Most users do not follow political elites on Twitter; those who do show overwhelming preferences for ideological congruity

Abstract

We offer comprehensive evidence of preferences for ideological congruity when people engage with politicians, pundits, and news organizations on social media. Using 4 years of data (2016–2019) from a random sample of 1.5 million Twitter users, we examine three behaviors studied separately to date: (i) following of in-group versus out-group elites, (ii) sharing in-group versus out-group information (retweeting), and (iii) commenting on the shared information (quote tweeting). We find that the majority of users (60%) do not follow any political elites. Those who do follow in-group elite accounts at much higher rates than out-group accounts (90 versus 10%), share information from in-group elites 13 times more frequently than from out-group elites, and often add negative comments to the shared out-group information. Conservatives are twice as likely as liberals to share in-group versus out-group content. These patterns are robust, emerge across issues and political elites, and exist regardless of users’ ideological extremity.

Echo Chambers or Doom Scrolling? Homophily, Intensity, and Exposure to Elite Social Media Messages

“…Another important and understudied aspect of political social media is the reach of politicians' posts, given that they are able to use platforms to spread both valuable information and potentially dangerous content, such as misinformation about vaccines or election results. The finding of Wojcieszak et al (2022) that few people actually follow political elites on social media highlights the importance of studies like this one that are not limited to following behavior. Our finding that exposure to political social media posts is fairly high (especially for prominent figures like Trump and Biden) even among less active social media users suggests that "offline" exposure through traditional media coverage or conversations with friends and family may extend politicians' social media reach.…”

“…It has the potential to capture exposure to posts through channels that objective measures could miss, such as reposts by other users (including screenshots, which would not show up as “retweets” or “shares”), reporting in the mainstream media, and content that is shared by individuals outside social media (via text, email, or even face-to-face). Since most individuals do not follow political elites on social media (e.g., Wojcieszak et al 2022), it is especially important to explore other channels through which individuals encounter this content. As a measure of respondents’ subjective experience, it is also weighted toward posts that are relatively salient and memorable to them, which are likely more relevant to their political beliefs and behavior.…”

How to study democratic backsliding

“…The authors infer from their findings that "partisan echo chambers are relatively common among partisan media viewers" (p. 30). Regarding social media, Wojcieszak et al (2022) find analogous evidence of echo chambers on X (formerly known as Twitter), showing that partisans are much more likely to share the posts of elites who are members of their own party. Robertson et al (2023) find that individuals engage with more ideologically congruent and unreliable news sources than they would if they relied only Google Search results (i.e., they choose congruence).…”

How People Justify Online Political Hostility

“…People who are active on social media are hold more extreme political opinions and the dynamics of social media bias inferences about others' political views and in turn increase partisan animosity (Settle, 2018). Recent evidence shows that those who follow political elites on social media share information from congenial politicians 13 times more than they share information from their political opponents-and that when they do, they often add negative comments (Wojcieszak et al, 2022). The role of political factors in online hostility is echoed in a study by Kim et al (2021), who show that frequent online commenters were more interested in politics, held more polarized opinions and in turn used more toxic language when commenting.…”