The number of likes and shares on a post across various social media platforms is an indicator of the popularity of both the post and the person who has posted it. But in this fight of who becomes more popular on these platforms and gets more numbers, people have become more abusive and furious, in terms of expressing their feeling in comments through text or videos through what they utter. The only reason being that such posts get more “likes” and “shares” on social media.
According to a new study by Yale University, social media platforms like Twitter amplify expressions of moral outrage over time because users who learn such language get rewarded with an increased number of “likes” and “shares”. And these rewards had the greatest influence on users connected with politically moderate networks.
In this study, a Yale University postgraduate (psychology) researcher and author William Brady explains that "social media stimuli are able to change the tone of our political conversations online." Significantly, this research was led by William Brady and his associate professor Molly Crockett.
During this research, the researchers measured the expression of moral outrage on Twitter during controversial events in real life. Also, control experiments designed to test social media mechanisms examined the behavior of subjects that reward users for posting popular content on social networking sites.
Brady says, “This is the first evidence that some people learn to express more outrage over time because they are rewarded by the basic design of social media”. The researchers suggest that this type of moral outrage can also become a powerful force for social good, encouraging punishment for moral offenses and promoting social cooperation. But there is also a dark side to this trend, which contributes to the persecution of minority groups, the spread of misinformation and political polarization.
Significantly, social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter argue that they provide a neutral platform for any type of conversation. But many people believe this ideology that such behavior on social media is fueling the tendency of anger among the people. Whereas, researchers believe that accurately measuring complex social expressions such as moral outrage remains a technical challenge.
To collect the data, Brady and Crockett's team developed machine learning software that monitors moral outrage on Twitter posts and monitored 12.7 million tweets from 7,331 Twitter users. They used the software to test whether users expressed more outrage over time, and if so, why.
In this research, the team found that incentives from social media sites like Twitter are actually changing the way people post. Users who receive more "likes" and "retweets" are more likely to express anger in their tweets and in subsequent posts. To support these findings, the researchers also conducted tests on controlled behavior to demonstrate that being rewarded for expressing outrage caused users to increase their expression of outrage over time.
These results raise questions about the role of social media in political polarization. Based on the results of the study, researchers show that more anger was expressed by members of politically liberal networks on social media sites than by members of politically active networks.
Crockett says, “Our studies find that people with politically moderate friends and followers are more sensitive to social feedback that reinforces their outrage expressions. This suggests a mechanism for how moderate groups can become politically radicalized over time — the rewards of social media create positive feedback loops that exacerbate outrage.”
However, Crockett also says that this study does not indicate whether an increase in moral resentment is good or bad for society. But the findings do have implications for leaders who use the platforms and policymakers who are considering whether to regulate them.
“Amplification of moral outrage is a clear consequence of social media’s business model, which optimizes for user engagement,” Crockett said. “Given that moral outrage plays a crucial role in social and political change, we should be aware that tech companies, through the design of their platforms, have the ability to influence the success or failure of collective movements.”
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