This work investigates three interrelated questions around false information targeting immigrants as a broad social group on U.S. social media (thereafter referred to as immigrant-targeting false SNS claims). Study 1 examines content-level features that potentially attract readers’ attention: a quantitative analysis of PolitiFact data showed that relative to those not specifically about immigrants, immigrant-targeting false SNS claims exhibited a stronger negative tone and were more about race-related issues. Study 2 experimentally investigates the effects of immigrant-targeting SNS claims with distinctive media frames (defined as claims emphasizing either economic or health-related concerns) and that of corrective approach (with vs. without fact-checking flags): participants who viewed immigrant-targeting SNS claims flagged as false reported lower threat and anxiety perceptions and higher positive trait perceptions than those who viewed unflagged claims. Regarding the reference groups—specifically, “legal” versus “illegal” immigrants—participants associated with their perceived anxiety, the effect of fact-checking flags was conditional on the SNS claims’ media frames. Study 2 also uncovered that cognitive reflection and actively open-minded thinking play distinct roles in shaping how people respond to immigrant-targeting misinformation and fact-checking labels.
Statistical and narrative evidence represent two distinct ways of substantiating claims in public reasoning, but does this distinction matter for how people engage with vaccine science skeptical (VSS) content and the discursive spaces surrounding it? This study addresses this question through a large-scale, LLM-assisted observational analysis of online engagement with VSS posts and comments that support or counter such content using statistical versus narrative evidence in the Reddit community r/DebateVaccines. Building on Fisher's distinction between rational and narrative paradigms, we theorize two paths of conversation through which evidentiary forms are associated with audience engagement with contentious vaccine discourses in a naturalistic social media setting: a rational pathway, marked by concentrated participation and corrective contestation around statistical claims and counterclaims, tending toward a single evidence-based truth "approved" by one-click reactions; and a narrative pathway, characterized by generative engagement featuring broader and more distributed participation, more discursive and generative engagement, and greater acceptance of competing viewpoints. These findings provide a springboard for theorizing evidentiary form as a key epistemic logic associated with how conversations evolve in real-world engagement with contentious, socially consequential issues such as vaccine misinformation, while informing hybrid approaches to addressing skepticism toward established vaccine science.
To examine how audiovisual characteristics of YouTube content are associated with children’s attention span and viewing control, we conducted a two-wave longitudinal survey in 2023 and 2024. The final analytical sample consisted of 195 Korean parents of children aged 4 to 6 whose children reported the same most frequently viewed YouTube channel across both waves. Videos from children’s most frequently viewed YouTube channels were coded for visual (scene changes and special effects) and audio (dialogues and sound effects) features. Structural equation modeling (SEM) results indicated that greater exposure to visual and auditory features in Year 1 content was associated with lower levels of children’s attention span and viewing control one year later. Dialogues, an audio feature, demonstrated the strongest negative association with both children’s attention span and viewing control. These findings highlight the importance of considering the design features of children’s digital media when examining associations between media environments and children's attentional and self-regulatory behaviors.
Political conversations across lines of disagreement are central to democracy. While some individuals approach them as opportunities to learn, others treat them as battles to be won. Theory suggests these contrasting motivations may shape how individuals process information and respond to disagreement, yet their consequences for attitude dynamics during conversations remain unclear. We fill this gap through an experiment (N = 466) that manipulates motivation in real-time video conversations between pairs of Israeli citizens holding opposing views on Israel-U.S. relations. We financially incentivized some participants to win the debate, others to learn their partner's perspective, while a control group received no incentive. We find consistent evidence that a winning-oriented mindset reduces the likelihood of persuasion, while a learning-oriented mindset increases it. Notably, there is no evidence that motivation polarizes attitudes. Our findings suggest that a winning-oriented mindset undermines mutual understanding, whereas learning-based dialogue can help bridge political divides.
We investigate how gender shapes women's political discussion on Twitter using an issue publics framework. We test whether the conditions for gendered issue publics to form among women around feminine issues exist using data on political discussion via social media in the 2020 and 2022 elections. Our data includes political discussion among political candidates, elites, and non-elites, or regular people. Our results reveal several key findings. First, we find that men elites were more likely to discuss feminine issues, such as health care, compared to women elites, but we found no gender differences between regular Twitter users in our sample. Democratic women elites are more likely to discuss equity-based feminine issues, such as equal pay, than Republican women elites, but we find no partisan differences among non-elite women. We also find no gender or partisan differences at the elite and non-elite levels in the discussion of trait-based feminine issues, such as education. Finally, we show that in 2022, the Dobbs decision that rescinded the constitutional right to an abortion in the U.S. increased the salience of this issue among both women and men. Overall, our research suggests that the conditions for issue publics among women may not strongly exist as we find that non-elite men talk about feminine issues too.
