Do men and women respond differently to negative political communication? Only a limited collection of studies into the effects of negative campaigns have investigated this research question, and the conflicting results produced from such studies have prevented the development of a widely accepted answer. As campaigns transition to new media environments, further problems arise, as any potential gender gap may be magnified on the new political communication battlefield of social media. The present article contributes to this sparsely investigated area through an empirical study of men's and women's reactions on Facebook to US presidential candidate attacks during two general election campaigns (2012 and 2016) and two primaries (2016 Democratic and Republican). Across nearly 400 million reactions and 40 million unique users, women demonstrate lower receptivity to candidate attacks than men. Two potential explanatory factors for the gap are examined, but neither fully captures the magnitude of the differences observed. Conceptualizing the gender gap composition in terms of differential receptivity most accurately explains these findings and potentially resolves the competing explanations for the gap within the existing literature.
The body-positive movement (#bodypositive) champions body acceptance by celebrating a diverse - visual - array of body types and shapes online. Sparked out of collective resistance to unrealistic bodies on social media, the #bodypositive community has assembled a considerable following: having now surpassed one billion engagements on Instagram. To mark this milestone, we highlight the problem, the promise, and the peril of image-focused movements on Instagram. On balance, we argue #bodypositive content on Instagram likely has a positive impact. As the movement continues to grow though, advocates can look to strengthen the content’s positive impact with some careful, research-informed, messaging adjustments.
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