Curation Algorithms and Filter Bubbles in Social Networks

Abstract

Do curation and personalization algorithms on social media create filter bubbles and increase content polarization?

Algorithmic meta-capital: Bourdieusian analysis of social power through algorithms in media consumption

“…Similarly, to Couldry (2003), I also focus my analysis on the media field. However, in this study, I turn the gaze towards these new digital intermediaries in media consumption and particularly home in on the curation algorithms which mediate the consumption of media content (Berman & Katona, 2020). Thus, extending the work of both Bourdieu (Bourdieu & Wacquant, 1992) and Couldry (2003), I posit that the social power through algorithms can be conceptualized as algorithmic meta-capital.…”

Whose agenda is it anyway: an exploration of cancel culture and political affiliation in the United States

“…This finding could have major ramifications for future work in both political psychology and communication, as well as our understanding of social media's role in these processes. For one, though many studies have derided social media as a source of echo chamber effects and a catalyst for the political polarization in the United States today (Berman and Katona 2020;Bessi et al 2016;Bright 2018), it would seem that, as postulated by Dubois and Blank (2018), this effect is overstated. Overall, the vast majority of our participants were not supporters of cancel culture behaviors, irrespective of their political leanings (see Tables 2 and 3 for mean scores on cancel culture engagement and agreement with video posters vs. commenters).…”

Learning without seeking?: Incidental exposure to science news on social media & knowledge of gene editing

“…Much of the work focusing on the implications of these interactions between users' choices and algorithms in online media focuses on the extent to which these interactions create ideological "filter bubbles" around political issues, or the trend of people to tailor their news networks to low-quality, highly partisan news with those choices then getting reinforced by the sites' algorithms [Pariser, 2011;Flaxman, Goel and Rao, 2016]. There is evidence to suggest that while curation algorithms do not promote homogeneity as a rule, they can be designed in such a way that creates homogeneity in networks [Berman and Katona, 2020;Chitra and Musco, 2020;Li et al, 2019;Min et al, 2019].…”