1. How minimizing conflicts could lead to polarization on social media: An agent-based model investigation
- Author
-
Michele Coscia and Luca Rossi
- Subjects
Computer and Information Sciences ,Systems Analysis ,Social Psychology ,Science ,Twitter ,Information Seeking Behavior ,Social Sciences ,Research and Analysis Methods ,Systems Science ,Social Networking ,Law Enforcement ,Sociology ,Agent-Based Modeling ,Psychology ,Humans ,Community Structure ,Policing ,Motivation ,Multidisciplinary ,Ecology ,Information Dissemination ,Simulation and Modeling ,Communication ,Ecology and Environmental Sciences ,Politics ,Social Influence ,Social Communication ,Biology and Life Sciences ,Models, Theoretical ,Communications ,Social Networks ,Community Ecology ,Public Opinion ,Physical Sciences ,Medicine ,Law and Legal Sciences ,Social Media ,Network Analysis ,Mathematics ,Criminal Justice System ,Research Article - Abstract
Social media represent an important source of news for many users. They are, however, affected by misinformation and they might be playing a role in the growth of political polarization. In this paper, we create an agent based model to investigate how policing content and backlash on social media (i.e. conflict) can lead to an increase in polarization for both users and news sources. Our model is an advancement over previously proposed models because it allows us to study the polarization of both users and news sources, the evolution of the audience connections between users and sources, and it makes more realistic assumptions about the starting conditions of the system. We find that the tendency of users and sources to avoid policing, backlash and conflict in general can increase polarization online. Specifically polarization comes from the ease of sharing political posts, intolerance for opposing points of view causing backlash and policing, and volatility in changing one’s opinion when faced with new information. On the other hand, it seems that the integrity of a news source in trying to resist the backlash and policing has little effect.
- Published
- 2022