IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/sagope/v14y2024i2p21582440241256438.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Politics on YouTube: Detecting Online Group Polarization Based on News Videos’ Comments

Author

Listed:
  • Raghvendra Mall
  • Mridul Nagpal
  • Joni Salminen
  • Hind Almerekhi
  • Soon-gyo Jung
  • Bernard J. Jansen

Abstract

Technology-mediated group toxicity polarization is a major socio-technological issue of our time. For better large-scale monitoring of polarization among social media news content, we quantify the toxicity of news video comments using a Toxicity Polarization Score. For polarizing news videos, our premise is that the comments’ toxicity approximates either an “M†or “U†shaped distribution—that is, there is unevenly balanced toxicity among the comments. We evaluate our premises through a case study using a dataset of ~180,000 YouTube comments on ~3,700 real news videos from an international online news organization. Toward polarization-mitigating information systems, we build a predictive machine learning model to score the toxicity polarization of news content even when its comments are disabled or not available, as it is a current trend among news publishers to disable comments. Findings imply that the most engaging news content is also often the most polarizing, which we associate with increasing research on clickbait content and the detrimental effect of attention-based metrics on the health of online social media communities, especially news communities.

Suggested Citation

  • Raghvendra Mall & Mridul Nagpal & Joni Salminen & Hind Almerekhi & Soon-gyo Jung & Bernard J. Jansen, 2024. "Politics on YouTube: Detecting Online Group Polarization Based on News Videos’ Comments," SAGE Open, , vol. 14(2), pages 21582440241, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:sagope:v:14:y:2024:i:2:p:21582440241256438
    DOI: 10.1177/21582440241256438
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/21582440241256438
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/21582440241256438?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ana L. Schmidt & Antonio Peruzzi & Antonio Scala & Matteo Cinelli & Peter Pomerantsev & Anne Applebaum & Sophia Gaston & Nicole Fusi & Zachary Peterson & Giuseppe Severgnini & Andrea F. Cesco & Davide, 2020. "Measuring social response to different journalistic techniques on Facebook," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 7(1), pages 1-7, December.
    2. Peters, Kay & Chen, Yubo & Kaplan, Andreas M. & Ognibeni, Björn & Pauwels, Koen, 2013. "Social Media Metrics — A Framework and Guidelines for Managing Social Media," Journal of Interactive Marketing, Elsevier, vol. 27(4), pages 281-298.
    3. Ana L. Schmidt & Antonio Peruzzi & Antonio Scala & Matteo Cinelli & Peter Pomerantsev & Anne Applebaum & Sophia Gaston & Nicole Fusi & Zachary Peterson & Giuseppe Severgnini & Andrea F. Cesco & Davide, 2020. "Correction: Measuring social response to different journalistic techniques on Facebook," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 7(1), pages 1-1, December.
    4. Chipidza, Wallace, 2021. "The effect of toxicity on COVID-19 news network formation in political subcommunities on Reddit: An affiliation network approach," International Journal of Information Management, Elsevier, vol. 61(C).
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Yadav, Manjit S. & de Valck, Kristine & Hennig-Thurau, Thorsten & Hoffman, Donna L. & Spann, Martin, 2013. "Social Commerce: A Contingency Framework for Assessing Marketing Potential," Journal of Interactive Marketing, Elsevier, vol. 27(4), pages 311-323.
    2. Irina Maiorescu & Mihaela Bucur & Bogdan Georgescu & Daniel Moise & Vasile Alecsandru Strat & Ion Daniel Zgură, 2020. "Social Media and IOT Wearables in Developing Marketing Strategies. Do SMEs Differ From Large Enterprises?," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(18), pages 1-18, September.
    3. Ponzoa, José M. & Gómez, Andrés & Mas, José M., 2023. "EU27 and USA institutions in the digital ecosystem: Proposal for a digital presence measurement index," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 154(C).
    4. Ivanete Schneider Hahn & Flavia Luciane Scherer & Kenny Basso & Marindia Brachak dos Santos, 2016. "Consumer Trust in and Emotional Response to Advertisements on Social Media and their Influence on Brand Evaluation," Brazilian Business Review, Fucape Business School, vol. 13(4), pages 49-71, July.
    5. Tonino Pencarelli & Maria Gabriella Mele, 2019. "A systematic literature review on social media metrics," MERCATI & COMPETITIVIT?, FrancoAngeli Editore, vol. 2019(1), pages 15-38.
    6. Matej Kovač & Vesna Žabkar, 2020. "Do Social Media and E-Mail Engagement Impact Reputation and Trust-Driven Behavior?," Tržište/Market, Faculty of Economics and Business, University of Zagreb, vol. 32(1), pages 9-25.
    7. Alberto Lopez & Eva Guerra & Beatriz Gonzalez & Sergio Madero, 2020. "Consumer sentiments toward brands: the interaction effect between brand personality and sentiments on electronic word of mouth," Journal of Marketing Analytics, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 8(4), pages 203-223, December.
    8. Jiayin Pei & Guang Yu & Xianyun Tian & Maureen Renee Donnelley, 2017. "A new method for early detection of mass concern about public health issues," Journal of Risk Research, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 20(4), pages 516-532, April.
    9. Onețiu Darius Daniel, 2020. "The Impact of Social Media Adoption by Companies. Digital Transformation," Studia Universitatis „Vasile Goldis” Arad – Economics Series, Sciendo, vol. 30(2), pages 83-96, June.
    10. Rosenthal, Benjamin & Brito, Eliane P.Z., 2017. "How virtual brand community traces may increase fan engagement in brand pages," Business Horizons, Elsevier, vol. 60(3), pages 375-384.
    11. Shahbaznezhad, Hamidreza & Dolan, Rebecca & Rashidirad, Mona, 2021. "The Role of Social Media Content Format and Platform in Users' Engagement Behavior," Journal of Interactive Marketing, Elsevier, vol. 53(C), pages 47-65.
    12. Ho Kim & Juncai Jiang & Norris I. Bruce, 2021. "Discovering heterogeneous consumer journeys in online platforms: implications for networking investment," Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Springer, vol. 49(2), pages 374-396, March.
    13. Liao, Junyun & Chen, Jiawen & Zhao, Haichuan & Li, Muhua, 2023. "Fanning the flames: Transmitting negative word of mouth of rival brands," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 154(C).
    14. Muhammad Naeem & Wilson Ozuem, 2021. "Understanding the social consumer fashion brand engagement journey: insights about reputed fashion brands," Journal of Brand Management, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 28(5), pages 510-525, September.
    15. Fangfang Li & Jorma Larimo & Leonidas C. Leonidou, 2021. "Social media marketing strategy: definition, conceptualization, taxonomy, validation, and future agenda," Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science, Springer, vol. 49(1), pages 51-70, January.
    16. Marchand, André & Hennig-Thurau, Thorsten & Flemming, Jan, 2021. "Social media resources and capabilities as strategic determinants of social media performance," International Journal of Research in Marketing, Elsevier, vol. 38(3), pages 549-571.
    17. Faseeh Amin Beig & Mohammad Furqan Khan, 2018. "Impact of Social Media Marketing on Brand Experience: A Study of Select Apparel Brands on Facebook," Vision, , vol. 22(3), pages 264-275, September.
    18. Daliborka Blazeska & Natasha Ristovska, 2019. "The Use Of Social Media As An Effective Tool For Obtaining Sustainable Competitive Advantage," Business Management, D. A. Tsenov Academy of Economics, Svishtov, Bulgaria, issue 2 Year 20, pages 31-45.
    19. Jose Ramon Saura & Ana Reyes-Menendez & Cesar Alvarez-Alonso, 2018. "Do Online Comments Affect Environmental Management? Identifying Factors Related to Environmental Management and Sustainability of Hotels," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(9), pages 1-20, August.
    20. Schaefers, Tobias & Falk, Tomas & Kumar, Ashish & Schamari, Julia, 2021. "More of the same? Effects of volume and variety of social media brand engagement behavior," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 135(C), pages 282-294.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:sagope:v:14:y:2024:i:2:p:21582440241256438. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.