Committee: Jennifer Victor (Chair, George Mason University); Nadine Gibson (University of North Carolina at Wilmington); Joseph Uscinski (University of Miami).

The authors of this article address an important question in U.S. politics: What makes people engage in illegal protest? As protest activity in the U.S. and elsewhere ticks upwards, the authors of this paper discriminate illegal protest activity from legal protest and show its nuanced relationship with authoritarian values. The committee was impressed with this article because of how it engages with current literature on protest and authoritarianism to derive expectations about a non-linear relationship. The authors use a panel survey fielded in Austria with impressive response rates. Their statistical approach is both sophisticated and appropriate for their data. The study finds that individuals with extremely low levels of authoritarianism or extremely high levels of authoritarianism engaged less frequently in illegal protest than individuals who have average levels of authoritarianism. They also find that those most likely to engage in illegal protest are not ideological extremists. The article is an important advancement of our understanding of illegal protest at a time of heightened authoritarianism in the U.S. and elsewhere.

Todos los premios: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1532673X251338249
PDF: http://acpa-usal.com/wp-content/uploads/Best-Published-Artcile-2022.pdf

Accede aquí al artículo: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1532673X211053221

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Sonja Utz – Leibniz-Institut für Wissensmedien (IWM)

Communicative AI and political information-seeking: the credibility challenge

Communicative AI systems like ChatGPT or Alexa have rapidly gained popularity; and many people, especially youth, use them for information search. In the political domain, this might be problematic because these chatbots are not unbiased and can even be influenced to spread propaganda. It is, thus, important to judge the credibility of the information provided by communicative AI. While the problem of hallucinations and misinformation from communicative AI has been widely discussed, another factor that makes people prone to belief in misinformation from communicative AI has been overlooked: The conversational way in which communicative AI presents information might also influence credibility judgments. I will present two experiments in which we examined the influence of presentation mode  – voice (e.g., Alexa), dynamic text (e.g., ChatGPT) and static text (e.g., Wikipedia) – on credibility judgments of information with varying accuracy. The results show that people struggle more to discern accurate from less accurate information when it is presented by a communicative AI. Additionally, we explored the underlying psychological processes that contribute to these credibility judgments. First, data from a longitudinal study also demonstrate the increasing use of communicative AI for information search and support the relationship between perception of communicative AI and credibility judgments. The implications of these findings for political information-seeking will be discussed.

Fuyuan Shen – Pennsylvania State University

The Power of Political Conversion Stories: How They Shape Message Attitudes

The use of political conversion narratives, wherein individuals publicly recount their shift in support to an opposing party’s candidate, has seen a notable increase. The talk will focus on the recent research we have conducted to examine the impact of such conversion messages disseminated via social media on individuals’ message attitudes. Results from our experiment revealed that conversion political posts exerted a significant influence on participants’ message attitudes, regardless of their pre-existing party affiliations. Furthermore, a significant interaction between message type and political involvement revealed that highly involved individuals exhibited greater susceptibility to conversion messages. Source credibility emerged as a significant mediator of these effects. These findings offer valuable theoretical and practical insights into the persuasive power of conversion messages.

Thaiane Moreira de Oliveira – Universidade Federal Fluminense

Science Under Siege: Belief Systems, Disinformation, and the Populist War on Academia in Latin America

In recent years, scientific institutions and universities across Latin America have faced escalating attacks fueled by disinformation and ideological polarization. This talk will explore how belief systems shape the acceptance or rejection of scientific knowledge, how populist movements weaponize anti-intellectualism to undermine academia, and how disinformation is used as a political tool to erode trust in scientific expertise. Drawing from the Brazilian context, we will examine the broader implications of these trends for democracy, policymaking, and the future of knowledge production

The post Youth Political Socialization in Focus: Data, Psychology, and Everyday Influence appeared first on Acpa.

“Stop the steal”: misinformation correction and misperceptions about election fraud”

Abstract
Purpose
The two primary purposes of the current study are to further understand the impact of corrective messages on misperceptions about election fraud in the US and to test the effect of party affiliation of the accused politician on participants’ election misperceptions.

Design/methodology/approach
To assess these relationships, we conducted a between-subjects randomized online experiment.

Findings
Our results show that participants in the control condition held higher misperceptions than those who were exposed to a correction message. Findings also showed that liberal media use was negatively associated with election fraud misperceptions, while conservative media use, information from Donald Trump, authoritarianism and self-reported conservatives were positively associated with election fraud misperceptions.

Originality/value
Experimental test to understand election fraud misperceptions, using our own original stimulus materials.

Read it here:
- https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/oir-08-2024-0512/full/html
- Full Text (ResearchGate)

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“Social Media Democracy Mirage How Social Media News Fuels a Politically Uninformed Participatory Democracy”

Summary
For over two decades, political communication research has hailed the potentially reinvigorating effect of social media on democracy. Social media was expected to provide new opportunities for people to learn about politics and public affairs, and to participate politically. Building on two systematic literature reviews on social media, and its effects on political participation and knowledge (2000–2020), and introducing empirical evidence drawing on four original US survey data that expands for over a decade (2009–2020), this Element contends that social media has only partially fulfilled this tenet, producing a Social Media Democracy Mirage. That is, social media have led to a socio-political paradox in which people are more participatory than ever, yet not necessarily more informed.

Read it here for free (until December 18): https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009053266

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“Seeking justice on social media: Funas as a localized form of Latin American youth activism”

Abstract
A funa, a public denouncement aimed at raising moral condemnation of a person accused of perpetrating a crime or injustice, has become a major digital activism instrument in Latin America, particularly in Chile. Originated in the human rights movement in the 1990s, funas re-emerged as a new form of online activism that hybridized with a Latin American and historical form of protest to exert informal justice through social media. Drawing on a face-to-face survey of Chilean youth aged 18–29 years, we examine the factors that explain young people’s attitudes and behaviors regarding funas. We find that funas are gendered, with issues like sexual harassment and misconduct being the primary subject of funas. We also show that women hold more positive views about funas and are more likely to engage in online funas. Finally, our findings indicate that individuals who trust the judicial system are less likely to share funas on social media.

Read it here: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/14614448241283943

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“Twitter Communication Among Democracy Actors: How Interacting With Journalists and Elected Officials Influence People’s Government Performance Assessment and Trust”

Abstract
Prior research highlights broad democratic benefits of sustained public trust in the government, and the confidence that the government performs responsively addressing citizens’ problems (i.e., unemployment, cost of living). As social media enhances citizens’ opportunities to interact with journalists and elected officials, little is known about these communication effects on people’s government trust, and citizens’ evaluations about how well the government is addressing important society problems. Relying on a two-wave US representative panel survey data, this study builds on prior literature to introduce Twitter Communication with Democracy Actors: journalists and politicians, as a single, yet two-dimensional construct. Then, advancing different ordinary least squares (OLS) predictive panel models, results indicate that people who interact with democratic actors on Twitter trust the government and assess its overall functioning more positively. Additional moderating tests indicate social media interactions with democracy actors help citizens who might need it the most, specifically those who have lower levels of external political efficacy. The study provides theoretical implications of findings and suggestions for future research.

Read it here: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/20563051241232907

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The paper entitled “The effect of sexist attitudes and identity of the speaker on the credibility of politically contested statements” it is an outcome of the ARGO Project led by Isabel Inguanzo and funded by the Spanish Ministry of Equality.

The international jury valued “The paper was innovative in terms of theory, research design and empirical findings. It pushed the boundaries on what we know about gender in South Europe (specifically Spain), collecting novel data on an under-researched topic. The analysis was well-executed. The findings were not only counter-intuitive but are also likely to speak to a much broader audience that is interested in gender, cueing theories, and experimental methods”.

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“Geographical and gender inequalities in health sciences studies: testing differences in research productivity, impact and visibility”

Abstract
Purpose
Gender and geographical imbalance in production and impact levels is a pressing issue in global knowledge production. Within Health Sciences, while some studies found stark gender and geographical biases and inequalities, others found little empirical evidence of this marginalization. The purpose of the study is to clear the ambiguity concerning the topic.

Design/methodology/approach
Based on a comprehensive and systematic analysis of Health Sciences research data downloaded from the Scival (Scopus/Scimago) database from 2017 to 2020 (n = 7,990), this study first compares gender representation in research productivity, as well as differences in terms of citation per document, citations per document view and view per document scores according to geographical location. Additionally, the study clarifies whether there is a geographic bias in productivity and impact measures (i.e. citation per document, citations per document view and view per document) moderated by gender.

Findings
Results indicate that gender inequalities in productivity are systematic at the overall disciplinary, as well as the subfield levels. Findings also suggest statistically significant geographical differences in citation per document, citations per document view, and view per document scores, and interaction effect of gender over the relation between geography and (1) the number of citations per view and (2) the number of views per document.

Originality/value
This study contributes to scientometric studies in health sciences by providing insightful findings about the geographical and gender bias in productivity and impact across world regions.

Read it here: https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/OIR-10-2022-0541/full/html

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“Tuning Out (Political and Science) News? A Selective Exposure Study of the News Finds Me Perception”

Abstract
Individuals harboring perceptions that the “news will find me” (NFM) tend to be less active consuming traditional media, preferring news online and on social media. NFM has also been linked with lower political knowledge and political participation over time. What remains to be seen, however, is whether high-NFM individuals are in fact less likely to expose themselves to news once they do encounter it online. This preregistered study fills this gap in the literature by unobtrusively logging selection behaviors while U.S. adults browsed a mock news website featuring various hard and soft news stories. Consistent with our hypothesizing, NFM was associated with greater exposure to soft news. Additionally, we examined whether genre-specific NFM beliefs would predict less exposure to those news genres. We found support for this hypothesis in the context of science news, but for political news, this relationship depended on the news stories presented.

Read it here: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/00936502231215528

The post NEW PUBLICATION: Tuning Out (Political and Science) News? A Selective Exposure Study of the News Finds Me Perception appeared first on Acpa.

In this publication the DRU authors introduce a broadly operational academic definition for of Artificial Intelligence (AI), and provide a value and simple theoretical framework for future research on AI based on its levels of performance, and autonomy.

“A Scholarly Definition of Artificial Intelligence (AI): Advancing AI as a Conceptual Framework in Communication Research”

Abstract
Research on Artificial Intelligence (AI) in communication research is gaining broader interest. This interdisciplinary interest has yet to be supported by a systematic scholarly definition and by a holistic theoretical framework in communication research. First, combining prior theoretical efforts from diverse disciplines in the social sciences, especially journalism and communication, this study introduces a wide-ranging working AI scholarly definition in communication research as the tangible real-world capability of non-human machines or artificial entities to perform, task solve, communicate, interact, and act logically as it occurs with biological humans. We also propose its theoretical operationalization based on two dimensions: level of performance and level of autonomy, advancing an elementary conceptual framework drawing on AI’s levels of potential actions or performance the AI may accomplish, including 1) performing tasks, 2) taking decisions, and 3) making predictions; as well as AI’s level of autonomy, or the agency results contingent on the degrees of human input, interaction, or supervision involved.

Read it here: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10584609.2023.2290497

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Proyecto PID2020-115562GB-I00 financiado por MICIU/AEI /10.13039/501100011033

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