Online Political Microtargeting: Promises and Threats for Democracy

Borgesius, Frederik J. Zuiderveen; Moeller, Judith; Kruikemeier, Sanne; Fathaigh, R. Ó; Irion, Kristina; Dobber, Tom; Bodó, Balázs; Vreese, Claes de

doi:10.18352/ulr.420

Cited by 171 publications

(123 citation statements)

References 6 publications

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“…PMT has become the subject of heated (public and academic) debate. Scholars point to the risk of voter manipulation (Zuiderveen Borgesius et al, 2018), following from an information asymmetry between the political actor and the citizen (Tufekci, 2014). Political campaigns can base their actions on personal data, while people usually do not know that the messages they receive are tailored to their personality in order to maximize their effectiveness.…”

Section: Political Microtargeting and Personality Traitsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Using a Personality-Profiling Algorithm to Investigate Political Microtargeting: Assessing the Persuasion Effects of Personality-Tailored Ads on Social Media

Zarouali

Dobber

Pauw³

et al. 2020

Communication Research

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103

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Political advertisers have access to increasingly sophisticated microtargeting techniques. One such technique is tailoring ads to the personality traits of citizens. Questions have been raised about the effectiveness of this political microtargeting (PMT) technique. In two experiments, we investigate the causal effects of personality-congruent political ads. In Study 1, we first assess participants’ extraversion trait by means of their own text data (i.e., by using a personality profiling algorithm), and in a second phase, target them with either a personality-congruent or incongruent political ad. In Study 2, we followed the same protocol, but instead targeted participants with emotionally-charged congruent ads, to establish whether PMT can be effective on an affect-based level. The results show evidence that citizens are more strongly persuaded by political ads that match their own personality traits. These findings feed into relevant and timely contributions to a salient academic and societal debate.

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Section: Political Microtargeting and Personality Traitsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Using a Personality-Profiling Algorithm to Investigate Political Microtargeting: Assessing the Persuasion Effects of Personality-Tailored Ads on Social Media

Zarouali

Dobber

Pauw³

et al. 2020

Communication Research

Self Cite

103

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“…For example, those most likely to be misled by disinformation, or to spread it further, could be targeted with counter-messaging. It is known that the originators of disinformation have already targeted specific demographic groups, in the same way as political campaigns micro-target messaging at those audience segments deemed most likely to be persuadable [ 27 ]. For example, it is believed that the ‘Internet Research Agency’ sought to segment Facebook and Instagram users based on race, ethnicity and identity by targeting their messaging to people recorded by the platforms as having certain interests for marketing purposes [ 4 ].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Why do people spread false information online? The effects of message and viewer characteristics on self-reported likelihood of sharing social media disinformation

2020

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Individuals who encounter false information on social media may actively spread it further, by sharing or otherwise engaging with it. Much of the spread of disinformation can thus be attributed to human action. Four studies (total N = 2,634) explored the effect of message attributes (authoritativeness of source, consensus indicators), viewer characteristics (digital literacy, personality, and demographic variables) and their interaction (consistency between message and recipient beliefs) on self-reported likelihood of spreading examples of disinformation. Participants also reported whether they had shared real-world disinformation in the past. Reported likelihood of sharing was not influenced by authoritativeness of the source of the material, nor indicators of how many other people had previously engaged with it. Participants' level of digital literacy had little effect on their responses. The people reporting the greatest likelihood of sharing disinformation were those who thought it likely to be true, or who had pre-existing attitudes consistent with it. They were likely to have previous familiarity with the materials. Across the four studies, personality (lower Agreeableness and Conscientiousness, higher Extraversion and Neuroticism) and demographic variables (male gender, lower age and lower education) were weakly and inconsistently associated with selfreported likelihood of sharing. These findings have implications for strategies more or less likely to work in countering disinformation in social media.

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“…Online political advertisement as the main vehicle of these targeting strategies has reshaped modern-day politics [18]. Political actors are now able to identify and reach individual users who are more likely to be persuaded by them and to match their messages to the users' specific interests and vulnerabilities [74]. Narrower targeting allows politicians to tailor advertising on wedge issues, such as immigration and abortion, to sway pivotal voters [40].…”

Section: Background 21 Online Advertisingmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…With the rise of online advertisement and microtargeting, serious concerns have been raised about data privacy and transparency [30,46,69,74]. Prior work has uncovered the use of sensitive data for Facebook advertisement targeting purposes [16].…”

Section: Data Privacy and Transparencymentioning

confidence: 99%

Exploring Political Ad Libraries for Online Advertising Transparency: Lessons from Germany and the 2019 European Elections

Serrano

Papakyriakopoulos

Hegelich

2020

International Conference on Social Media and Society

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This study investigates the possibilities and limits presented by the newly created ad libraries from Facebook and Google to analyze online political campaigns. We selected Germany as a case study and focused on the months leading up to the 2019 elections to the European Parliament. We identified the political actors that were active advertisers, compared their spending, and contrasted the number of ad impressions with user engagement on their organic online content. From the political ads, we extracted the unique ads and manually analyzed a subsample of them. Furthermore, we explored regional and demographic distributions of users reached by the advertisements and used them as a proxy for the advertisers' targeting strategies. We also compared the success of the ad campaigns on boosted Facebook posts. We found that even though all the major German political parties engaged in online ad campaigns, they kept their attempts at microtargeting to a minimum. Although their Facebook-sponsored posts were more successful than normal posts, we did not find statistical significance for all the political parties. Interestingly, we noticed that the distribution of users reached by the right-wing party Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) diverges from that of the other parties. Finally, we discuss further challenges for enhancing transparency in online advertising. CCS CONCEPTS • Information systems → Display advertising; Social networks; • Human-centered computing → Social network analysis.

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Online Political Microtargeting: Promises and Threats for Democracy

Cited by 171 publications

References 6 publications

Using a Personality-Profiling Algorithm to Investigate Political Microtargeting: Assessing the Persuasion Effects of Personality-Tailored Ads on Social Media

Using a Personality-Profiling Algorithm to Investigate Political Microtargeting: Assessing the Persuasion Effects of Personality-Tailored Ads on Social Media

Why do people spread false information online? The effects of message and viewer characteristics on self-reported likelihood of sharing social media disinformation

Exploring Political Ad Libraries for Online Advertising Transparency: Lessons from Germany and the 2019 European Elections

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