Like-minded Information Research Articles

To whom do people reply in comment sections? Effects of attitude (un)congeniality, age, confidence, and knowledge

Phenomena like echo chambers and societal polarization have often been linked to an individual preference for like-minded information (selective exposure). This view has been challenged recently: behavior on comment sections in online forums suggests the opposite dynamic, with users more likely to reply to attitudinally uncongenial content. Three experimental studies (total N = 1524) explore boundary conditions of this uncongeniality bias by measuring participants’ tendency to reply to comments on climate science. Studies 1 (student sample) and 2 (non-student sample) replicate the uncongeniality bias. However, Study 3 (representative for age and gender in Germany) yielded a surprising congeniality bias (a preference for replying to congenial comments) which was driven by participants with higher age. Further results across studies suggest that high confidence increases engagement (general likelihood to reply) but reduces antagonism (likelihood to reply to uncongenial content). Conversely, high knowledge reduces engagement but increases the uncongeniality bias.

Generic or Specific Search Terms: What Do Citizens Type in the Google Search Bar to Obtain Political Information?

ABSTRACT Facing a policy issue, citizens use search engines such as Google to seek political information. Although some scholars have expressed concern that higher user control, and high choice might induce selectivity, existing literature has neglected the role of search terms in the echo chamber debate. This study applied two cross-section surveys during two referendum votes to expose respondents to mock Google webpages (N = 728; N = 820). With thematic coding analysis and logistic regressions, the study indicates that citizens rarely use the search bar to search for only like-minded information sources and that individual-level characteristics are not drivers of search terms. Though search terms foresee self-selection in the results’ page for some motivated citizens, ranking remains the main driver of self-selection for most citizens.

The Effects of the COVID-19 Outbreak on Selective Exposure: Evidence from 17 Countries

ABSTRACT A widely believed claim is that citizens tend to selectively expose themselves to like-minded information. However, when individuals find the information useful, they are more likely to consume cross-cutting sources. While crises such as terror attacks and pandemics can enhance the utility of cross-cutting information, empirical evidence on the role of real-world external threats in selective exposure is scarce. This paper examines the COVID-19 pandemic as a case study to test the extent to which citizens were exposed to information from cross-cutting sources on traditional and social media after the outbreak. Utilizing a two-wave panel survey among 14,218 participants across 17 countries – conducted before and after the initial outbreak – we show that citizens concerned about COVID-19 were more exposed to cross-cutting information on traditional and social media. The positive relationship with cross-cutting exposure to traditional news was stronger in countries where governments adopted less stringent policy responses, and in countries with greater pandemic severity and weaker democratic institutions. Our comparative approach thus sheds light on the social and political contexts in which cross-cutting exposure can occur.

Judging “Them” by My Media Use: Exploring the Cause and Consequences of Perceived Selective Exposure

ABSTRACT Focusing on Hong Kong’s anti-extradition bill movement and drawing on a sample of 527 pro-democracy Hong Kong students, this paper investigates the relations among selective exposure, perceived selective exposure, presumed media influence, and their potential consequences. It shows that individuals’ assumption of the outgroup’s media diet is a mirror image of their own media choices. The more an individual consumes like-minded information, the more he/she expects outgroup members to do so. On the contrary, the more one uses cross-cutting media, the more he/she expects outgroup members to engage in cross-cutting exposure as well. Individuals’ perceived media exposure of the outgroup will further influence their presumed media influence on the outgroup, which may trigger potential attitudinal and behavioral reactions. The findings shed new light on the consequences of selective exposure. Besides directly influencing us through pro-attitudinal information, selective exposure can also affect us indirectly, by making us believe that our rivals are also engaging in and polarized by selective exposure to ideologically congruent sources.

The Interplay of Online Network Homogeneity, Populist Attitudes, and Conspiratorial Beliefs: Empirical Evidence From a Survey on German Facebook Users

AbstractSocial networking sites are suspected to impede the communication between members of different political camps and thereby increase network homogeneity. This homogeneity can be a result of humans’ tendency to process information in confirmatory ways—a characteristic which is also ascribed to populist citizens and those who hold conspiratorial beliefs. It is hypothesized that populist views and conspiratorial beliefs are associated with higher exposure to like-minded information within Facebook. An online survey with German Facebook users (N = 469) revealed that populist attitudes are positively associated with conspiratorial beliefs but negatively associated with homogeneity. Conspiratorial beliefs are unrelated to homogeneity. Findings are discussed in the light of extant research.

The Role of News Brands and Leads in Exposure to Political Information on the Internet

Today, the internet serves a wealth of news sources that encourages selective exposure to attitude-consistent and likeminded information. Several cues have been proposed to influence selective exposure, including partisanship, familiarity, and differential framing techniques. This study investigates the effects of news brand partisanship and news lead partisanship on selective exposure behaviors to internet news stories. With online news, it is possible that news brands believed to have a particular partisan bias may feature stories with an opposite partisan bias. This paper asks which of the two tested selective exposure cues used in this study participants respond to in an online news search environment. Using a non-college adult sample of 382 participants, this study confirms that selective exposure behavior is robust in a simulated news search environment and that news brand partisanship is a more powerful predictor of exposure than is news lead partisanship. The study finds, however, that the news brand effect on selective exposure is diminished when the news brand partisanship and news lead conflict with one another. The implications of the findings are discussed, and future directions for research are proposed.

Homophily, group size, and the diffusion of political information in social networks: Evidence from Twitter

We investigate the role of homophily – a tendency to interact with similar individuals–in the diffusion of political information in social networks. We develop a model predicting disproportionate exposure to like-minded information and that larger groups have more connections and are exposed to more information. To test these hypotheses, we use data on links and communications between politically-engaged Twitter users. We find that users affiliated with majority political groups, relative to the minority group, have more connections, are exposed to more information, and are exposed to information more quickly. Likewise, we find that users are disproportionately exposed to like-minded information and that information reaches like-minded users more quickly.

Causes and Consequences of Selective Exposure Among Political Blog Readers: The Role of Hostile Media Perception in Motivated Media Use and Expressive Participation

ABSTRACTConcerns about selective exposure to partisan information have become a mainstay for scholars of political communication in the changing media environment. This study draws on a survey of a unique population—readers of political blogs—to explore the relationship between perceptions of mainstream media bias (as hostile media perception) and selective exposure to media sources that provide like-minded information as well as social support. We find that hostile media perception is an important motivator for partisan selective exposure among this audience, and also that such perceptions can lead indirectly to expressive political participation by encouraging visits to politically homogeneous online spaces.

Political Television Hosts on Twitter: Examining Patterns of Interconnectivity and Self-Exposure in Twitter Political Talk Networks

This study takes a social networks approach to studying the Twitter talk evoked by politically oriented cable television hosts. Two aspects of user interactions are examined: the interconnectedness of users as an indication for users' networks of exchange of opinions and information, and exposure to a political diversity of information sources. Findings suggest that users prefer exposing themselves to politically like-minded information sources. Furthermore, television hosts failed to evoke an exchange of opinions and ideas among their followers. In contrast, other information sources that reported about these hosts evoked denser interaction among their followers.

Captain Cook versus the tadpole - the captain wins hands down

In the field of corporate information there is a proliferation of terms and descriptions aimed at designating a wide range of jobs and functions in terms of their being associated with ‘information’ or ‘knowledge’. If information professionals are to ensure that they have a role to play in the corporate information/knowledge scene it is essential that they gain an understanding of who they are, what they are and what they should be doing. Information professionals can also gain further insights by observing those with other duties who also claim that they are working in the information/knowledge field and informing the rest of their profession about what this is likely to portend for the future. One definition of the information professional that is offered is the author’s personal one that it involves working extensively with data to transfer it up the value chain to convert it into knowledge and this is taken as the starting point for a discussion of how and why he moved on from the information industry and ceased to be an information professional. It is argued that the ever-expanding knowledge economy will provide people with opportunities that did not exist until relatively recently. Information professionals can now move away from pure information environments, such as libraries and research teams, and explore hitherto unknown parts of their organizations. The article concludes that, if people are to help themselves to develop as information professionals, and to develop the information profession as a whole, it is necessary for them to seek out groups of other like-minded information professionals who have other approaches to their professions and different ways of defining it.