Political Polarisation on Social Media and Social Trust amongst Voters: Analysing the Moderating Effect of Media Efficacy

Party Identity and the Evaluation of Political Candidates

Background: Social media has transformed political news consumption, particularly among urban youth in Kathmandu, Nepal, displacing traditional media (TV, newspapers). Platforms like Facebook, YouTube, and X facilitate real-time engagement but amplify risks of filter bubbles, echo chambers, misinformation, and declining trust in journalism. Nepal’s rapid internet growth (15% annually) intensifies these dynamics, yet rural areas remain reliant on traditional sources. Objective: This study investigates (a) how social media alters political news consumption patterns (frequency, platform preference, engagement) in Kathmandu, and (b) its relationship with public trust in news sources. Methods: A comprehensive literature review analyzed secondary data from academic journals, reports (e.g., Pew Research, NTA), and regional studies. Thematic synthesis identified trends and challenges, framed through Uses and Gratifications Theory, Media Dependency Theory, Social Cognitive Theory, and Social Responsibility Theory. Findings: Platform Dominance: Facebook, YouTube, and X are primary news sources for Kathmandu’s youth, valued for interactivity and real-time updates. Trust Challenges: Algorithmic personalization fosters echo chambers and exposure to unverified content, eroding trust in both social and traditional media. Traditional Media Coexistence: While social media use surges, traditional media (especially radio/TV) retains significance in rural Nepal despite urban decline. Theoretical Insights: UGT explains preference for social media’s convenience; Media Dependency and Social Cognitive theories highlight its influence on perceptions and behaviors; Social Responsibility Theory underscores the tension with journalistic standards. Risks: Rapid information sharing enables misinformation proliferation and political polarization, exacerbated by low digital literacy. Conclusion: Social media is the dominant vector for political news among Kathmandu’s youth, offering accessibility and engagement but significantly threatening information integrity through filter bubbles, misinformation, and diminished trust. Traditional media persists in rural contexts. Responsible platform design, media literacy initiatives, and adaptation by traditional outlets are critical to mitigate risks and support informed citizenship. Novelty: This study uniquely synthesizes the interplay of social media consumption, trust dynamics, and theoretical frameworks (UGT, Media Dependency, Social Cognitive, Social Responsibility) within the under-researched context of Nepal’s evolving media landscape, focusing explicitly on Kathmandu’s urban demographic.

Bounded generalized reciprocity (BGR) predicts that people cooperate to maintain a positive reputation with ingroup, but not outgroup, members—and this explains ingroup favoritism in cooperation. We propose that the benefits of maintaining a positive reputation are not limited by group boundaries and so people may cooperate to maintain a good reputation among outgroup members when they will meet and interact with members of that group again. According to this unbounded indirect reciprocity perspective, reputation can promote cooperation with both ingroup and outgroup members. Alternatively, social identity theory (SIT) favors social identity versus reputation as an explanation for cooperation among ingroup members. We test these hypotheses across five studies (Ns=619, 607, 613, 360, and 615) that manipulate reputation, social identification, and partner's group membership in a cooperative decision making task. Across our studies, people were more cooperative with both ingroup and outgroup members when their reputation was at stake (Studies 1–5), and reputational concern mediated the effect of cues of gossip on cooperation in interactions with ingroup and outgroup members (Studies 1–4). Social identification did not affect cooperation with ingroup members. We discuss the theoretical and practical implications of the indirect benefits of cooperation that can transcend group boundaries.

IntroductionPolitical polarization has increased in the USA within recent years. Studies have shown Republicans are less likely to accept COVID-19 vaccinations than Democrats; however, little is known regarding the association between COVID-19 vaccination acceptance and political polarization.MethodsWe used data from a nationally-representative survey of 1427 participants conducted between 9 February 2021 and 17 February 2021. We estimated multivariate-adjusted odds ratios for COVID-19 vaccination intent and receipt according to perceived political polarization (measured as the perceived size of the ideological gap between Democrats and Republicans), political party affiliation, and social trust, controlling for demographic and socioeconomic factors.ResultsAmong participants perceiving high levels of polarization, Republicans (versus Democrats) reported a 90% lower odds of vaccination intent (OR = 0.10 [0.05, 0.19], P < 0.001). Participants with high (versus low) social trust and low perceived polarization had a 2-folder higher vaccination intent (OR = 2.39 [1.34, 4.21], P = 0.003); this association was substantially weaker in the high perceived polarization group.ConclusionsHigh perceived levels of political polarization appear to magnify the decrease in the odds of receiving the COVID-19 vaccine and the intent to get vaccinated among Republicans versus Democrats. Political polarization may further attenuate the protective associations of high social capital with vaccination.

In past leadership research using common resource dilemmas, most researchers have studied the behavior of participants who identified as the leader. Individuals labeled tended to harvest more commonresources and impede the implementation of the public interest (De Cremer, 2003; De Cremer Van Dijk, 2005; Van Dijk De Cremer, 2006). Less is known, however, about the effects of establishing a leader on the behavior of the participants. If the betrayal of the leader could stimulate the self-restraint behavior of the group members, then the establishing a leader might promote the realization of the public interest. Three experiments were used to examine the impact of a leader’s behavior on the group member’s decision making. Experiments 1 manipulated the presence or absence of a leader and tested how the different behavior of a leader or common group member would influence the group member’s decision. Participants showed more self-restraint behavior when a leader showed the betrayal than when a common group member showed the betrayal. The participants also found the leader’s betrayal fairer, and regarded the leader as out-group member. Experiment 1 didn’t find the explanatory differences between Equity Theory and Social Identity Theory. Experiment 2 was conducted to evaluate the group member’s reaction to appointed and elected leaders. Participants showed more self-restraint behavior when an appointed leader showed the betrayal than when an elected leader did so. The participants also found the betrayal of the elected leader fairer, and regarded the appointed leader as out-group member. Experiment 2 confirmed the explanatory power of Social Identity Theory. Experiment 3 tested the impact of the betrayal of the in-group and out-group elected leader to the group member, in order to examine the Social Identity Theory. Participants showed more self-restraint behavior when out-group elected leader showed the betrayal. In contrast, when the in-group elected leader showed the betrayal, participants did not show self-restraint behavior. The results from all three experiments supported the hypotheses and suggested implications for organization management. Elected leaders should display justice and try to avoid the pursuit of personal interest. Leaders also should keep distance from their subordinates in some circumstances. Future research on leadership using the social dilemmas could evaluate the effects of personal variables.

POLITICAL POLARIZATION AND ITS IMPACT ON MENTAL HEALTH: WHERE DO WE STAND?

The current article explains why netizens are escaping the political polarization observed in their activities on social media during the 2014 and 2019 Indonesian presidential elections. The research data were obtained from in-depth interviews with a number of netizens who were activists on social media and engaged in political polarization. The existing political polarization had been bolstered by netizen’s activities that were rampant across various echo chambers, which were established and driven by ideological and affective elements. Netizens succeeded in escaping the existing political polarization on account of promises broken by the pair of presidential-vice presidential candidates they supported and due to a natural drive of the election being over. Nevertheless, this article reveals that netizen’s escape from political polarization on social media does not necessarily suggest the end of the existing political polarization. The present study found that netizen’s political polarization on social media has shifted to political polarization awareness and latent political polarization. This clarifies that the existing political polarization has simply evolved into a new political polarization. The findings in this research may have implications on factors that threaten democracy in the general election system or new relations of political communication in the era of new media.

Recommender systems are an effective solution to the information overload problem, especially in the World Wide Web where we gather vast information from anonymous people around the world. Trust enhanced recommender system to be promising to overcome the cold-start and sparsity challenges of traditional recommender system as well as improving the accuracy of the recommendations. This arise a research focus about blending of the trust information and trust level prediction to the recommendation framework. From the past decade, numerous researches were done to adapt online social network trust (simply social trust) for many web applications, including e-commerce, P2P networks, multi-agent systems, recommendation systems, and service-oriented computing. Usually, online social trust prediction can be based on two mechanisms to acquire trust value: evaluating trustee on basis of truster / truster's neighbor trust experience information (local trust), otherwise evaluating trustee on the basis of the whole social network trust experience information as reputation (global trust). Here, we leverage social science theories to develop the trust models that enable the study of online social trust evolution. In this paper, we propose a matrix factorization based trust enhanced recommendation system which properly incorporates both local trust and global trust with diffusion of the social trust multi-aspects to improve the quality of recommendations for mitigating the data sparsity and the cold-start issues. Through experiments on the Epinions data set, we show that our model outperforms its standard trust enhanced counterparts with respect to accuracy on recommender systems.

This chapter applies social identity analysis to social capital theory in order to explain trust and conflict in social networks. It reformulates Putnam's bridging-bonding social capital distinction in terms of the relational social identities-categorical social identities distinction, and represents individuals as socially embedded by explaining them in social identity terms. The goal of the argument is to show how an individual-social group dynamic which social identity theory examines interacts with a conflict-trust dynamic which social capital theory examines. Different types of individual motivation are linked to different social capital-social identity forms. Social group conflict is explained in connection with social psychology's stigma identity-threat model. Individual response to identity conflict is explained in terms of cognitive dissonance reduction.

Social Identity, Psychology of

BackgroundCOVID-19-related information on social media is overabundant and sometimes questionable, resulting in an “infodemic” during the pandemic. While previous studies suggest social media usage increases the risk of developing anxiety symptoms, how induced anxiety affects attitudes and behaviors is less discussed, let alone during a global pandemic. Little is known about the relationship between older adults using social media during a pandemic and their anxiety, their attitudes toward social trust in information, and behaviors to avoid contracting COVID-19.ObjectiveThe goal of this study was to investigate the associations between using social media for COVID-19-related information and anxiety symptoms as well as the mediation effect of anxiety symptoms on social trust in information and COVID-safe behaviors among older adults.MethodsA cross-sectional telephone survey was conducted in Hong Kong between May and August 2020. A rapid warm-call protocol was developed to train social workers and volunteers from participant nongovernmental organizations to conduct the telephone surveys. Questions related to COVID-safe behaviors, social trust in information, social media use, anxiety and depressive symptoms, and sociodemographic information were asked. The number of confirmed COVID-19 cases at the community level was used to account for the risk of contracting COVID-19. Ordinary least squares regressions examined the associations between social media use and anxiety symptoms, and how they were associated with social trust in information and COVID-safe behaviors. Structural equation modeling further mapped out these relationships to identify the mediation effects of anxiety symptoms.ResultsThis study collected information regarding 3421 adults aged 60 years and older. Use of social media for COVID-19-related information was associated with more anxiety symptoms and lower social trust in information but had no significant relationship with COVID-safe behaviors. Anxiety symptoms predicted lower social trust in information and higher COVID-safe behaviors. Lower social trust in information was predicted by using social media for COVID-19 information, mediated by anxiety symptoms, while no mediation effect was found for COVID-safe behaviors.ConclusionsOlder adults who rely on social media for COVID-19-related information exhibited more anxiety symptoms, while showing mixed effects on attitudes and behaviors. Social trust in information may be challenged by unverified and contradictory information online. The negligible impact on COVID-safe behaviors suggested that social media may have caused more confusion than consolidating a consistent effort against the pandemic. Media literacy education is recommended to promote critical evaluation of COVID-19-related information and responsible sharing among older adults.

This study examines the relationship between social media use, disease risk perception, social and political trust, and out-group stereotyping and prejudice during a social upheaval. Analyses of primary data collected during the COVID-19 outbreak in Singapore found that disease risk perception is positively related to stereotyping and prejudice against Chinese immigrants. Individuals who used social media for news were more likely to stereotype and express prejudice. However, those who engaged in frequent heterogenous discussions, and had more extensive social networks, were less likely to stereotype and express prejudice. Higher social and political trust was also associated with lower stereotyping and prejudice. Finally, moderation effects of network characteristics on the relationship between risk perception, social trust, and prejudice were observed.

Social media platforms enable like‐minded users to form online groups, interact and thereby contribute to ideological polarisation. However, online groups also polarise along a continuum of liking or affect for their group compared to other groups. We explore affective polarisation on social media and its implications for online intergroup interaction. Using social identity theory, we investigate the effects of group identification, passion, and affective polarisation on social media users' intergroup approach and avoidance tendencies. We test the research model in the context of political groups on social media. We find group identification contributes to affective polarisation by strengthening favouritism for the ingroup rather than hostility for the outgroup. Although those with greater group identification prefer to confront (approach) the opposition group on social media, the behaviour is a function of inflated feelings for the ingroup more so than animus for the outgroup. Interestingly, users with greater affective polarisation tend to shut out (avoid) the rival group on social media. Our findings imply affective polarisation contributes to group isolation that may exacerbate ideological polarisation.

Much of human learning happens in the social world. A person's social identity-the groups to which they belong, the people with whom they identify-is a powerful cue that can affect our goal-directed behaviors, often implicitly. In the present experiment, we explored the underlying neural mechanisms driving these processes, testing hypotheses derived from social identity theory. In a within-subjects design, participants underwent a minimal group manipulation where they were randomly assigned to an arbitrary ingroup. In two blocks of the experiment, participants were asked to complete a task for money while being observed by an ingroup member and outgroup member separately. Results revealed that being observed by an ingroup or outgroup member led to divergent patterns of neural activity associated with feedback monitoring, namely the feedback-related negativity (FRN). Receiving feedback in the presence of an ingroup member produced a typical FRN signal, but the FRN was dampened while receiving feedback in the presence of an outgroup member. Further, this differentiated neural pattern was exaggerated in people who reported greater intergroup bias. Together, the mere presence of a person can alter how the brain adaptively monitors feedback, impairing the reinforcement learning signal when the person observing is an outgroup member.

&#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; This scientific article investigates the construction of political identity through hashtag movements on Instagram, focusing on the "#kadrun" hashtag related to Anies Baswedan, a presidential candidate for the 2024 election in Indonesia. Using the framing analysis method by Zhong Dang Pan and Gerald M. Kosicky, the study examines the structural dimensions of political identity content by observing and analyzing the hashtag from October 3, 2022, to May 3, 2023. The results reveal three Instagram accounts actively contributing and acting as political identity buzzers, uploading 89 to 92 contents within seven months. The hashtag frames Anies Baswedan and his supporters as a radical Islamic group, seeking to establish a caliphate, and intolerant, potentially leading to political polarization based on religion, community, and ethnicity in the upcoming election. These findings hold implications for understanding the impact of social media content on political discourse and polarization, especially among young active voters who rely on Instagram as a source of information during elections.&#x0D; Highlight:&#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; Research Scope: The study explores the construction of political identity on social media, particularly through hashtag movements on Instagram related to the 2024 presidential candidate in Indonesia, Anies Baswedan, and the "#kadrun" hashtag.&#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; Framing Analysis: Utilizing the framing analysis method by Zhong Dang Pan and Gerald M. Kosicky, the research examines the structural dimensions of political identity content on Instagram, focusing on message characteristics and content design from October 3, 2022, to May 3, 2023.&#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; The hashtag spreads messages identifying Anies Baswedan as a radical Islamic group, causing potential religious-based political polarization, as seen in the 2019 Election. Additionally, ethnic elements now contribute to polarization based on religion, community, and ethnicity in the 2024 elections.&#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; Keyword: Political Identity, Social Media, Hashtag Movements, Instagram, Political Polarization.&#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D; &#x0D;