction
re-quires partisan-motivated reasoning, such that individuals find their party’s arguments
compelling, ignore discordant views, or argue against the other side (Levendusky 2013).
However, this expectation of polarization might not hold universally.”
●
Studies of cross-cutting discussions and theories of biased information processing:
○
1) scholarship on interpersonal discussion and social networks highlights how
cross-cutting interactions can foster mutual understanding, reevaluation of positions and
moderation.
■
Follows belief that exposure to a myriad of views is good for democracy.
●
Ghana as a case study:
○
Post-independence history marked by single-party or military rule where media was
significantly restricted
○
1992 multipartyism returned and state-run media monopoly ended
○
By 2012, 225 FM stations were operated with 75% being commercially owned
○
Stations owners are often participants in presidency and Parliament competitions
■
Led many to believe that animosities among different groups occurred and
cleaveges widened, heightened tensions, etc.
○
However, evidence of casual relationship between biased media and polarizing Ghanians
was lacking.
●
Results:
○
No statistically significant differences on any of our outcomes between partisans exposed
to like-minded media and those in the control
○
No statistically significant differences in neutral radio group and the control
○
Find that cross cutting media did significantly moderate attitudes and reduce partisan
polarization.
■
Narrowing of relative attitudes on both governing party and opposition party
■
Decreased aversion to the other side
■
Cross cutting treatment more likely to select a keychain with national symbol
●
Discussion:
○
Relative newness of the multiparty system means that partisan identities, reinforced over
generations in the U.S. are relatively weak—> meaning Ghanians don’t have the same
inclinations of distrust or argue against cross cutting sources.
Chen, Yuyu, and David Y. Yang. 2019. “The impact of media censorship: 1984 or brave new world?”
American Economic Review 109(6):2294-2332.
Questions to consider ahead of class:
●
How much does slanted news content and censorship affect political beliefs and behaviors?
●
What types of people (in what types of context) can be persuaded by partisan media, and are these
persuadable types important for broader outcomes?
●
When does counter-attitudinal content persuade rather than induce backlash?
●
Does the rise of online content, which has lowered barriers to news production and facilitated
interaction between consumers, help counteract media power?
●
If media outlets wield great control over the information environment, how should they be
regulated?
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Week 7, 10/18 – Digital media technologies and political action
Tucker, Joshua A., Yannis Theocharis, Margaret E. Roberts, and Pablo Barberá. 2017. “From liberation to
turmoil: social media and democracy.” Journal of Democracy 28(4):46-59.
Main Idea:
A study that explores the role of social media in democratic and authoritarian regimes,
presenting a framework based on:
1)
Social media gives voice to those previously excluded from political discourse by traditional
media.
2)
Although social media democratize access to information, the platforms themselves are neither
inherently democratic nor nondemocratic, but represent a tool political actors can use for a variety
of goals, including, paradoxically, illiberal goals.
●
The authors argue that while social media was initially celebrated as a platform for marginalized
voices and free discourse, it has now shown to have problematic consequences in both
authoritarian and democratic regimes. This is because the same technology that fuels hopes for
liberation in authoritarian regimes can also be used for repression by these regimes, and can be
exploited by antisystem actors in democracies
Pierskalla, Jan H., and Florian M. Hollenbach. 2013. “Technology and collective action: The effect of cell
phone coverage on political violence in Africa.” American Political Science Review 107(2):207-224.
Main Idea: investigates the impact of cell phone technology on violent collective action.
●
The authors propose that the availability of cell phones as a communication technology allows
political groups to overcome collective action problems more easily and improve in-group
cooperation and coordination
●
Greater cell phone coverage leads to more conflict in “areas with structural conditions that favor
violence” than those where the conditions do not favor violence; it “enables groups to overcome
their collective action and coordination problems more easily, which translates to more organized
conflict events.”
●
They utilize novel, spatially disaggregated data on cell phone coverage and the location of
organized violent events in Africa
●
Their findings show that the availability of cell phone coverage significantly and substantially
increases the probability of violent conflict
●
These findings hold across numerous different model specifications and robustness checks,
including cross-sectional models, instrumental variable techniques, and panel data methods
●
Even when confounding variables such as income, inequality, ethnic fractionalization, and
geography are accounted for, increases in cell phone coverage are associated with higher levels of
violence throughout Africa
●
“The increase in violence induced by better communication might represent a short-term
technological shock, while the positive effects of better communication networks on growth and
political behavior may mitigate root causes of conflict in the long run.”
●
These findings don’t just apply to authoritarian governments; for example, Spain protestors
organized quickly.
●
New technology has often been accredited to playing a key role in the Arab Spring, but in
Mozambique improved voter education and political participation and Namibia allowed citizens
to hold corrupt governemnts accountable.
Bond, Robert M., Christopher J. Fariss, Jason J. Jones, Adam D.I. Kramer, Cameron Marlow, Jaime E.
Settle, and James H. Fowler. 2012. “A 61-million-person experiment in social influence and political
mobilization.” Nature 489(7415):295-298.
Main idea: social media messages directly influenced political self-expression, information seeking and
real-world voting behavior of millions of people.
●
The messages not only influenced the users who received them but also the users’ friends, and
friends of friends.
●
The effect of social transmission on real-world voting was greater than the direct effect of the
messages themselves, and nearly all the transmission occurred between ‘close friends’ who were
more likely to have a face-to-face relationship.
●
These results suggest that strong ties are instrumental for spreading both online and real-world
behaviour in human social networks.
Guriev, Sergei, Nikita Melnikov, and Ekaterina Zhuravskaya. 2021. “3G Internet and Confidence in
Government.” Quarterly Journal of Economics 136(4):2533-2613.
Questions to consider ahead of class:
How is digital media distinctive from its predecessors?
Are new media technologies a catalyst or a facilitator? If a facilitator, what else needs to be present to
activate protest – i.e. why at a particular moment? Does it complement or displace other forms of
leadership? Must it capitalize on events?
To what extent does the form of recent protests event like the Arab Spring or the BLM protests rely on
new communication technologies?
Do you believe new technologies (and access to them) ultimately benefit governments or political
organizers more?
Week 8, 10/25 – The production of news
Hamilton, James. 2004. "All the News That’s Fit to Print." Princeton University Press. (Pages 7-13 and
chapter 3)
Main Idea/Preface:
news is a commodity, shaped by forces of supply and demand, not a mirror image of
reality. This book explores the degree that market models can actually be used to predict the content of
news and evaluate its impact on society. Focusing on media economics shows how consumers’ desires
drive news coverage and how this conflicts with ideals of what news ought to be.
●
News coverage traditionally answer five questions, the “five Ws”: who what, where, when, and
why.
○
1. Who cares about a particular piece of information?
○
2. What are they willing to pay to find it, or what are others willing to pay to reach them?
○
3. Where can media outlets or advertisers reach these people?
○
4. When is it profitable to provide the information?
○
5. Why is this profitable?
●
Explores the power of market imperatives through three centuries of reporting, with different
media such as newspapers, radio, broadcast, and cable television, and the internet, across local
and national media markets.
●
News creation and distribution depend on the market value attached to the attention and tastes of
different individuals, the technologies affecting the cost of information generation and
transmission, and the values pursued by journalists and media owners.
Chapter 1:
●
Develops the set of economic ideas and models that explain how the market generates news
coverage and briefly discusses the policy levers available to influence media markets.
●
Raises the questions about what is information and what is news.
●
Defines news as the subset of information offered as news in the marketplace.
●
Use the market categories employed to devise Nielson ratings, define advertising rates, and
organize Internet sites.
●
Analysis focuses on news specifically relating to politics, government, and public affairs.
●
News is a public good, defined by a lack of both rivalry and exclusion in consumption, as in one
person’s consumption of a public good doesn’t diminish another and they can consume it without
paying for it.
●
News stories are an experience good, and are also highly differentiated products
●
High fixed cost/low variable cost
●
An individual will search out and consume information depending on the marginal cost and
benefits
●
Even information that appears free because its acquisition does not involve a monetary exchange
will involve an opportunity cost
●
Downs established that voters do not demand information on policy details and choose to remain
“rationally ignorant.”
●
The logic of free riding in politics predicts that an individual will not vote, since the likelihood of
making a difference is so small. The theory of rational ignorance says that a person will not learn
the details of policy since the returns for casting an informed ballot versus an uninformed ballot
are negligible.
●
Duty, diversion, and drama
will generate some expressed demand for news about government
and politics.
●
Anthony Downs (1957) showed that two parties in search of votes would similarly converge on
the middle of the road in their selection of policy positions
Chapter 3:
●
Martin, Gregory J., and Joshua McCrain. 2019. “Local news and national politics.” American Political
Science Review 113(2):372-384.
●
Main Idea: Find a substantial supply-side role in the trends toward nationalization and
polarization of political news, with negative implications for the accountability of local elected
officials and mass polarization.
○
Analyzed the content and viewership of 743 local news stations over the latter two-thirds
of 2017, a period that saw the acquisition of a set of local television stations by a large
conglomerate owner, the Sinclair Broadcast Group.
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○
acquisition led to a roughly three percentage point increase in the share of programming
devoted to coverage of national politics, a roughly 25% increase relative to the average
level in the sample. Furthermore, this increase came largely at the expense of coverage of
local politics.
○
We also find that text-based measures of ideological slant (Gentzkow and Shapiro 2010)
shifted to the right at Sinclair-acquired stations following the acquisition, relative to other
stations in the same market
■
If anything, viewers prefer the more locally focused and ideologically neutral
coverage to the more nationally focused and ideologically conservative coverage:
The existing Sinclair stations acquired prior to 2017 see significantly lower
viewership for their news broadcasts compared with other stations operating in
the same market, paying a ratings penalty of about one percentage point.
●
The level of journalistic resources dedicated to coverage of local politics is in a long-term decline
in the US news media, with readership shifting to national outlets
●
We investigate whether this trend is demand- or supply-driven, exploiting a recent wave of local
television station acquisitions by a conglomerate owner.
●
We find that the ownership change led to (1) substantial increases in coverage of national politics
at the expense of local politics, (2) a significant rightward shift in the ideological slant of
coverage, and (3) a small decrease in viewership, all relative to the changes at other news
programs airing in the same media markets
●
Economic changes in the production of news and greater national competition in the news market
could potentially be imposing negative externalities on the quality of local political information
available to citizens and consequently on the performance of local governments.
●
On the other hand, it is also possible that declines in local coverage are primarily demand- rather
than supply-driven.
●
In an age of increasing nationalization of elections, dedicated coverage of local politics may no
longer be as valuable to citizens asit once was.
●
The more closely do local elected officials’ positions align with those of their national party, the
more does information about national party leaders suffice for most readers’ purposes and the less
incremental value is there in coverage of local figures.
●
The long-term decline in local coverage may thus simply reflect adaptation by the news industry
as a whole to changes in audience tastes for political information
●
Whereas a 1970s news reader unhappy with her city paper’s local focus and seeking more
national coverage would have had limited and relatively high-cost alternatives, today’s news
reader can easily access a wide variety of national sources for low or no cost.
●
This greater opportunity for news consumers to choose their favored sources that modern news
media affords has led to a second kind of concern: that proliferation of media choice will lead to
increased ideological or partisan polarization of content
○
Emergence of highly partisan misinformation or fake news on social media in the 2016
election
○
Hatte, Sophie, Etienne Madinier, and Ekaterina Zhuravskaya. 2021. “Reading Twitter in the Newsroom:
How Social Media Affects Traditional-Media Reporting.” CEPR working paper.
●
Examines the influence of social media, particularly Twitter, on traditional media's reporting of
conflicts. The paper highlights the impact of social media on journalism and its role in shaping
news coverage, with a focus on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The study finds that online content
from the conflict zone affects the extent, tonality, and topics covered by US TV channels
reporting on the conflict. It also suggests that citizen journalism, facilitated by social media, can
change the way traditional media covers conflicts, emphasizing the suffering of civilians and
increasing the coverage of conflict-related stories.
Radsch, Courtney. 2022. “Making Big Tech Pay for the News They Use.” Center for International Media
Assistance.
Questions to consider ahead of class:
●
Is the content of independent media outlets driven more by audience demand, owner preferences,
or journalists and editors themselves?
●
How is the rise of social media changing journalism?
●
How problematic is the decline of traditional media outlets? Could this be reversed?
Week 9, 11/1 – Control of the media and censorship
Guriev, Sergei, and Daniel Treisman. 2022. Spin Dictators: The Changing Face of Tyranny in the 21st
Century. Princeton University Press. Chapter 4.
Guriev and Treisman write that softer, non-ideological autocracies are emerging, and the key to these
regimes is information. They want citizens to believe their competence, and therefore, rely on less violent
oppression and conceal more information. There is a gap in knowledge between the informed elite and the
general mass public. Oppression is still used but more discretely, with the reasons being economic
modernization and the spread of education. These informational autocrats utilize overlaps with population
by mimicking democracy, and they come into power in rigged elections while still trying to render
elections credible. They have a rhetoric of performance rather than violence. Violence is concealed
because it could harm their image, torture is less frequent, and they prosecute dissents for non-political
crimes rather than dissent. They want to have a reputation of competence and place emphasis on
economic performance and public service provision. Still, they have clear limitations to information
validity and disinformation making the regime vulnerable to downturns, but they focus on redirecting
blame to foreign enemies.
Rozenas, Arturas, and Denis Stukal. 2019. “How Autocrats Manipulate Economic News: Evidence from
Russia’s State-Controlled Television.” Journal of Politics 81(3):982-996.
Roberts, Margaret E. 2020. Censored: Distraction and Diversion Inside China's Great Firewall. Princeton
University Press. Chapter 2.
●
Flooding
●
Friction: make it hard to post things online or make internet slow; more spin dictator.
●
Fear: more outright blocking; more old-school dictator.
King, Gary, Jennifer Pan, and Margaret E. Roberts. 2014. “Reverse-engineering censorship in China:
Randomized experimentation and participant observation.” Science 6199(345):1-10.
China Social Media and Censorship
➔
King, Pan, and Roberts study social media in China before it is taken down
➔
Two theories of censorship
◆
Censor criticism of the state
◆
Censor attempts to promote collective action
➔
Studied more than 1 million posts in China and examined which ones were taken down and how
quickly
➔
“posts with negative, even vitriolic, criticism of the state, its leaders, and its policies are not more
likely to be censored.
➔
Instead, we show that the censorship program is aimed at curtailing collective action by silencing
comments that represent, reinforce, or spur social mobilization, regardless of content. Censorship
is oriented toward attempting to forestall collective activities that are occurring now or may occur
in the future—and, as such, seem to clearly expose government intent.”
➔
Block action more, block information less
Week 10, 11/8 – Social media, citizen welfare, and political polarization
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Sunstein, Cass R. 2017. #Republic: Divided Democracy in the Age of Social Media. Princeton University
Press. Chapter 3.
Nyhan, Brendan, Jaime Settle, Emily Thorson, Magdalena Wojcieszak, Pablo Barberá, Annie Y. Chen,
Hunt Allcott, Taylor Brown, Adriana Crespo-Tenorio, Drew Dimmery, Deen Freelon, Matthew
Gentzkow, Sandra González-Bailón, Andrew M. Guess, Edward Kennedy, Young Mie Kim, David Lazer,
Neil Malhotra, Devra Moehler, Jennifer Pan, Daniel Robert Thomas, Rebekah Tromble, Carlos Velasco
Rivera, Arjun Wilkins, Beixian Xiong, Chad Kiewiet de Jonge, Annie Franco, Winter Mason, Natalie
Jomini Stroud & Joshua A. Tucker. 2023. “Like-minded sources on Facebook are prevalent but
not polarizing.” Nature 620:137-144.
●
The paper “Like-minded sources on Facebook are prevalent but not polarizing” by Nyhan et al.
presents data from 2020 for the entire population of active adult Facebook users in the USA. The
study found that content from ‘like-minded’ sources constitutes the majority of what people see
on the platform, although political information and news represent only a small fraction of these
exposures.
●
To evaluate a potential response to concerns about the effects of echo chambers, the authors
conducted a multi-wave field experiment on Facebook among 23,377 users. They reduced
exposure to content from like-minded sources during the 2020 US presidential election by about
one-third12. The intervention increased their exposure to content from cross-cutting sources and
decreased exposure to uncivil language.
●
However, the intervention had no measurable effects on eight preregistered attitudinal measures
such as affective polarization, ideological extremity, candidate evaluations, and belief in false
claims12. These results suggest that although exposure to content from like-minded sources on
social media is common, reducing its prevalence during the 2020 US presidential election did not
correspondingly reduce polarization in beliefs or attitudes.
●
Discussion Question: Given the findings of this study, how might social media platforms better
design their algorithms to promote a more balanced and less polarized discourse? What other
factors beyond exposure to like-minded content might be contributing to the polarization
observed on these platforms?
Main Idea: The prevalence of politically like-minded sources on Facebook and the impact of reducing
exposure to such sources. There is concern that online echo chambers on social media, such as Facebook,
may be contributing to increased partisan polarization and hostility. Echo chambers are believed to form
when people are repeatedly exposed to content from like-minded sources while being shielded from
opposing viewpoints. The study conducted by the authors aims to address gaps in understanding the
prevalence and effects of exposure to congenial (like-minded) content on social media.
Summary of findings/discussions:
●
commonly held belief that Americans are trapped in online echo chambers that intensify political
polarization. It also explores the idea that social media platforms could mitigate this issue by
reducing exposure to politically like-minded content. The passage, however, argues that these
concerns and proposed solutions are based on largely untested assumptions.
●
The text presents evidence that many social media users indeed consume content from politically
like-minded sources. It acknowledges that only a small fraction of content on Facebook explicitly
deals with politics or news, and few users exhibit extremely high exposure to like-minded
sources. Nevertheless, a majority of content seen by active adult Facebook users in the US
originates from politically like-minded friends or groups, reinforcing partisan identities even
when the content is not explicitly political.
●
The passage reports the results of a field experiment showing that changes in social media
algorithms can significantly reduce exposure to like-minded content, along with uncivil and
misinformation-related content. However, these changes cannot fully offset users' inclination to
seek and engage with congenial information. Surprisingly, the experiment found that reducing
exposure to like-minded content on Facebook had no substantial impact on various political
attitudes, such as polarization and ideological extremity.
●
Several potential explanations for these results are offered, including the limited role of social
media in overall information consumption, the difficulty of changing political beliefs, and the
ethical decision to reduce, rather than increase, exposure to like-minded content. The passage also
calls for future research to investigate other aspects of social media's impact, explore why some
individuals are exposed to large amounts of like-minded information, and conduct replications in
different countries with distinct political systems and information environments.
●
In summary, the passage challenges the popular narrative that social media echo chambers are the
primary cause of contemporary American democracy's problems. It suggests that algorithmic
changes to decrease exposure to like-minded sources may not be a straightforward solution,
indicating that social media content may reflect identity more than it shapes opinions.
Key Points:
●
The rise in political polarization and animosity, often attributed to the existence of online echo
chambers on social media platforms, is a growing concern, especially since the 2016 US
presidential election. Platforms like Facebook are believed to contribute to extremism by
repeatedly presenting users with content from sources that share their political beliefs, while
limiting exposure to opposing viewpoints, which could promote moderation and tolerance. This
study aims to assess how frequently people encounter content from like-minded sources on
Facebook and examines the potential effects of reducing exposure to such content through a
large-scale field experiment.
●
The research addresses three key knowledge gaps. First, there is a lack of systematic measures of
content exposure on platforms like Facebook, making it challenging for researchers to access
such data. Second, although surveys have found associations between consuming like-minded
content and holding polarized attitudes, there is limited causal evidence to establish a direct link.
Finally, it's unclear whether reducing exposure to like-minded content leads to increased exposure
to content from sources with different political leanings or has unintended consequences.
●
The study involves analyzing data from active adult Facebook users in the USA to understand the
prevalence of exposure to content from politically like-minded sources. Additionally, it reports
the results of an experiment aimed at reducing exposure to such content on Facebook and
evaluates its effects on users' beliefs and attitudes over time. The study involves collaboration
between Meta researchers and academics, with the academic authors having final say on the
analysis plan.
●
Key findings from the research indicate that the majority of content that Facebook users see
comes from like-minded sources, and an experimental intervention reducing exposure to such
content leads to decreased engagement with it. However, this intervention only modestly
increases exposure to content from cross-cutting sources. Importantly, reducing exposure to
like-minded content has no measurable impact on various attitudinal measures, such as
ideological extremity and party affiliation.
●
The study concludes that while many Facebook users are exposed to content from like-minded
sources, extreme echo chamber patterns of exposure are rare. The intervention successfully
reduces exposure to like-minded content but does not have a significant impact on users' political
attitudes.
●
Treatment effects on content exposure: The impact of the treatment on participants' exposure to
content from like-minded sources is demonstrated in Figure 2. As intended, the treatment
significantly decreased exposure to content from like-minded sources during the treatment period,
which lasted from September 24 to December 23, 2020. In the treatment group, the average
exposure to like-minded content dropped to 36.2%, while it remained steady at 53.7% in the
control group (P < 0.01). Exposure levels remained relatively constant during the treatment period
in both groups, with a brief increase in the treatment group's exposure to like-minded content on
November 2 and November 3 due to technical issues (see Supplementary Information, section
4.11 for details).
●
Our key findings are depicted in Figure 3, illustrating the effects of the treatment on exposure to
different types of content during the treatment period (Figure 3a), the total number of interactions
with that content (Figure 3b), the engagement rate with content based on exposure (Figure 3c),
and survey-based measurements of post-election attitudes (Figure 3d; Extended Data Table 3
provides the corresponding point estimates from Figure 3; Supplementary Information, section
1.4 offers measurement details).
●
As shown in Figure 3a, the reduction in exposure to like-minded content from 53.7% to 36.2%
corresponds to a difference of 0.77 s.d. (95% confidence interval: -0.80, -0.75). Total daily views
also decreased by 0.05 s.d. among treated participants (95% confidence interval: -0.08, -0.02). To
put this in perspective, an average control group participant had 267 total content views on a
typical day, with 143 from like-minded sources. In contrast, an average participant in the
treatment group had 92 out of 255 total content views from like-minded sources on an average
day (Supplementary Tables 33 and 40).
●
However, this reduction in exposure to like-minded sources did not result in a corresponding
increase in exposure to content from sources with different political leanings (cross-cutting
sources), which increased from 20.7% in the control group to 27.9% in the treatment group, an
increase of 0.43 s.d. (95% confidence interval: 0.40, 0.46). Instead, respondents in the treatment
group saw a more significant relative increase in exposure to content from sources categorized as
neither like-minded nor cross-cutting. Exposure to such content rose from 25.6% to 35.9%, a
change of 0.68 s.d. (95% confidence interval: 0.65, 0.71).
●
Figure 3a also indicates that reducing exposure to like-minded sources led to decreased exposure
to content classified as containing one or more derogatory words by 0.04 s.d. (95% confidence
interval: -0.06, -0.02), content categorized as uncivil by 0.15 s.d. (95% confidence interval: -0.18,
-0.13), and content from misinformation repeat offenders (sources identified by Facebook as
repeatedly posting misinformation) by 0.10 s.d. (95% confidence interval: -0.13, -0.08). In
practical terms, the average proportion of exposures decreased from 0.034% to 0.030% for
content with derogatory words (a reduction of 0.01 views per day on average), from 3.15% to
2.81% for uncivil content (a reduction of 1.24 views per day on average), and from 0.76% to
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0.55% for content from misinformation repeat offenders (a reduction of 0.62 views per day on
average). Lastly, the treatment decreased exposure to civic content (-0.05 s.d.; 95% confidence
interval: -0.08, -0.03) and increased exposure to news content (0.05 s.d., 95% confidence interval:
0.02, 0.07) (see Supplementary Information, section 1.3 for details on how uncivil content,
content with derogatory words, and misinformation repeat offenders are measured).
●
Treatment effects on content engagement: The effects of the treatment (reducing exposure to
content from like-minded sources) on how participants interact with content on Facebook are
examined in two ways: 'total engagement' and 'engagement rate.' Figure 3b presents the effects of
the treatment on total engagement with content, which includes the total number of actions taken
that are defined as 'passive' (clicks, reactions, and likes) or 'active' (comments and reshares).
Figure 3c displays the effects of the treatment on the engagement rate, which is the likelihood of
engaging with the content based on exposure.
●
These two measures do not necessarily change in tandem. As reported below, participants in the
treatment group had less total engagement with content from like-minded sources (since they
were intentionally seeing less of it), but their engagement rate was higher than that of the control
group, indicating that they interacted more frequently with the like-minded content they were
exposed to.
●
Figure 3b shows that the intervention did not significantly affect the time spent on Facebook
(-0.02 s.d., 95% confidence interval: -0.050, 0.004) but did reduce total engagement with content
from like-minded sources. This reduction was observed for both passive and active engagement
with like-minded content, which decreased by 0.24 s.d. (95% confidence interval: -0.27, -0.22)
and 0.12 s.d. (95% confidence interval: -0.15, -0.10), respectively. Conversely, participants in the
treatment condition engaged more with cross-cutting sources: passive and active engagement
increased by 0.11 s.d. (95% confidence interval: 0.08, 0.14) and 0.04 s.d. (95% confidence
interval: 0.01, 0.07), respectively. Finally, we observed a decrease in passive engagement but no
decrease in active engagement with content from misinformation repeat offenders (for passive
engagement, -0.07 s.d., 95% confidence interval: -0.10, -0.04; for active engagement, -0.02 s.d.,
95% confidence interval: -0.05, 0.01).
●
When individuals in the treatment group did encounter content from like-minded sources in their
Facebook feed, their engagement rate was higher than that of the control group. Figure 3c shows
that, given exposure, passive and active engagement with like-minded content increased by 0.04
s.d. (95% confidence interval: 0.02, 0.06) and 0.13 s.d. (95% confidence interval: 0.08, 0.17),
respectively. Furthermore, although treated participants saw more content from cross-cutting
sources overall, they were less likely to engage with the content they encountered: passive
engagement decreased
Allcott, Hunt, Luca Braghieri, Sarah Eichmeyer, and Matthew Gentzkow. 2020. “The Welfare Effects of
Social Media.” American Economic Review 110(3):629-676.
Bessone Tepedino, Pedro, Filipe Campante, Claudio Ferraz, and Pedro Souza. 2022. “Social Media and
the Behavior of Politicians: Evidence from Facebook in Brazil.” Working paper.
Questions to consider ahead of class:
• Is social media good for individuals or society? Does it vary by society?
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• Is social media special in terms of creating “echo chambers” to facilitating
political polarization and hate? Do they really make a difference?
• How are the communication strategies of politicians altered by social media?
• What policy solutions might be viable to harness good outcomes and limit bad?
Week 11, 11/15 – Misinformation and fact-checking
Jerit, Jennifer, and Yangzi Zhao. 2020. “Political misinformation.” Annual Review of
Political Science 23:77-94.
➔
Misinformation: incorrect, but confidently held, political beliefs.
➔
When people firmly hold beliefs that happen to be wrong, efforts to correct them will be met with
resistance.
◆
Correction should be difficult because people cling to misinformation for both
motivational and cognitive reasons.
◆
Positive relationship between inaccuracy and confidence
➔
The motivational component of political misinformation implies that the prospects for correcting
false beliefs are dim
➔
People might share information online might not actually reflect their beliefs they just post to
maintain a facade.
Porter, Ethan, and Thomas J. Wood. 2021. “The global effectiveness of fact-checking: Evidence from
simultaneous experiments in Argentina, Nigeria, South Africa, and the United Kingdom.” Proceedings of
the National Academy of Sciences 118(37):e2104235118.
●
Misinformation doesn’t really have a large effect but correcting misinformation does have a larger
impact
●
In total, we evaluated 22 fact-checks, including two that were tested in all four countries.
Fact-checking reduced belief in misinformation, with most effects still apparent more than 2 wk
later. A meta-analytic procedure indicates that factchecks reduced belief in misinformation by at
least 0.59 points on a 5-point scale. Exposure to misinformation, however, only increased false
beliefs by less than 0.07 points on the same scale.
●
Across continents, fact-checks reduce belief in misinformation, often durably so.
Guess, Andrew M., Michael Lerner, Benjamin Lyons, Jacob M. Montgomery, Brendan Nyhan, Jason
Reifler, and Neelanjan Sircar. 2020. “A digital media literacy intervention increases discernment between
mainstream and false news in the United States and India.” Proceedings of the National Academy of
Sciences 117(27):15536-15545.
●
People using social media less are more vulnerable to misinformation.
●
Interventions were not as successful— some populations were not very responsive to digital
literary trainings.
Pennycook, Gordon, Ziv Epstein, Mohsen Mosleh, Antonio A. Arechar, Dean Eckles, and David G. Rand.
2021. “Shifting attention to accuracy can reduce misinformation online.” Nature 592(7855):590-595.
●
We found a dissociation between accuracy judgments and sharing intentions that suggests that
people may share news that they do not necessarily have a firm belief in.
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●
As a consequence, people’s beliefs may not be as partisan as their social media feeds seem to
indicate.
Questions to consider ahead of class:
• What is misinformation, and how prevalent is it?
• Does misinformation produce real harms or is harmless fun?
• How, if at all, can the prevalence of misinformation be combated? What types of interventions would be
most effective? Which could be scaled?
• If the prevalence of misinformation cannot easily be combated, how can its damage be mitigated? What
other types of interventions are needed?
No class, 11/22 – Thanksgiving break
Week 12, 11/29 – Student presentation session I
Week 13, 12/6 – Student presentation session II
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Questions to consider ahead of class:
• To what extent are autocrats limited in their capacity to influence shape what their citizens believe and
do? When will autocrats allow for truthful news reporting?
• How and why do autocrats differ in their restrictions on the media?
• Has the rise of social media made it easier to harder to control media in autocratic contexts?
• What, if anything, could restrict autocratic control of the media?
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