(An article published in 'Media Mimamsa' (January-March 2017; ISSN 2229-5593), refereed research journal, published by Makhanlal Chaturvedi National University of Journalism & Communication, Bhopal)
Padmanabha
K. V., Assistant Professor, Department of Journalism,
University College of Arts, B. H. Road, Tumkur-572103. E-mail: sibanthipadmanabha@gmail.com
Dr.
Sathish Kumar, Assistant Professor, Department of Journalism and
Mass Communication, Kuvempu University, Jnana Sahyadri, Shankaraghatta-577451.
E-mail: sathishandinje@gmail.com
ABSTRACT
Social media plays a
vital role in fostering democratic deliberations. Several studies have revealed
that there are significant positive relationships between the use of digital
media and political participation. Facebook is, nowadays, one of the widely
used social media platforms to discuss news about government and politics. It
allows users to share their political beliefs, support specific candidates, and
interact with others on political issues. The present study is an attempt to
understand the relationship between Facebook and political ideologies among the
youth. The study based on an online survey reveals that Facebook can be a
platform for political discussions but it does not have much impact on the
political ideology of the youth.
Keywords:
Social media, political communication,
political knowledge, political participation, political ideology, Facebook
Introduction:
Social media plays a
vital role in fostering democratic deliberations. Online tools such as
blogging, podcasting, political websites with mechanisms for online feedback
and participation, social networking, and online video sharing play a critical
role in the political communication process (Kaid & Holtz-Bacha, 2008).
Research has indicated that levels of political knowledge affect the acceptance
of democratic principles, attitude toward specific issues and political
participation (Galston, 2001). According to Pew Research Centre, the advent of
social media has opened up new ways for people with similar interests to find,
share and talk about news including news about politics with friends and colleagues.
Several studies have revealed that an increased exposure and attention to
online news is positively related to political knowledge, and there are
significant positive relationships between the use of digital media and
political participation (as cited in Dimitrova et al., 2011).
Social media has a
great role to play in a democratic country like India. It is interesting to
note that one third of India’s population is comprised of youth in the age
group of 15-34 years, and it is expected to be the world’s youngest country by
2020 (Shivakumar, G., 2013). India has been recording a fast growth in Internet
penetration too. In 2010, only 7.5% of Indian population had access to Internet,
and in 2016, it has leaped to 34.8% (internetlivestats.com). According to a
report by Internet and Mobile Association of India, 66% of Internet users in
urban India regularly access social media (livemint.com), and at present there
are about 21.5 crore social media users in the country (statista.com). Politicians
and political parties in India have been making the best use of social media to
reach out the voters during elections in the recent years.
Literature
review:
Tolbert & McNeal
(2003) found out that Internet may enhance voter information about candidates
and elections, and in turn stimulate increased participation. Gil de Zúñiga et.al. (2012) found that informational
use of social networking sites exerted a significant and positive impact on
individuals' activities aimed at engaging in civic and political action.
Another study (McClurg, 2003) has revealed that interaction in social networks
has a strong influence on the propensity to participate in politics. A study of
blogging by Gil de Zúñiga et al (2010) strongly suggest that blog readers are
involved in a range of participatory activities, both online and offline, and
that these two spheres are highly complementary and mutually supportive.
Cogburn &
Espinoza-Vasquez (2011) examined the impact of internet and social media on
political participation and civic engagement in the 2008 Obama campaign and
found that the campaign created a nationwide virtual organization that
motivated 3.1 million individual contributors. A study by Gil de Zúñiga et al.
(2014) indicated that social media news use has direct effects on offline
political participation and indirect effects on offline and online political
participation mediated via political expression. Another study by Yamamoto et
al. (2015) showed that online political expression enhanced the effects of
political mobile apps, traditional offline and online media, and social media
on political participation.
Sorensen (2016)
examined the presence on Facebook and Twitter of Members of the Danish National
Parliament and revealed that Danish MPs have a relatively high degree of
engagement in political conversations with citizens on Facebook. Focusing on
usage of Facebook in Hong Kong, Tang & Lee (2013) examined how time spent
on FB, exposure to shared political information, network size, network
structural heterogeneity, and direct connection with public political actors
relate to young people’s online and offline political participation.
Chu (2011) examined the
potential link of Facebook group participation with viral advertising
responses. The study suggested that college-aged Facebook group members engage
in higher levels of self-disclosure and maintain more favorable attitudes
toward social media and advertising in general than do non-group members.
A few studies have been
conducted in India too with regard to the use of social media by politicians
and political parties during elections. However, there have been no specific
efforts to understand whether social media like Facebook have any impact on the
political ideology of the voters, especially the youth. The present study
attempts to explore how young Facebook users’ react to the political posts and
what kind of influence Facebook has on the political ideology of its users.
Method:
The primary data for
the present study was collected through an online survey that lasted for two
weeks. A total of 130 Facebook users, basically natives of Karnataka, in an age
group of 18-35 years, were selected via a convenience sampling, who were
distributed with a structured questionnaire using Google Forms. The respondents
were invited to fill in the questionnaire through e-mails and Facebook
messages. A total of 92 people responded to the request with a response rate of
71%.
The questionnaire gauged
the demographic characteristics such as sex, age, education, employment and
income of the respondents in the first part. In the second part, it collected
information on their Facebook usage, like since when they had a Facebook account,
hours spent on Facebook, number of ‘friends’ and groups, and reasons why they
use Facebook. A question was also asked which political ideology they wanted to
be identified with.
The third part of the
questionnaire dealt with Facebook and politics. Respondents were asked to rate
on a 5-point Likert-type scale (1= strongly agree, 5= strongly disagree) how
they treated Facebook as a forum for political discussions. Another set of
questions were asked to measure the connection between the respondents’ interest
in political issues and their Facebook behaviour. They were also asked to
respond to a set of eight items on 5-point scale (1= never, 5= very often) in
order to assess their political activities on Facebook.
The respondents were
also asked some direct questions with an intention to measure the impact of
Facebook on their political ideologies such as, ‘Has your Facebook experience
made you think that the political ideology you have is the correct one?’ or
‘not the correct one?’, ‘Have you started admiring a specific political
ideology in course of your Facebook experience?’, ‘Have you changed your views
on a politician or political party after going through Facebook posts?’, etc. The
respondents were also asked which social media other than Facebook and which
mass media influenced their political ideology.
Results:
Of the 92 respondents,
59 were males and 33 were females. Majority of them (66.3%) were
post-graduates, while 12.8% had an under graduate degree, and 18.6% had an M.
Phil. or PhD. Most of the respondents (71.8%) were employed in private sector,
while 15.3% were in government sector, 8.2% were self-employed.
Majority of the
respondents (77.9%) said that they had Facebook accounts for more than five years,
while 16.3% said they created their account 3-4 years ago. As many as 37.2%
respondents said they spend 1-5 hours on FB in a week, while 30.2% spent less
than one hour and 24.4% spent 6-10 hours. Majority of the respondents (29.1%)
had FB friends in between 1001-2000 and FB groups in between 1-10 (66.7%).
Most of respondents
(71.4%) use FB for keeping in touch with friends, 57.1% for getting news
updates, 47.6% for expressing their views on current issues, 29.8% for getting
feedback on the contents they post, 22.6% for making news contacts, 21.4% for
passing time and having fun, and 9.5% for promoting business. For a question,
which political ideology they wanted to be identified with, 16.3% answered
‘rightist’, 2.3% leftist, 18.6% centrist, while 46.5% said they did not want to
be identified with any political ideology, while 16.3% said they did not have
any political ideology.
As shown in Table-1,
most of the respondents considered FB an appropriate forum to discuss about
politics. Majority of them felt that political leaders having accounts/pages on
FB is something good.
Statements |
Strongly Agree |
Agree |
Undecided |
Disagree |
Strongly Disagree |
FB
is an appropriate place for people to express political views
|
25.8%
|
36%
|
13.5%
|
16.9%
|
7.9%
|
FB
can be used to inform and educate people regarding politics
|
27.3%
|
40.9%
|
13.6%
|
14.8%
|
3.4%
|
It
is good that political leaders have accounts/pages on FB
|
47.7%
|
40.9%
|
3.4%
|
6.8%
|
1.1%
|
FB
can be used to convince people on certain political issues
|
20.5%
|
48.9%
|
17%
|
11.4%
|
2.3%
|
Table-1:
Facebook as a forum to discuss politics
However, when asked
about their individual behavior in Facebook with regard to political issues, the
majority of the respondents were negative in their answers. This is clear in Table-2.
How many times did you do the
following things on Facebook in the past one year
|
Never
|
Rarely
|
Sometime
|
Often
|
Very Often
|
Posting
a status update about a political issue
|
36.5%
|
31.8%
|
21.2%
|
7.1%
|
3.5%
|
Commenting
on a friend’s post on politics
|
29.1%
|
30.2%
|
25.5%
|
11.6%
|
3.5%
|
Posting
or sharing a photo or video or link about politics
|
41.7%
|
26.2%
|
23.8%
|
6%
|
2.4%
|
Writing
or sharing a note about politics on my network
|
45.9%
|
27.1%
|
20%
|
3.5%
|
3.5%
|
Joining
or leaving a group about politics
|
57.6%
|
24.7%
|
10.6%
|
4.7%
|
2.4%
|
Clicking
‘going’ for a political event
|
69.5%
|
24.4%
|
3.7%
|
1.2%
|
1.2%
|
Discussing
a political issue on a message
|
48.2%
|
28.2%
|
20%
|
2.4%
|
1.2%
|
Clicking
‘like’ on a political party or politician’s fan page
|
52.9%
|
24.7%
|
14.1%
|
4.7%
|
3.5%
|
Table-2:
FB users’ individual behavior in Facebook with regard to political issues
In case of individual reactions
to Facebook posts (Table 3), respondents showed varied attitudes.
What do you do with a post/link/photo/
video related to political issues on Facebook?
|
Never
|
Rarely
|
Sometime
|
Often
|
Very Often
|
Read
|
8.2%
|
20%
|
36.3%
|
24.7%
|
10.6%
|
Like
|
20.7%
|
35.4%
|
39%
|
1.2%
|
3.7%
|
Comment
|
30.1%
|
43.4%
|
20.5%
|
3.6%
|
2.4%
|
Share
on my wall
|
56.1%
|
22%
|
17.1%
|
3.7%
|
1.2%
|
Share
on a message privately
|
61.4%
|
22.9%
|
15.7%
|
0%
|
0%
|
Tag
friends
|
81.9%
|
12%
|
4.8%
|
0%
|
1.2%
|
Table-3:
FB users’ reaction to political posts
The responses for the
questions what do they do with the political posts which they don’t like, or what
they do with a friend whose political posts irritate them often, also did not
make much difference (Table-4 and Table-5).
What do you do with a post/link/photo/
video related to political issue or party, which you don’t like?
|
Never
|
Rarely
|
Sometime
|
Often
|
Very Often
|
Ignore
|
14%
|
15.1%
|
33.7%
|
17.4%
|
19.8%
|
Comment
|
57.1%
|
27.4%
|
10.7%
|
3.6%
|
1.2%
|
Share
on my wall
|
79.8%
|
7.1%
|
11.9%
|
0%
|
1.2%
|
Share
on a message privately
|
79.8%
|
14.3%
|
4.8%
|
0%
|
1.2%
|
Tag
friends
|
88.1%
|
9.5%
|
0%
|
0%
|
2.4%
|
Table-4:
FB users’ reaction to political posts which they don’t like
What
do you do with a friend whose political posts irritate you often?
|
Never
|
Rarely
|
Sometime
|
Often
|
Very
Often
|
Ignore
|
16.5%
|
7.1%
|
22.4%
|
18.8%
|
35.3%
|
Block
|
53.1%
|
14.8%
|
18.5%
|
6.2%
|
7.4%
|
Unfriend
|
50%
|
21.3%
|
16.3%
|
6.3%
|
6.3%
|
Unfollow
|
42.5%
|
15%
|
16.3%
|
10%
|
16.3%
|
Hide
|
46.9%
|
17.3%
|
16%
|
9.9%
|
9.9%
|
Table-5:
Reaction to political posts that irritate users often
Table-6 summarizes the
responses for some direct questions which were intended to understand whether
FB had any impact on the political ideology of the respondents.
Questions
|
Yes
|
No
|
Don’t know
|
Has your Facebook experience made you think
that the political ideology you have is the correct one?
|
4.8%
|
59.5%
|
35.7%
|
Have you started admiring a specific
political ideology in course of your Facebook experience?
|
9.5%
|
75%
|
15.5%
|
Have you changed your views on a politician
or political party after going through Facebook posts?
|
17.6%
|
77.6%
|
4.7%
|
Have you changed your option of candidate in
any election after going through Facebook posts?
|
10.6%
|
78.8%
|
10.6%
|
Table-6:
Impact of FB on political ideology of respondents
Responding to two other
questions, the respondents said Twitter (41%) and YouTube (20.5%) were among
the other social media that influenced their political ideology, while 45.8%
marked the option ‘none of the above’. According to them, newspaper (79.1%) and
television (61.6%) were the mass media that influenced their political
thoughts.
Discussion:
The main objective of
the present study was to explore how Facebook users’ react to the political
posts and what kind of impact Facebook has on the political ideology its users.
A large majority of the respondents made it clear that Facebook did not have
any impact on their political ideology. As shown in Table-6, 59.5% of
respondents said their FB experience did not even reassure them that what
ideology they had was the correct one (35.7% replied ‘don’t know).
75% of the respondents
said they did not start admiring any specific political ideology in course of
their FB experience. 77.6% of the respondents said the political posts on the
FB did not made them change their views on a politician or a political party. Finally,
a high majority of respondents (78.8%) said they did not change their option of
a candidate in any election after going through FB posts (Table-6).
As per the results,
many people agree that FB can be an appropriate place to discuss about
politics, but when it comes to their personal reaction to political issues,
they maintain a distance. They were more positive on ‘reading’ and ‘liking’
certain posts/links/photos/videos related to politics, but negative on
commenting, sharing and tagging friends (Tables 2, 3 & 4).
For instance, 36.3%
respondents said they ‘sometime’ read, and 24.7% said they ‘often’ read; but
56.1% said they ‘never’ share such posts on their wall, 61.4% said they ‘never’
share them on messages privately, and 81.9% of respondents said they ‘never’
tag friends to such posts. Even most of them were never for blocking (53.1%),
unfriending (59%), unfollowing (42.5%) or hiding (46.9%) a friend whose
political posts irritated them. However, majority of the respondents said they
ignored such friends (Table-5).
An interesting finding
that can be noted here is that almost half of the respondents (46.5%) replied
that they did not want to be identified with any political ideology. And a
large number of respondents found FB a platform for keeping in touch with
friends (71.4%), for getting news updates (57.1%) and for expressing views on
current issues (47.6%).
Conclusion:
Various researches
across the world have shown that social media platforms such as Facebook and
Twitter play a major role in the 21st century politics. They
revealed that the social media have a vital role in improving political
knowledge, political expression, and political participation of the people. The
present study reassures the phenomenon but emphasizes that Facebook does not
have much to do with the political ideologies of the youth. As the response to the last question
indicates, people are highly influenced by newspaper and television with regard
to politics but not by social media in the Indian context. However, it should
be noted that the study has its own limitations, and further research should be
conducted in a larger scale to confirm the results. The authors feel that a
study during General Elections will be more helpful in assessing the social
media impact on the political ideology of youth in a more precise manner.
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To cite this article:
Padmanabha, K. V. & Sathish Kumar. (2017). Effects of Facebook on the political ideology of the youth. Media Mimamsa, 10(3), 31-36.
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