How politicians learn from citizens' feedback: The case of gender on Twitter
This article studies how politicians react to feedback from citizens on social media. We use a reinforcementlearning framework to model how politicians respond to citizens’ positive feedback by increasing attention to better received issues and allow feedback to vary depending on politicians’ gender...
| Autores: | , , |
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| Formato: | artículo |
| Estado: | Versión aceptada para publicación |
| Fecha de publicación: | 2022 |
| País: | España |
| Recursos: | Universidad de Barcelona |
| Repositorio: | Dipòsit Digital de la UB |
| OAI Identifier: | oai:diposit.ub.edu:2445/221351 |
| Acesso em linha: | https://hdl.handle.net/2445/221351 |
| Access Level: | acceso abierto |
| Palavra-chave: | Opinió pública Xarxes socials Estudis de gènere Public opinion Social networks Gender studies |
| Resumo: | This article studies how politicians react to feedback from citizens on social media. We use a reinforcementlearning framework to model how politicians respond to citizens’ positive feedback by increasing attention to better received issues and allow feedback to vary depending on politicians’ gender. To test the model, we collect 1.5 million tweets published by Spanish MPs over 3 years, identify gender-issue tweets using a deep-learning algorithm (BERT) and measure feedback using retweets and likes. We find that citizens provide more positive feedback to female politicians for writing about gender, and that this contributes to their specialization in gender issues. The analysis of mechanisms suggests that female politicians receive more positive feedback because they are treated differently by citizens. To conclude, we discuss implications for representation, misperceptions, and polarization. |
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