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Informal Political Conversations, Social Networks and Participation in Public Life

Sebastián Valenzuela

School of Journalism

Jesse Jones Fellowship Presentation

October 2008

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Talk is good for democracy

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New approach to an old idea…

Gabriel Tarde (1890s)

Alexis de Tocqueville (1830s)

Paul Lazarsfeld (1940s)

Jurgen Habermas (1960s)

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“With talk we can invent alternative futures, create mutual purposes, and construct competing visions

of community”

--Benjamim Barber (1983/2003, p. 177)

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But what kind of talk?

• Formal vs. Informal

• Interpersonal vs. Computer-Mediated

• Family vs. Strangers

• Public issues vs. Private issues

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What I study

• The effects of informal conversations about public affairs between non-elite members of a political community on their knowledge, efficacy and participation

• Online and offline public talk

• Public talk within social networks

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And the news media???

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My Research

1. Talk as moderator of news use effects

2. New online platforms for talk

3. Social network attributes (e.g., diversity, ties)

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Talk as Moderator

• Moderator: A variable that changes the impact of one variable on another.

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Previous Research

• Talking amplifies the positive effects of news use– Compensates for news shortcomings (cognitive)– Provides mobilizing information (behavioral gaps)

• Talking can be detrimental to the positive effects of news use:– Interference or distortion (cognitive)

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Purpose and method

• Test if talk moderates news effects on attitudes

• Which attributes interact with news use:– Is it talking more often?– Talking with politically sophisticated people?– Talking with people who share (or don’t) my political

preferences?

• Secondary analysis, NES survey, 2000

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OPTIMISTIC VIEW:

People who don’t follow the news can learn from discussion with others

OR

PESSIMISTIC VIEW:

For people who follow the news, discussing too much can hinder their political learning

Political Knowledge

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Network disagreement strengthens the positive relationship between news and political self-efficacy, particularly among those who discuss frequently.

SO

Talkative news junkies with heterogeneous networks have extremely high political efficacy!

Self-Efficacy

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New online platforms for talk

• Virtual forums

• E-mail threads

• Blogs

• Chatrooms

• IM

• Social network sites

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and civic/political life

• Not SNS per se, but specific uses what matter

• Informational vs. recreational uses of SNS

• Own online survey, college students, 2007

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Life satisfaction +15% (±2%)

Social trust + 5% (±1%)

Civic participation +16% (±4%)

FB Groups +10% (±4%)

Political participation +2% (±4%)

FB Groups +27% (±5%)

Heavy vs Light Users

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• Informational uses are more related to participation than recreational uses.

Civic Political

Social interaction -1% +2%

Entertainment -1% +1%

Self-status seeking +1% +2%

Information seeking +4% +3%

Testing our Assumptions

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Social Network Attributes

• Unique contribution of F2F and CMC on offline and online participation

• Specific attributes:• Ties: strong, weak• Heterogeneity: disagreement, diversity• Quality: expertise, reasoning

• CJCR online survey, adult sample, 2009

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Network Variables

• Network size online/offline• Strong ties: family, friends• Weak ties: strangers, demographic

diversity• Network disagreement: ratio of “safe” to

“dangerous” discussion• Reasoning: argumentation, issue-based

discussion

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Results

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Some lessons…

• Talk is good for democracy

• Talk and news: a complex relationship

• Cyberoptimism AND cyberpessimism

• We’re only starting to scratch the surface!

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Future Research

• Theoretical synthesis– Connection to existing theories– From deliberation to communication

• Methodological challenges– Experiments– Observations

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Thanks to…

• My co-authors: Homero Gil de Zúñiga, Kerk Kee, Namsu Park and Yonghwan Kim

• All my colleagues at the

• Maxwell McCombs, Talia Stroud, Sharon Strover, Teresa Correa and all the other people who directly or indirectly contributed to my research

• The J-School and the College of Comm for the $$$!