Does Social Networking Breed Social Division?

Great Debates
1

asks an op ed in the New York times here.

danah boyd [captilization sic] apparently feels that yes, it does. This due to the research she has that suggests that while MySpace used to be the only social networking space and everyone belonged to it, now the white, Asian, and/or well-off have moved over to Facebook, while the poor and/or Hispanic have remained on MySpace. She seems to feel that this indicates big trouble.

Let me start by saying that I’ve never been on MySpace or Facebook, or Twitter for that matter. I have no personal interest in “social networking.” The only reason any of this took my attention is that I majored in psychology, and I remember a concept called group polarization. This is a phenomenon in which, if you start out with a group who all mildly support a position and let them talk for a while, on the whole all of them will end up supporting that position much more extremely at the end of that time.

It seems to me that the Internet, chat rooms, message boards, and social networking are all things that are likely to increase group polarization. Prior to the Internet, if you were a wingnut, there was a good chance that everyone you ever talked to about your wingnuttery told you that you were a wingnut (or at least stared at you with glazed eyes and said “uh huh” at random intervals). Eventually, you might actually think to question your ideas to see if there was some reason why they might not be valid.

Now, if you’re a wingnut, you’ll go find a website or six where others not only share your wingnuttery, but go beyond it. You are hailed as one of The Chosen Few, who understand despite the determined blindness of the Vulgar Horde.

People are lazy, or ,at least, I am lazy. For example, I’ve always rather admired the conservatives who hang out here for their energy, if not their ideas, because it’s a lot easier to listen to those who already agree with you for the most part. I watch MSNBC rather than FOX NEWS because I can’t be bothered with ‘those idiots,’ and so forth. I don’t think I’m unique in preferring to sit in the choir for the preaching rather than to visit another church, so to speak.

What I’m driving at (you may very well be wondering, if you’ve made it this far) is that mass communications, but especially distributed mass communications like the Internet, can be a tool for education and broadening, but more often, I think they end up an instrument of group polarization. I don’t know that much of anything can be done about it, or even that anything should be done about it, but personally I think it’s one of the tragedies of human nature that the easier it is for many of us to communicate, the more we will just listen to the same thing over and over rather than learning something new.

What do you think?

2

I missed the part on Facebook where it asked my ethnicity & social status. Dammit- I knew those people were too good for me! :smiley:

3

I’m guessing they polled people rather than getting data directly from the sites.

4

Sure, people will congregate with people they’re similar to, just as they have for as long as there were different groups.

5

I think the fragmentation of media in general has the results you describe. I don’t think social networking sites are any worse than, say, the explosion of news channels that allow me to choose a channel that confirms my biases.

6

Originally Facebook was only for people in college. My guess is that people like me who joined then have invited friends now that it’s open to all and those friends are more likely to be of a similar social make-up to the original people. It doesn’t surprise me that this generally means a higher social status. I’ll leave the ethnicity aside because I don’t know the breakdown of people in college.

7

Oredigger, that was the impression I got from the comments posted about the article on the NYT site. I’m not claiming the essay was true; as a matter of fact, I thought it was a bit overwrought. But I did get to thinking that the recent ease of interacting with many people of like mind, even if they would otherwise be people you would look long and hard to find because they weren’t very common, might contribute to further polarization, as does the fragmentation of news that kevlaw mentioned. I just thought it a tad ironic that both social networking and the proliferation of media such as cable news and internet blogs has been touted as broadening and educational, but I suspect it functions more as devices for more group polarization.

It wasn’t important; never mind.

8

No it’s not a problem because anyone can join either. Also MySpace was NEVER unique. Friendster was bigger than MySpace up until Facebook joined the scene. It wasn’t until after Facebook already existed that MySpace became the top dog. Also, LinkedIn is more high-brow than Facebook, and there are plenty of specialty networking sites related to specific things like say Open Source networks like Drupal.

It’s just another attempt to create leftist victim crap out of something where it doesn’t actually exist. Yes, there is a difference in the demographic, Facebook caters to urban professionals more, and MySpace caters to a more working class mentality. I see this division in my own family with the more blue collar types proudly proclaiming their allegiance to MySpace. I personally use Facebook more though I have hundreds of friends on both, a lot of them overlapping.

These ideas are for the sort of morons who think that Twitter did something unique and original and is a phenomenon that is even worth noting as opposed to just another blogsite with a character limit.

The entire point of the internet is to help people sort the noise from the signal so they can find information that suits their needs. That has resulted in people organizing with others like themselves. There is no reason that someone cannot join the networks when they change their social strata if they choose to. The difference in social networks of the two sites is more effect than it is cause.

9

I’m not suggesting victimhood, and I don’t think the original author was either. Apparently I haven’t made my point well at all.

What I’m referring to is the fact that in what could be (and is often viewed to be) a huge melting pot, what we have on the internet is in fact self-dividing along the same lines that existed pre-internet, only more so. That people seek out others of their same ‘kind’ (whatever their kind happens to be, whether religious or political or social or whatever) and in doing so, become more ‘that kind’ due to the group polarization effect. People, rather than becoming more open-minded and educated, become more fixed in their attitudes and beliefs. They do this on their own, not because anyone makes them.

This is an observation, not a call to action. There’s almost certainly nothing that could be done about it anyway.

10

Put me in the camp that says it should be happening.

First of all, there is nothing new about Liberal versus Conservative, or Left versus Right polarization. You could easily have read nothing but right wing literature if you wanted to in, say, 1800.

Suppose, however, that you advocated a more extreme viewpoint in that year, one that only a handful of people in the entire world might have held. It would be almost impossible to even acquire knowledge of others who shared your views, let alone communicate with them regularly. But in 2009, that same percentage of the population who held that extreme viewpoint could easily be enough to support a newsletter or website to market their ideas. That is progress, and the marketplace of ideas has now flourished, especially with the Internet. It is a good thing that ideas now have to be judged on their merits rather than dismissed as extreme or uncommon.

It isn’t like anyone is being forced to change their mind. If people choose to advocate a more extreme position due to a certain kind of peer pressure, that is still their choice. Presumably a choice they would have made a hundred or two hundred years ago if their particular group had existed.

It isn’t that technology is impeding cooperation and increasing polarization; it is that technology is enhancing the ability for ideas to be heard and spread, including, unfortunately, ideas we personally dislike or disagree with. From a certain perspective, that appears to be increasing divisiveness or polarization, because “Hey, I’ve never heard that particular wacko viewpoint before, now there’s even more people I’m aware of that disagree with me or are opposed to my viewpoint!”.

11

I think of group polarization a little differently, as in:

John comes into the discussion believing X because of Reasons A, B, and C. Mary comes into the discussion believing X because of B, D, and E. William comes into the discussion believing X because of reasons C, E, and F. They spend time talking, and all leave the discussion believing X much more strongly than they did when they began, because all of them now have reasons A, B, C, D, E, and F.

I am aware that people have had the opportunity to reinforce their beliefs from mass publications for many centuries. I just am pointing out that the Internet makes this much easier, and does this at least as readily as it educates and broadens, probably more readily. People who started out liberal become more liberal. People who started out conservative become more conservative. People who are batshit crazy find others of their ilk to convince them that they are the only people who really know the truth - something that, without the Internet, a batshit crazy person might never encounter. It also allows really weird but wonderful people to find one another when without the Internet they might not have ever been able to.

It is good, but it’s also bad, and it’s possible that the bad side could win out and the batshit crazy could be able to organize to the point of really messing us up.

Tools are wonderful things but they can also be dangerous.

12

I don’t understand the OP’s thesis. The OP is positing some sort of exposure to competing political views that happened before the Internet that is no longer taking place. Where precisely did this occur, and how has it been eliminated by the Internet?

Moreover, the Internet also facilitates exposure to competing political and cultural views far more easily than ever before. One can’t just look at one side of the equation.

13

I think people have just as much opportunity hear arguments against their positions today as they have of reinforcing what they already believe. And much more opportunity than they had in the past. It is much better in this day and age with the internet showing them all the ways they might possibly be wrong; if one’s ideas are reinforced after that competition, presumably it is a somewhat reasonable position. However, if someone refuses to entertain alternatives and challenge their own beliefs, they never would have, no matter what century.

If the solution to ideas you oppose is to argue against them, then of course as more ideas become available more argument will occur. I don’t see this as a bad thing. Of course, I never really bought the whole cooperation, peace and harmony vision anyway. As long as no one resorts to violence, I think argumentation and competition is a good thing.

14

On the contrary, exposure to competing views is absolutely available, and you certainly have the opportunity to hear opposing ideas. My point is that many people don’t seek out exposure to competing views. They seek out those who agree with them, no matter how nutty their ideas, and they get validation for those ideas/beliefs/value systems, etc.

Pre internet, you couldn’t get access to people who vehemently agreed with you 24/7/365. With modern media of the internet and five million cable channels, you can find at least a dozen people who make you look like a moderate no matter how extreme you are, and you can do so any time, anywhere.

Yes, these media can provide you access to competing views. But a lot of us are lazy, and it’s so much easier to listen to people who already agree with you. Thus, that which appears to be an educating, broadening environment can turn out to be a device that works to reinforce and polarize instead.

I’m not suggesting that we get rid of readily available mass communication. I’m just pointing out a pitfall and trying to get people to consider that the effect it has on them might be less broadening than reinforcing.

15

Yes, and this is a GOOD thing, considering our society is based on specialization and the division of labor. The entire POINT of networking is to narrow down the pool of potential people you associate with so that you aren’t wasting your time with people who cannot help you advance yourself in any way.

16

Personally, I think the bigger “Social Divide” is between “People on Social Networking Sites” and “People Who Aren’t On Social Networking Sites.”

I already have to explain to countless people that I’m not on Facebook and I’m not going to join, and if they want to communicate with me then I’d prefer it be done in person, on the phone, or via E-mail.

But when you say “I’m Not On Facebook” in certain circles nowadays, it’s as if you’d been teleported back to the 1950s and said “Why yes, now you mention it, I am a Card-Carrying Communist. That Stalin fella is just swell!”

That, I think, is the divide- not the 1980s stand-up “White people are all like this, whilst Black/Asian/Latino people are all like this” divide outlined in the OP’s linked article.

17

Does anybody actually use social networking to expose themselves to new ideas, or to reinforce existing ideas while pretending to broaden them? I use facebook to keep in touch with a few friends and to spy on a few hundred people I knew once. Not only do I not interact with a single person I haven`t known in person, but I’m not interested in exchanging any ideas with the friends I do interact with. I primarily concern myself with making sure that blonde from freshman year still looked good in a bikini on her recent trip to the Bahamas and keeping up to date on that bitch from high school who got fat, pregnant and recently married.

I realize my own utter lack of interest in using social networking to expose myself to any ideas, new or old, doesnt negate your thesis........ but I dont know anybody who proclaims to do that.