The Effect of Exposure to (Non-)Like-Minded Information on the Use of
Political Incivility on Twitter
Abstract
Does exposure to like- and non-like-minded information lead to political
incivility? Few previous studies have investigated this question, and
the results have been mixed. There are two conflicting possibilities:
(i) if individuals are frequently exposed to like-minded political
information, their preexisting beliefs are reinforced and they are more
likely to use uncivil language, and (ii) if individuals are frequently
exposed to non-like-minded information, they often feel negative
emotions and therefore are more likely to be uncivil. To evaluate these
two competing hypotheses, the present study analyzes data from Japanese
Twitter using a semi-supervised machine learning method. The results
show that individuals who are exposed to non-like-minded information are
more prone to political incivility.