Quantifying echo chamber effects in information spreading over political communication networks

Echo chambers in online social networks, in which users prefer to interact only with ideologically-aligned peers, are believed to facilitate misinformation spreading and contribute to radicalize political discourse. In this paper, we gauge the effects of echo chambers in information spreading phenom...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores: Cota, Wesley, Ferreira, Silvio C., Pastor Satorras, Romualdo|||0000-0002-4051-6007, Starnini, Michele|||0000-0002-9161-5339
Tipo de recurso: artículo
Fecha de publicación:2019
País:España
Institución:Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC)
Repositorio:UPCommons. Portal del coneixement obert de la UPC
Idioma:inglés
OAI Identifier:oai:upcommons.upc.edu:2117/184169
Acceso en línea:https://hdl.handle.net/2117/184169
https://dx.doi.org/10.1140/epjds/s13688-019-0213-9
Access Level:acceso abierto
Palabra clave:Computational social sciences
Telecommunication policy
Echo chambers
Computational social science
Information spreading
Online communication networks
Political polarization
Política de la telecomunicació
Àrees temàtiques de la UPC::Física
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oai_identifier_str oai:upcommons.upc.edu:2117/184169
network_acronym_str ES
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repository_id_str
spelling Quantifying echo chamber effects in information spreading over political communication networksCota, WesleyFerreira, Silvio C.Pastor Satorras, Romualdo|||0000-0002-4051-6007Starnini, Michele|||0000-0002-9161-5339Computational social sciencesTelecommunication policyEcho chambersComputational social scienceInformation spreadingOnline communication networksPolitical polarizationPolítica de la telecomunicacióÀrees temàtiques de la UPC::FísicaEcho chambers in online social networks, in which users prefer to interact only with ideologically-aligned peers, are believed to facilitate misinformation spreading and contribute to radicalize political discourse. In this paper, we gauge the effects of echo chambers in information spreading phenomena over political communication networks. Mining 12 million Twitter messages, we reconstruct a network in which users interchange opinions related to the impeachment of the former Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff. We define a continuous political leaning parameter, independent of the network’s structure, that allows to quantify the presence of echo chambers in the strongly connected component of the network. These are reflected in two well-separated communities of similar sizes with opposite views of the impeachment process. By means of simple spreading models, we show that the capability of users in propagating the content they produce, measured by the associated spreading capacity, strongly depends on their attitude. Users expressing pro-impeachment leanings are capable to transmit information, on average, to a larger audience than users expressing anti-impeachment leanings. Furthermore, the users’ spreading capacity is correlated to the diversity, in terms of political position, of the audience reached. Our method can be exploited to identify the presence of echo chambers and their effects across different contexts and shed light upon the mechanisms allowing to break echo chambers.20192019-12-0920202020-04-21journal articlehttp://purl.org/coar/resource_type/c_6501VoRhttp://purl.org/coar/version/c_970fb48d4fbd8a85info:eu-repo/semantics/articleapplication/pdfhttps://hdl.handle.net/2117/184169https://dx.doi.org/10.1140/epjds/s13688-019-0213-9reponame:UPCommons. Portal del coneixement obert de la UPCinstname:Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC)Inglésengopen accesshttp://purl.org/coar/access_right/c_abf2Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Spainhttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/es/info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccessoai:upcommons.upc.edu:2117/1841692026-05-27T15:37:01Z
dc.title.none.fl_str_mv Quantifying echo chamber effects in information spreading over political communication networks
title Quantifying echo chamber effects in information spreading over political communication networks
spellingShingle Quantifying echo chamber effects in information spreading over political communication networks
Cota, Wesley
Computational social sciences
Telecommunication policy
Echo chambers
Computational social science
Information spreading
Online communication networks
Political polarization
Política de la telecomunicació
Àrees temàtiques de la UPC::Física
title_short Quantifying echo chamber effects in information spreading over political communication networks
title_full Quantifying echo chamber effects in information spreading over political communication networks
title_fullStr Quantifying echo chamber effects in information spreading over political communication networks
title_full_unstemmed Quantifying echo chamber effects in information spreading over political communication networks
title_sort Quantifying echo chamber effects in information spreading over political communication networks
dc.creator.none.fl_str_mv Cota, Wesley
Ferreira, Silvio C.
Pastor Satorras, Romualdo|||0000-0002-4051-6007
Starnini, Michele|||0000-0002-9161-5339
author Cota, Wesley
author_facet Cota, Wesley
Ferreira, Silvio C.
Pastor Satorras, Romualdo|||0000-0002-4051-6007
Starnini, Michele|||0000-0002-9161-5339
author_role author
author2 Ferreira, Silvio C.
Pastor Satorras, Romualdo|||0000-0002-4051-6007
Starnini, Michele|||0000-0002-9161-5339
author2_role author
author
author
dc.subject.none.fl_str_mv Computational social sciences
Telecommunication policy
Echo chambers
Computational social science
Information spreading
Online communication networks
Political polarization
Política de la telecomunicació
Àrees temàtiques de la UPC::Física
topic Computational social sciences
Telecommunication policy
Echo chambers
Computational social science
Information spreading
Online communication networks
Political polarization
Política de la telecomunicació
Àrees temàtiques de la UPC::Física
description Echo chambers in online social networks, in which users prefer to interact only with ideologically-aligned peers, are believed to facilitate misinformation spreading and contribute to radicalize political discourse. In this paper, we gauge the effects of echo chambers in information spreading phenomena over political communication networks. Mining 12 million Twitter messages, we reconstruct a network in which users interchange opinions related to the impeachment of the former Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff. We define a continuous political leaning parameter, independent of the network’s structure, that allows to quantify the presence of echo chambers in the strongly connected component of the network. These are reflected in two well-separated communities of similar sizes with opposite views of the impeachment process. By means of simple spreading models, we show that the capability of users in propagating the content they produce, measured by the associated spreading capacity, strongly depends on their attitude. Users expressing pro-impeachment leanings are capable to transmit information, on average, to a larger audience than users expressing anti-impeachment leanings. Furthermore, the users’ spreading capacity is correlated to the diversity, in terms of political position, of the audience reached. Our method can be exploited to identify the presence of echo chambers and their effects across different contexts and shed light upon the mechanisms allowing to break echo chambers.
publishDate 2019
dc.date.none.fl_str_mv 2019
2019-12-09
2020
2020-04-21
dc.type.none.fl_str_mv journal article
http://purl.org/coar/resource_type/c_6501
VoR
http://purl.org/coar/version/c_970fb48d4fbd8a85
dc.type.openaire.fl_str_mv info:eu-repo/semantics/article
format article
dc.identifier.none.fl_str_mv https://hdl.handle.net/2117/184169
https://dx.doi.org/10.1140/epjds/s13688-019-0213-9
url https://hdl.handle.net/2117/184169
https://dx.doi.org/10.1140/epjds/s13688-019-0213-9
dc.language.none.fl_str_mv Inglés
eng
language_invalid_str_mv Inglés
language eng
dc.rights.none.fl_str_mv open access
http://purl.org/coar/access_right/c_abf2
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Spain
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/es/
dc.rights.openaire.fl_str_mv info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess
rights_invalid_str_mv open access
http://purl.org/coar/access_right/c_abf2
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Spain
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/es/
eu_rights_str_mv openAccess
dc.format.none.fl_str_mv application/pdf
dc.source.none.fl_str_mv reponame:UPCommons. Portal del coneixement obert de la UPC
instname:Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC)
instname_str Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC)
reponame_str UPCommons. Portal del coneixement obert de la UPC
collection UPCommons. Portal del coneixement obert de la UPC
repository.name.fl_str_mv
repository.mail.fl_str_mv
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score 15.198674

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