Question: Does social media and the internet encourage a diversity of opinions in general discussions or do they pressure one to conform one's opinion is variance with "popular opinion"?
Answer: Do I really need to tell you? ;-) New research by the folks at Pew Research and Rutgers seems to show that when people realize that their opinion is different from the majority, they tend not to express it. The researchers did a survey study (half of the respondents were contacted by landline telephone, the other half by cell phone) using the Snowden-NSA situation as a focus. At least with this topic, people seemed to repress divergent opinions. The study is getting some popular media coverage, such as the NY Times; see: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/27/upshot/how-social-media-silences-debate.html?emc=edit_th_20140827&nl=todaysheadlines&nlid=389166&abt=0002&abg=1 One can access the Pew study here: http://www.pewinternet.org/2014/08/26/social-media-and-the-spiral-of-silence/ The "Spiral of Silence" is one explanatory framework used to interpret the results: this refers to the tendency of not speaking about policy issues in public when the one's point of view is not shared by others. For more on the spiral of silence, see the Wikipedia entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spiral_of_silence I am sure that one might be able to come up with instance where a person was more than willing to share their opinion with others, regardless of others reactions to it (which is why the common advice for family get togethers is never discuss politics, religion, or Fox News). One conclusion seem to be that in social media, people seek out others with similar views and become less tolerant of "inconsistent" opinions. There is no mention of the Asch conformity research but perhaps this is an oversight (for more on Asch, see the Wikipedia entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conformity_experiments ). -Mike Palij New York University m...@nyu.edu --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: arch...@jab.org. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df5d5&n=T&l=tips&o=38115 or send a blank email to leave-38115-13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df...@fsulist.frostburg.edu
