scholarly journals Voting and Social Media-Based Political Participation

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sascha Göbel

Does online political involvement reinforce or compensate participatory deficiencies at the polls? Extant survey evidence portrays online participation as a weapon of the strong, wielded by a highly politically involved, white, and affluent subset of the American electorate. Surveys face systematic sampling and measurement errors in the domain of political participation, though. In this study, I revisit this question using individual voter registration records that I integrate with observed Twitter activity. Based on a large sample that reflects Florida’s voting-eligible population, I find that political involvement on Twitter is prevalent across the electorate and extends to those most likely to abstain from voting. Moreover, race and income, which are salient dividing lines in voting, do not structure social media-based political participation. These results challenge reinforcement theory and substantiate social media’s compensatory potential for more inclusive representation. I discuss implications for political representation and future research examining political involvement.

Author(s):  
Sascha Göbel

Does online political involvement reinforce or compensate participatory deficiencies at the polls? Extant survey evidence portrays online participation as a weapon of the strong, wielded by a highly politically involved, white, and affluent subset of the American electorate. Surveys face systematic sampling and measurement errors in the domain of political participation, though. In this study, I revisit this question using individual voter registration records that I integrate with observed Twitter activity. Based on a large sample that reflects Florida’s voting-eligible population, I find that political involvement on Twitter is prevalent across the electorate and extends to those most likely to abstain from voting. Moreover, race and income, which are salient dividing lines in voting, do not structure social media-based political participation. These results challenge reinforcement theory and substantiate social media’s compensatory potential for more inclusive representation. I discuss implications for political representation and future research examining political involvement.


Author(s):  
Johannes Knoll ◽  
Jörg Matthes ◽  
Raffael Heiss

Although studies suggest that the use of social media can promote political participation (PP), there is a lack of theorizing about the psychological processes underlying this relationship. This article attempts to fill this gap by suggesting a social media political participation model. Taking a goal systemic perspective, the model specifies a set of interrelated processes that need to be realized so that social media use affects PP. Furthermore, key contingent conditions are outlined and insights into fostering PP are offered. The article explains ways of testing the model with surveys and experiments. Implications for future research are discussed.


2016 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 66-79
Author(s):  
Rua Al-Sheikh

This research seeks to examine the role played by the Egyptian Diaspora living in the UK during the 2011 Egyptian revolution and the extent to which they participated in it. The aim is to detangle the factors impacting the UK Egyptian community in terms of identity and belonging, and discuss whether the 2011 uprising had increased their political involvement through mass media or not. The assumption that diasporic communities are politically apathetic is considered. Little research has been conducted in this area of Diaspora, and a qualitative approach has been used to explore this. Preliminary findings indicate that Egyptians in the UK are more involved in political activities with regard to Egypt since 2011 uprising. When the Egyptian revolution broke out, some Egyptians living in the UK engaged in the revolution by voicing their opinions over the Internet and social media, while others travelled to Egypt to participate in the uprising.


Author(s):  
Raffael Heiss

Abstract. Individuals frequently process political posts on social media in the context of humorous, non-political posts, which research suggests may stimulate or dampen their engagement with the political posts depending on their political involvement. To clarify that claim, I conducted a 2 × 2 experiment ( N = 286) in which individuals viewed political posts situated among either humorous or non-humorous posts, all presented as video-recorded posts on a social media newsfeed, in a condition of either low or high political involvement. Among the results, the humorous posts directly boosted general attention, the elaboration of political posts, and the acquisition of political knowledge in the low political involvement group and stimulated political participation in the high political involvement group. Further analyses revealed that, in the low involvement group, increased attention and the elaboration of the posts may have mediated humor’s effect on the acquisition of political knowledge. Meanwhile, its positive effect on participation in the high involvement group occurred independently from general attention and the elaboration of the posts. Altogether, the findings suggest that humorous social media contexts may benefit the acquisition of political knowledge and political participation.


2020 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Alih Aji Nugroho

The world is entering a new phase of the digital era, including Indonesia. The unification of the real world and cyberspace is a sign, where the conditions of both can influence each other (Hyung Jun, 2018). The patterns of behavior and public relations in the virtual universe gave rise to new social interactions called the Digital Society. One part of Global Megatrends has also influenced public policy in Indonesia in recent years. Critical mass previously carried out conventionally is now a virtual movement. War of hashtags, petitions, and digital community comments are new tools and strategies for influencing policy. This paper attempts to analyze the extent of digital society's influence on public policy in Indonesia. As well as what public policy models are needed. Methodology used in this analysis is qualitative descriptive. Data collection through literature studies by critical mass digital recognition in Indonesia and trying to find a relationship between political participation through social media and democracy. By processing the pro and contra views regarding the selection of social media as a level of participation, this paper finds that there are overlapping interests that have the potential to distort the articulation of freedom of opinion and participation. - which is characteristic of a democratic state. The result is the rapid development of digital society which greatly influences the public policy process. Digital society imagines being able to participate formally in influencing policy in Indonesia. The democracy that developed in the digital society is cyberdemocracy. Public space in the digital world must be guaranteed security and its impact on the policies that will be determined. The recommendation given to the government is that a cyber data analyst is needed to oversee the issues that are developing in the digital world. Regulations related to the security of digital public spaces must be maximized. The government maximizes cooperation with related stakeholders.Keywords: Digital Society; Democracy; Public policy; Political Participation


2017 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 70-82
Author(s):  
Soumi Paul ◽  
Paola Peretti ◽  
Saroj Kumar Datta

Building customer relationships and customer equity is the prime concern in today’s business decisions. The emergence of internet, especially social media like Facebook and Twitter, changed traditional marketing thought to a great extent. The importance of customer orientation is reflected in the axiom, “The customer is the king”. A good number of organizations are engaging customers in their new product development activities via social media platforms. Co-creation, a new perspective in which customers are active co-creators of the products they buy and use, is currently challenging the traditional paradigm. The concept of co-creation involving the customer’s knowledge, creativity and judgment to generate value is considered not only an upcoming trend that introduces new products or services but also fitting their need and increasing value for money. Knowledge and innovation are inseparable. Knowledge management competencies and capacities are essential to any organization that aspires to be distinguished and innovative. The present work is an attempt to identify the change in value creation procedure along with one area of business, where co-creation can return significant dividends. It is on extending the brand or brand category through brand extension or line extension. This article, through an in depth literature review analysis, identifies the changes in every perspective of this paradigm shift and it presents a conceptual model of company-customer-brand-based co-creation activity via social media. The main objective is offering an agenda for future research of this emerging trend and ensuring the way to move from theory to practice. The paper acts as a proposal; it allows the organization to go for this change in a large scale and obtain early feedback on the idea presented. 


2021 ◽  
pp. 004728162110078
Author(s):  
Shanna Cameron ◽  
Alexandra Russell ◽  
Luke Brake ◽  
Katherine Fredlund ◽  
Angela Morris

This article engages with recent discussions in the field of technical communication that call for climate change research that moves beyond the believer/denier dichotomy. For this study, our research team coded 900 tweets about climate change and global warming for different emotions in order to understand how Twitter users rely on affect rhetorically. Our findings use quantitative content analysis to challenge current assumptions about writing and affect on social media, and our results indicate a number of arenas for future research on affect, global warming, and rhetoric.


2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-31
Author(s):  
Esteban A. Ríssola ◽  
David E. Losada ◽  
Fabio Crestani

Mental state assessment by analysing user-generated content is a field that has recently attracted considerable attention. Today, many people are increasingly utilising online social media platforms to share their feelings and moods. This provides a unique opportunity for researchers and health practitioners to proactively identify linguistic markers or patterns that correlate with mental disorders such as depression, schizophrenia or suicide behaviour. This survey describes and reviews the approaches that have been proposed for mental state assessment and identification of disorders using online digital records. The presented studies are organised according to the assessment technology and the feature extraction process conducted. We also present a series of studies which explore different aspects of the language and behaviour of individuals suffering from mental disorders, and discuss various aspects related to the development of experimental frameworks. Furthermore, ethical considerations regarding the treatment of individuals’ data are outlined. The main contributions of this survey are a comprehensive analysis of the proposed approaches for online mental state assessment on social media, a structured categorisation of the methods according to their design principles, lessons learnt over the years and a discussion on possible avenues for future research.


Author(s):  
MAX SCHAUB

How does poverty influence political participation? This question has interested political scientists since the early days of the discipline, but providing a definitive answer has proved difficult. This article focuses on one central aspect of poverty—the experience of acute financial hardship, lasting a few days at a time. Drawing on classic models of political engagement and novel theoretical insights, I argue that by inducing stress, social isolation, and feelings of alienation, acute financial hardship has immediate negative effects on political participation. Inference relies on a natural experiment afforded by the sequence of bank working days that causes short-term financial difficulties for the poor. Using data from three million individuals, personal interviews, and 1,100 elections in Germany, I demonstrate that acute financial hardship reduces both turnout intentions and actual turnout. The results imply that the financial status of the poor on election day can have important consequences for their political representation.


SAGE Open ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 215824402110164
Author(s):  
Lian Tang ◽  
Siti Zobidah Omar ◽  
Jusang Bolong ◽  
Julia Wirza Mohd Zawawi

The widespread use of social media has promoted extensive academic research on this channel. The present study conducts a systematic analysis of extant research on social media use among young people in China. This systematic literature review aims to identify and bridge gaps in topics, theories, variables, and conceptual frameworks in studies of social media usage among young people in China. The study aims to develop a cause–effect framework that shows the causal relationships among research structures. The PRISMA method is used to review 20 articles drawn from the Scopus and Google Scholar databases. From the analysis, 10 major research topics, eight theories or models, and a complete framework of causal relations emerge. It is recommended that future research on social media should include a greater diversity of types of social media, investigate a wider range of research topics, and adopt different theories or models. Researchers should also implement a more complete and detailed systematic method for reviewing literature on social media research in China.


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