Political Parties and American Democracy Mini-Conference III: How the Public Used Facebook and Instagram in the 2020 U.S. Election

Session Submission Type: Full Paper Panel

Part of Mini-Conference

• Political Parties and American Democracy Mini-Conference III

Session Description

This panel will discuss results from four as-of-yet unpublished papers as part of a path-breaking collaboration among 17 independent (that is, not paid by Facebook, now Meta) academics and a team of Meta researchers. This group worked together to evaluate the role of Facebook and Instagram in the 2020 U.S. presidential election. The project involved a multi-wave panel survey beginning in August 2020 and continuing through the aftermath of the 2020 general election, including a wave added after the events of January 6th. Survey participants were selected in two ways: a stratified random sample of Facebook and Instagram users recruited on the platforms and an independent probability sample, stratified based on whether people used these platforms. The survey focused on four key outcome variables: (1) political participation, (2) political polarization, (3) knowledge and misperceptions, and (4) beliefs about democratic norms. For those who gave their consent, the survey data were paired with on-platform data. We also use platform-wide aggregate statistics to understand the content to which users were exposed on Facebook and Instagram, such as exposure to various types of news and political content, misinformation, targeted political ads, and other similar content. A series of different classifiers were used to categorize election-relevant platform content.

The collaboration was structured such that all of the academics and Meta researchers contributed to the common goods by, for example, helping to design the survey and develop classifiers. Teams of academic and Meta researchers then worked to design and pre-register analyses that focused on different aspects of the election season and platforms. The academics are lead authors on the publications resulting from these collaborations, with control rights over the details; Facebook agreed to no pre-publication approval. All human subjects contact was managed by Meta and NORC at the University of Chicago.

The four papers proposed as part of this panel include: (a) detailed descriptive information about Facebook and Instagram engagement and information exposure during the 2020 elections; (b) the diffusion and reach of information and misinformation on Facebook; (c) the dynamics of friendship creation and destruction over a tumultuous period in American history, which included the Covid-19 pandemic, the 2020 election, and the January 6th insurrection; and (d) the prevalence and targets of anti-normative content on the platform.

Sub Unit

• Theme Panel

Cosponsor

• Division 38: Political Communication

Individual Presentations

• The Diffusion and Reach of Information on Social Media - Sandra Gonzalez-Bailon, University of Pennsylvania; David Lazer, Northeastern University; Pablo Barbera, Computational Social Science, Meta; William Godel, New York University

• Prevalence, Dynamics, and Effects of Behavioral Polarization on Facebook - Fang Guo; Neil Malhotra, Stanford University; Jaime E. Settle, College of William & Mary; Magdalena Wojcieszak, UC Davis, U of Amsterdam; Annie Franco, Facebook

• Facebook and Instagram Use and Information Exposure in the 2020 Election - Emily Thorson, Syracuse University; Christopher Schwarz, New York University; Taylor W Brown; Arjun Wilkins, Meta

• Prevalence and Targets of Anti-normative Content on Facebook and Instagram - Rebekah Tromble, George Washington University; Deen Freelon, University of Pennsylvania; Stefan McCabe, Northeastern University; Taylor W Brown; Winter Mason, Facebook Research

Chair

• Natalie Jomini Stroud University of Texas, Austin

Discussants

• Joshua A. Tucker New York University

• Kevin Munger Pennsylvania State University