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Yuri Kim

Dr. Anderson

7 June 2019

Social Media’s Influence on Politics

During the 2016 elections, social media played a large influence in the political

outcome. Through popular networking sites, such as Facebook and Twitter, people were

exposed to targeted advertising, and most importantly, fake news. With social media's

popularization and people's increasing dependence on it, it has also become a primary source

for news. However, as individuals have grown to trust their home feed, the media has been able

to skew user content to create political bias. Instead of having ideologies shaped through biased

media, people should limit their SNS use to keep an open mind and a deeper dialogue for

political means.

Social media use has increased dramatically within recent years. Although the main

objective of social network sites (SNS) is to stay updated on friends and family, it has slowly

evolved to become a news medium. Since their introduction, these sites ”have attracted

millions of users, many of whom have integrated these sites into their daily practices” (Boyd

210). It is clearly evident that social media has become a main source of communication for

many individuals. Moreover, “a majority of U.S. adults – 62% – get news on social

media...two-thirds of Facebook users get news on the site, nearly six-in-ten Twitter users get

news on Twitter, and seven-in-ten Reddit users get news on that platform” (Gottfried and

Shearer 2016). However, “the most popular fake news stories were more widely shared on

Facebook than the most popular mainstream news stories” (Silverman 2016). Rather than

accessing news on serious platforms or political websites, people are choosing to obtain their

news through social media. Alongside, home feeds are becoming saturated with fake news,
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making it difficult to access legitimate information. Despite the plethora of information

obtained through these network sites, it is important to consider how fabricated the majority of

this information deems to be.

As more users turn to social media for news, they become exposed to demographic and

analytic targeting. To make profit, corporate social media sites and its “targeted advertising

makes use of the users’ personal data, interests, interactions, information behaviour, and also

the interactions with other websites... it is not just you interacting with others and browsing

profiles; all of these activities are framed by advertisements presented to you” (Fuchs 109).

Traditionally, targeted advertising is used throughout the advertising industry to make sure that

advertisements and messages reach the right audience. Similarly, “Facebook does the same,

commodifying the thoughts, ideas, opinions, emotional states, and images of its two billion

users” (Mosco 106). By analyzing user data, media companies take advantage of people’s

interests by commodifying their individual values and beliefs. Although people believe that

their opinions are authentically created, media sites are the main reasons for how and why

people create and shape their political ideologies. Furthermore, social media companies will

continue to release skewed information for their own monetary gain, rather than to benefit

people’s political spheres.

Another hidden force that operates on social media is confirmation bias. Usually, SNS

users share similar interests with the people they follow, which affirms their individual beliefs.

Moreover, “users mostly tend to select and share content related to a specific narrative and to

ignore the rest. In particular, we show that social homogeneity is the primary driver of content

diffusion, and one frequent result is the formation of homogeneous, polarized clusters”

(Willingham). The vast majority of the content that people read on feeds tend to express and
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repeat opinions that readers already hold. Furthermore, social networks reinforce opinions and

difficult to accept alternative points of view. Therefore, this confirmation bias makes people

vulnerable to false claims that confirm what seems right but may be wrong. The result is

intense polarization, where people echo confirming information and mute everything else on

their feeds. Although this can cause people to become more opinionated, individuals can

simultaneously become less tolerant of opposing sides. While media bias continues to expand,

media conglomerates gain economic profit and individuals diminish their sense of political

thought.

Despite social media having the power to shape negative politicism, it has expanded

direct communication between political candidates and citizens. The increased use of social

media has allowed citizens to obtain “strategic choices of candidates, parties, interest groups,

and activists, political, economic, and social change has tipped the balance of political

participation in America…Candidates now speak directly to the electorate through new

campaign technologies” (Rosenstone and Hansen 233). Frequently and more accessible than

ever before, these technological outlets increase communication between candidates and the

public sphere. These platforms give individuals access to the candidates in ways that have not

always been possible. Moreover, this new medium can be used to help get citizens become

active in the political process and actually get them to go out to vote and voice their opinions.

Social media’s widespread popularity has had an enormous impact on society and

political behavior. Through the accessibility of information at the tip of their fingers, it

continues to stay a prominent figure for the public. As people expand their political knowledge

based on the content they are exposed to, social media is sure to increase its impact over time.

However, as news becomes more saturated with fake information and targeted bias, it becomes
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difficult to shape authentic ideologies. As media sites continue to influence political behavior,

it is crucial for citizens to be able to differentiate between objective and subjective sources.

Ultimately, modifying our social media use can greatly affect the future of politics and societal

values.

Works Cited
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Boyd, d.m. “Social Network Sites: Definition, History, and Scholarship.” Journal of

ComputerMediated Communication 13, no. 1 (2007): 210-230. Online:

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1083-6101.2007.00393.x/epdf

Fuchs, Christian. “The Power and Political Economy of Social Media.” In Social

Media: A Critical Introduction. London: Sage Publications, 2014. Pp. 97-122.

Gottfried, Jeffrey, and Elisa Shearer. 2016. “News Use across Social Media Platforms

2016.” Pew Research Center, May 26. http://www. journalism.org/2016/05/26/news-

use-acrosssocial-media-platforms-2016.

Mosco, Vincent. “The Body and Culture.” In Becoming Digital: Toward a Post-Internet

Society. Bingley, UK: Emerald House Publishing, 2017. Pp. 97-128.

Rosenstone, Steven J. Hansen, John Mark. Mobilization, participation, and democracy

in America. Macmillan Publishing Company, 1993.

Willingham, AJ. “How Facebook Actually Isolates Us.” CNN, Cable News Network,

22 Jan. 2017, www.cnn.com/2017/01/22/health/facebook-study-narrow-minded-

trnd/index.html.