Male and female politicians on Twitter: A machine learning approach

Abstract

How does the language of male and female politicians differ when they communicate directly with the public on social media? Do citizens address them differently? We apply Lasso logistic regression models to identify the linguistic features that most differentiate the language used by or addressed to male and female Spanish politicians. Male politicians use more words related to politics, sports, ideology and infrastructure, while female politicians talk about gender and social affairs. The choice of emojis varies greatly across genders. In a novel analysis of tweets written by citizens, we find evidence of gender‐specific insults, and note that mentions of physical appearance and infantilising words are disproportionately found in text addressed to female politicians. The results suggest that politicians conform to gender stereotypes online and reveal ways in which citizens treat politicians differently depending on their gender.

Insta(nt)famous? Visual self-presentation and the use of masculine and feminine issues by female politicians on Instagram

“…Words might become less, and pictures become more important online (Strand & Schill, 2019). However, female politicians might be more judged on their physical appearance (Beltran et al, 2020), indicating that female politicians may be more vulnerable on visual social media. The (growing) importance of visuals in political communication is widely acknowledged (e.g., Ekman & Widholm, 2017;Gerodimos, 2019;Hale & Grabe, 2018;Lalancette & Raynauld, 2019;Muñoz & Towner, 2017).…”

Who Did Spanish Politicians Start Following on Twitter? Homophilic Tendencies among the Political Elite

“…In Spain, Twitter research has focused on the identification of influential actors in the political conversation using big data to detect digital authority (Casero-Ripollés 2021), and the use that Spanish political leaders make of the social platform analyzed from different perspectives such as in comparison to politicians from different political systems such as the United Stated of America and Norway (Cervi and Roca 2017), to detect the influence degree and the types of strategic communications tactics that the Spanish leaders use on Twitter, as well as analyzing the interconnection between the politicians' Twitter and media profiles (Suau-Gomila et al 2020), or regarding the linguistic strategies that politicians use in self-referencing (Coesemans and De Cock 2017). Moreover, previous research on Twitter in Spain has focused on gender gaps among politicians, showing how there are still differences between the attention and amplification that women receive in the political Twitter sphere (Guerrero-Solé and Perales-García 2021), the differences in the language used between men and women politicians (Beltran et al 2021), as well as the differences between women and men politicians from different Spanish parties when tweeting about feminist issues (Fernández-Rovira and Villegas-Simón 2019).…”

O papel da moderação nas Audiências Públicas Interativas do e-Democracia: entre a promoção do debate e o receio da censura

“…Diferentemente do que a literatura descreve sobre ameaças direcionadas a parlamentares (AKHTAR; MORRISON, 2019;BELTRAN et al, 2021;GREENWOOD et al, 2019;KROOK;RESTREPO SANÍN, 2020;WARD;MCLOUGHLIN, 2020) e aumento da desinformação e do comportamento incivilizado em espaços de interação digitais (PAPACHARISSI, 2004;ANDERSEN et al, 2014;ROSSINI, 2020), não foi isto o que constatamos nas entrevistas ou nos dados coletados. Todorov (2019) ressalta que a quantidade de comentários ofensivos ou agressivos é pequena 44 , e apenas em algumas poucas ocasiões a moderação foi exigida nesse sentido, com o bloqueio de trolls, sendo que o corpo técnico do LabHacker precisa ser acionado nessas ocasiões.…”

“…Entre outros fenômenos contemporâneos, vários pesquisadores constatam um aumento da desinformação e do comportamento incivilizado em espaços de interação digitais, com atitudes agressivas (PAPACHARISSI, 2004;ANDERSEN et al, 2014;ROSSINI, 2020). Ao mesmo tempo, uma série de estudos aponta o aumento dos casos de ameaças, agressões, abusos, xingamentos, trolling 6 e discurso violento direcionado aos parlamentares, em vários países (AKHTAR; MORRISON, 2019;BELTRAN et al, 2021;GREENWOOD et al, 2019;KROOK;RESTREPO SANÍN, 2020;WARD;MCLOUGHLIN, 2020).…”