Group Epistemology and Structural Factors in Online Group Polarization

Episteme ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 1-16
Author(s):  
Kenneth Boyd

Abstract There have been many discussions recently from philosophers, cognitive scientists, and psychologists about group polarization, with online and social media environments in particular receiving a lot of attention, both because of people's increasing reliance on such environments for receiving and exchanging information and because such environments often allow individuals to selectively interact with those who are like-minded. My goal here is to argue that the group epistemologist can facilitate understanding the kinds of factors that drive group polarization in a way that has been overlooked by the existing research. Specifically, I argue that polarization can occur in part because of the ways that members of a group treat the group itself (as opposed to an individual member within that group) as a source of information, and in doing so makes their own position, as well as that of the group, more extreme. I refer to this as a structural factor in driving polarization, and argue that such factors can contribute to explanations of polarization that occurs specifically in an important subset of groups, namely online and social media groups in which little is known about other members within the group, what I refer to as anonymous, semi-anonymous and pseudonymous (ASAP) groups.

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Emad Aborajooh ◽  
Mohammed Qussay Al-Sabbagh ◽  
Baraa Mafrachi ◽  
Muhammad Yassin ◽  
Rami Dwairi ◽  
...  

UNSTRUCTURED We aimed to measure levels of knowledge, awareness, and stress about COVID-19 among health care providers (HCP) in Jordan. This was a cross-sectional study on 397 HCPs that utilized an internet-based questionnaire to evaluate knowledge about COVID-19, availability of personal protective equipment (PEE), future perception, and psychological distress. Ordinal logistic regression analysis was used to evaluate factors associated with knowledge and psychological stress. Overall, 24.4% and 21.2% of the participants showed excellent knowledge and poor knowledge, respectively. Social media (61.7%) was the most commonly used source of information. Being female (β= 0.521, 95% CI 0.049 to 0.992), physician (β=1.421, 95% CI 0.849 to 1.992), or using literature to gain knowledge (β= 1.161, 95% CI 0.657 to 1.664) were positive predictors of higher knowledge. While having higher stress (β= -0.854, 95% CI -1.488 to -0.221) and using social media (β= -0.434, 95% CI -0.865 to -0.003) or conventional media (β= -0.884, 95% CI -1.358 to -0.409) for information were negative predictors of knowledge levels. HCPs are advised to use the literature as a source of information about the virus, its transmission, and the best practice. PPEs should be secured for HCPs to the psychological stress associated with treating COVID-19 patients.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lauren Race ◽  
Amber James ◽  
Andrew Hayward ◽  
Kia El-Amin ◽  
Maya Gold Patterson ◽  
...  

2019 ◽  
Vol 58 (2) ◽  
pp. 478-501 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ismail Celik

Social media users should have a critical approach and look at any of knowledge in social media environments through a rational lens outside of their personal beliefs. In the era of posttruth, the rational lens concerns the epistemological beliefs that are about questioning the source of knowledge and perceive knowledge with criticism. The purpose of this study was to develop the social media-specific epistemological beliefs scale. The dimensions for the scale to be developed in the study were determined on the basis of a theoretical structure earlier proposed in the literature. The development of the social media-specific epistemological beliefs scale consisted of five stages: creating item pool, content and face validity analysis, construct validity analysis, reliability analysis, and language validity analysis. The study group created to analyze the construct validity of the scale consists of 432 preservice teachers who are studying in the education faculty of a large state university in Turkey. As a result of exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis, the social media-specific epistemological beliefs scale was found to be composed of 15 items as a five-point Likert-type, which was fallen under three factors. Findings on the social media-specific epistemological beliefs scale showed that the scale was valid and reliable.


2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 30
Author(s):  
Ana Fitriana P ◽  
Ema Ema ◽  
Fardiah Oktariani Lubis

This study aims to uncover the political discourse of the Presidential Candidates after the second round of debates, Jokowi VS Prabowo in virtual space. The background of the political discourse of the 2019 Presidential Election debate in the virtual space gave rise to various responses and sentiments among the supporters. After the Presidential Election debate, the hashtag war between #BohongLagiJokowi and # 02GagapUnicorn on social media Twitter became the main discussion. The aim is to disperse the power, ideology, and interests behind the presidential political discourse through the Fairclough Critical Discourse Analysis. The research method uses qualitative methods to parse the problem in research, using critical thinking as a basis for research. The results showed the tweet of Prabowo supporters trying to show stunts through language. The use of subject pronouns such as the word Mukidi to dwarf the subject, also uses the hashtags #DeletJokowi, #UnistallJokowi, and #BohongLagiJokowi as symbols of virtual communication. In contrast, the tweet of Jokowi's supporters sent a stuttering sentiment because they didn't understand the e-comer business. Hashtag # 02GagapUnicorn as a virtual symbol for organizing texts. In the order of messo or the production of text, the two supporters make a virtual symbol through the hashtag to become a topic of discussion on Twitter. In the situational or macro aspects are influenced by the post-truth phenomenon that is vague information whose source is unclear, have an impact on the inclusion of opinions on the assassination of certain characters. The advice, wise social media, understand and thoroughly source of information, is not affected by the use of certain metaphors, and at the stage of text, production needs to pay attention to the effects that will impact on the influence of social psychology of each supporter.Penelitian ini bertujuan untuk mengungkap diskursus politik Capres pasca debat putaran kedua, Jokowi VS Prabowo di ruang virtual. Dilatarbelakangi oleh lanskap diskursus politik debat Pilpres 2019 di ruang virtual yang menimbulkan berbagai tanggapan dan sentimen di antara kedua kubu pendukung. Pasca debat Pilpres perang tagar antara #BohongLagiJokowi dan #02GagapUnicorn di Twitter menjadi pembahasan utama. Tujuannya untuk membongkar kuasa, ideologi dan kepentingan di balik wacana politik Pilpres melalui analisis wacana kritis Fairclough. Metode penelitian menggunakan metode kualitatif untuk mengurai masalah dalam penelitian, dengan menggunakan pemikiran kritis sebagai dasar pijakan penelitian. Hasil penelitian menunjukan tweet warganet pendukung Prabowo berusaha menunjukkan pengkerdilan melalui Bahasa. Penggunaan kata ganti subjek seperti kata Mukidi untuk mengkerdilkan subjek, juga menggunakan tagar #DeletJokowi, #UninstallJokowi dan #BohongLagiJokowi sebagai simbol komunikasi virtual. Namun sebaliknya, tweet warganet pendukung Jokowi membuat sentimen dengan kata-kata gagap karena tidak memahami bisnis milenial (e-commerce). Tagar #02GagapUnicorn sebagai simbol virtual untuk pengorganisasin teks, sedangkan di tahapan produksi teks (messo) kedua pendukung membuat simbol virtual melalui tagar (#) untuk menjadi tren topik pembahasan di Twitter. Pada aspek situasional (makro) dipengaruhi oleh fenomena post-truth yaitu informasi-informasi samar yang tidak jelas sumbernya, berdampak terhadap penggiringan opini terhadap pembunuhan karakter tertentu. Sarannya, bijak bermedia sosial, pahami dan teliti sumber informasinya, tidak terpengaruh terhadap penggunaaan metafora tertentu, serta pada tahap produksi teks perlu memperhatikan efeknya yang akan berdampak pada pengaruh psikologi sosial masing-masing pendukung. 


Author(s):  
Milena Vukić ◽  
Snežana Milićević ◽  
Ksenija Vukić

Purpose of this paper is to determine how students perceive the image of their faculty on social networks, but also to analyse their experience and attitudes towards faculty social media strategy. The research was implemented using descriptive statistic techniques, as well as non-parametric tests such as Mann-Whitney U Test, Kruskal-Wallis H Test and Spearman’s Rho. The most common source of information when it comes to enrolment to faculty is word of mouth, while social media have a signifi-cantly lower credibility. During their schooling the respondents have most confidence in the official website, and far less in social networks. Such findings signalize the necessity of creating an adequate digital marketing strategy that can significantly improve the perceived faculty image. Positive perception of the image is fundamental for understanding the process of searching for and selection of the faculty, especially since the results have shown that the students do not value highly the image their faculties have on social networks. Positive perception of faculty image mostly depends on promotion strategy on Facebook and Insta-gram, and far less on LinkedIn and Twitter. In addition, students value more the image of the faculty whose social network pro-file they follow and, in a case, when they are followed back. No correlation was found between faculty image and gender, age or average grade. Therefore, we can conclude that social networks are very important in creating positive image and thanks to new technology, they are a promising solution for differentiation from competition in digital space.


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