Auteur: John Horrigan, Kelly Garrett, Paul Resnick

Datum: 27/10/2004

Opdrachtgever: Pew Internet & American Life Project

Titel: The Internet and Democratic Debate

Url: http://www.pewinternet.org/pdfs/PIP_Political_Info_Report.pdf

Abstract: Increasing numbers of Americans are getting news and information about politics online.
More than 40% of those who use the internet have gotten political material during this
campaign, according to the Pew Research Center for The People & The Press, more than
50% higher than the number who had gotten such information in the 2000 campaign.
As internet use has grown, prominent commentators and scholars have expressed concern
that this would be harmful to democratic deliberation. They worried that citizens would
use the internet to seek information that reinforced their political preferences and avoid
material that challenged their views. They feared that people would use internet tools to
customize and insulate their information inputs to a degree that held troubling
implications for American society. Democracy functions best when people consider a
range of arguments, including those that challenge their viewpoint. If people screened out
information that disputed their beliefs, then the chances for meaningful discourse on great
issues would be stunted and civic polarization would grow.
The Pew Internet & American Life Project and the University of Michigan School of
Information conducted a survey in June to test those concerns. We focused on the role of
the internet related to four dimensions of contemporary politics: the arguments anchoring
the campaign between George W. Bush and John Kerry; the arguments for and against
the war in Iraq; the arguments for and against gay marriage; and the arguments for and
against free trade. And our survey results belie the greatest fears about the impact of the
internet on democracy:
The internet is contributing to a wider awareness of political views during this year’s
campaign season.
At a time when political deliberation seems extremely partisan and when people may
be tempted to ignore arguments at odds with their views, internet users are not
insulating themselves in information echo chambers. Instead, they are exposed to moreSummary of Findings
political arguments than non-users.
While all people like to see arguments that support their beliefs, internet users are not
limiting their information exposure to views that buttress their opinions. Instead, wired
Americans are more aware than non-internet users of all kinds of arguments, even
those that challenge their preferred candidates and issue positions.
Some of the increase in overall exposure merely reflects a higher level of interest in
politics among internet users. However, even when we compare Americans who are
similar in interest in politics and similar in demographic characteristics such as age
and education, our main findings still hold. Internet users have greater overall
exposure to political arguments and they also hear more challenging arguments.