Echoes of Misinformation

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The idea of an “echo chamber” is a rather new development. The term refers to a group of people or an organization that controls the media taken in by the participants, potentially leading to . ycho chambers have , but they have most recently gained attention and notoriety due to their relevance in today’s political climate. The United States’ most recent presidential election that echo chambers changed the way that many people thought about the candidates and . The issues brought by echo chambers are numerous, but the main the average person. The average person in the US experiences echo chambers for numerous reasons, with the blame falling both One concept is certain though. Echo chambers have become a topic of great concern for the public because of their rise in pertinence, media control over information, their ubiquity, and the

The rise in the of echo chambers may beattributed to the prominence of social media in the average person’s life. The modern era features people who are dependent on social media for their news intake, this causes several problems (Boutyline, 2016)Aside from fake news, which is a different matter, the climate experienced in an echo chamber is often one of intense support for already-established ideas and beliefs (Garrett, 2009). This may seem like a controlled, negative environment in thought, but in execution, it attracts people with a falsesense of security. By subscribing to one of the few prominent sides of an argument, a person joins a community of like-minded individuals who will support anything said that agrees with the already-established views of the group.Seth Flaxman found this to be true in his study of online news consumption. After analyzing conducted in 2016. news bias patterns in social media-promoted content and user-found (browsed) content, he concluded that “individuals generally read publications that are ideologically quite similar” (317) and that people who read opinionated articles “are almost exclusively exposed to only one side of the political spectrum.” (317) It’s a near guarantee that, they ,will not need to prove their point or fight for what they believe in. All they need to do upon entering an echo chamber is go with the flow.

Social media offers the perfect setting for the stagnation of ideas. When people join social media groups or news networks, they tend to gravitate to what they already believe in (Flaxman, 2016). This is proven by a study conducted in 2015, headed by R. Kelly Garrett, a professor at the School of Communications at Ohio State. He studiedpeople’s social media preference concerning news intake and found that his “results suggest that subjects’ news item selections were biased toward opinion reinforcement and against opinion challenge” (270). Conservatives will follow conservative pages and liberals will follow liberal pages. This seems like a rather obvious logical thought path to follow, but delving into this idea unearths some unnervingramifications. A lack of outside input means that the other side of the argument is not given a fair chance (Garrett, 2015). Both sides are alienated, allowing for an ever-strengthening identity of thought to take place within the group. This vehement lack of understanding from both sides fosters an “us vs. them” mentality, one that is growing ever prominent in the environment experienced by Americans today (Levendusky, 2013). By denying different views the option to be present in a debate, all sidessuffer a fundamental miscommunication of what the debate is inherently about.

The blame for people not receiving a wide variety of news and viewpoints on a subject can be shifted to numerous organizations and individuals, but the main guilty parties are often found to be the news sources themselves. People aiming to try and gather truly unbiased, high-quality journalism often find themselves frustrated by the surprising lack of truly neutral reporting available to the public today. There are very, very few information networks, news providers, and media distributors that do not have some sort of skew toward one side of an argument or another (almost always left or right-winged in the US). The simple ubiquity of biased news makes it an almost daunting task to try and stay informed in the current news climate. Because most media is skewed in some way, people end up taking sides on issues that they merely wanted to exploreIt is easy for news organizations and groups to take a side, even if subtly, to ensure a base of support from people who already have that view.

Matthew Levendusky addressed this topic in his 2013 study on echo chamber-esque media activity, “Why do Partisan Media Polarize Viewers?”. He says that “these programs broadcast one-sided, proattitudinal messages to viewers, which they will uncritically accept” (2). They play it safe by hinting slightly that one side of an argument is correct, making sure that they receive followers and fans no matter what the situation is. People go toward and listen to sources of information that align with their own views, so a simply informative article is not an article that gains attention (Levendusky, 2013). This fendemental flaw in the way that information is published and produced can easily explain how difficult it is to find simply informative content. By not showing all sides of an argument or debate, these information providers are denying the reader the ability to form a truly cohesive opinion on a subject, which drives even more people to be caught in echo chambers as their beliefs grow stronger and they seek agreeance and a generalcomfort in a group of peoplewho think the same way.

The effect that these echo chambers have on people is rather apparent in both the short and long term. People see issues in a different way than they normally would if they have been exposed to a group of people that strengthen their views. The idea of, Support networks,especially online, is one that brings with a slew ofconsequences in the way that people see the world around them. They make people more willing to strengthen their views on a subject despite what the other side may say. Drawing once again from Levundusky the effects of echo chambers are “concentrated among the more informed, engaged, and extreme segments of the populace who regularly watch partisan media programs” (5). The effect of these groups of people doing nothing but supporting one another’s viewpoints fostersa sense of community. The community associated with these groups is one of total isolation. In a lot of cases, and the lack of diversity in the ideologies and thoughts of the group makes them hostile and unwilling to respect the viewpoints of those from the other side (Levendusky, 2013).

The idea of isolated groups becoming almost radical regarding outside viewpoints is covered quite extensively in Johnathan Bright’s 2017 paper, “Explaining the emergence of echo chambers in social media: the role of ideology and extremism”. In the paper, Bright asserts that the filtering of different type of information lead to an increase for people to neglect any discerning opinions. in the ability He found, through studying the social media patterns of people on Twitter, that “as one or both parties in a party pair tend towards the ideological extremes, communication pattern between the drop” (12). He observed that “centrist parties communicate more than extremist parties” (12), supporting the idea that divided and strong-willed groups will isolate themselves more, and thus can form more divided and extreme opinions on a subject of debate By participating in a group that only servesto reaffirm beliefs, one is introducing themselves to an environment in which they can foster more radical views.

Some of the biggest and most consequential sources of echo chambers are political parties, and they are very much intertwined in the points brought up by this paper. Bright says that “larger parties seemed to generally communicate less with other groups” (15), showing that even prominent and relevant groups fall victim to the dangers of echo chambers. The point being made here is not that echo chambers make people believe radical and extremist views. The point is that the absence of outside views on any subject can cause more concrete and uncontested arguments about one side of the debate. The overflow of information and support for one side of a debate often makes people fail to consider the other side’s views are even pertinentto the conversation (Bright, 2017).

While this may all be quite disturbing, there is truly hope for those who wish to remove themselves from this fundamental flaw in today’s information sharing process. Most people do not have the free time associated with researching all sides of an issue, but that doesn’t mean that they can’t train themselves to consider different viewpoints automatically. Keith Stanovich, a psychology professor at the University of Toronto, conducted a study to see if people who actively tried to be more open-minded while hearing about different viewpoints experienced different ways of thinking about issues presented, and he said that he “found stronger relationships between cognitive ability and the tendency to evaluate evidence independent of prior beliefs” (352). This can reasonably be cited as evidence to the idea that it is possible to make one’s self more open-mindedand able to consider different views. People do not need to learn every viewpoint of an argument to understand the problem fully. People simply need to learn to think in a way that allows for opposing ideas to enter their heads. Just by watching an opposing television program or reading an opposing magazine, even occasionally, people cangain a greater understanding for all sides of an issue if they want to (Stanovich, 1997).

Echo chambers change the way that people take in information, and they are growing more relevant by the day as more people fall into their comforting grasps. The inability for one or both sides of an argument to acknowledge the others’ views as a valid point within an issue is something to be concerned about, and the media around the average citizenis not going to do much to try and sto this problem. It is going to be up to the people themselves to try and think differently, challenging their own views and becomings informed citizen. There is no doubt that people naturally move toward groups that hold the same views as them. It is more comforting and validating to be surrounded by people who think in the same way that one already does. The lack of knowledge of the different sides of an issue that come with this comfort is something that is inevitable if echo chambers continue to hold their prominence in the media. This is an issue that affects each person living in this nation today, and it will continue to affect us for as long as echo chambers have the power that they have right now. The least that we owe ourselves is be preventative of the stagnation of ideas and beliefs within our minds and the minds of those around us.

References

Levendusky, M. S. (2013). Why Do Partisan Media Polarize Viewers? American Journal of Political Science, 57(3).

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Garrett, R. K. (2009). Echo chambers online?: Politically motivated selective exposure among Internet news users. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communications, 14

Sarkar, D. (2015). Paper: 'echo chambers' reinforce beliefs rather than challenge them in climate change debate. FierceHomelandSecurity.

Boutyline, A., & Willer, R. (2016). The social structure of political echo chamber: variation in ideological homophily in online networks. Political Psychology, 38(3)

Grömping, M. (2014). ‘Echo chambers’ Partisan groups during the 2014 Thai election. Asia Pacific Media Educator, 12(1)

O’Hara, K., & Stevens, D. (2015). Echo chambers and online radicalism: assessing the internet’s complicity in violent extremism. Policy & Internet, 7(4)

Bright, J. (2017). Explaining the Emergence of Echo Chambers on Social Media: The Role of Ideology and Extremism. SSRN Electronic Journal. Retrieved November 05, 2017

Stanovich, K. E., & West, R. F. (1997). Reasoning independently of prior belief and individual differences in actively open-minded thinking. Journal of Educational Psychology, 89(2), 342-357.

Flaxman, S., Goel, S., & Rao, J. M. (2016). Filter Bubbles, Echo Chambers, and Online News Consumption. Public Opinion Quarterly, 80(S1), 298-320.

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Colton Stanislawski is a first-year Mechanical Engineering student at Tech. When he’s not doing homework or participating in AFROTC, he’s either hanging out with or playing alongside his friends in the Huskies Pep Band’s Concussion section. Colton decided to write this paper because he saw echo chambers as an alarmingly prevalent problem in the recent election cycle. He hopes to draw attention to this issue and help people make more informed decisions regarding their democratic power.