Breaking the Social Media Prism: How to Make Our Platforms Less Polarizing

A revealing take a look at how person habits is powering deep social divisions on-line―and the way we’d but defeat political tribalism on social media

In an period of accelerating social isolation, platforms like Facebook and Twitter are amongst the most vital instruments we’ve got to perceive one another. We use social media as a mirror to decipher our place in society however, as Chris Bail explains, it features extra like a prism that distorts our identities, empowers status-seeking extremists, and renders moderates all however invisible. Breaking the Social Media Prism challenges widespread myths about echo chambers, international misinformation campaigns, and radicalizing algorithms, revealing that the resolution to political tribalism lies deep inside ourselves.

Drawing on progressive on-line experiments and in-depth interviews with social media customers from throughout the political spectrum, this e book explains why stepping outdoors of our echo chambers could make us extra polarized, not much less. Bail takes you inside the minds of on-line extremists by vivid narratives that hint their lives on the platforms and off―detailing how they dominate public discourse at the expense of the average majority. Wherever you stand on the spectrum of person habits and political opinion, he provides recent options to counter political tribalism from the backside up and the high down. He introduces new apps and bots to assist readers keep away from misperceptions and interact in higher conversations with the different aspect. Finally, he explores what the digital public sq. may seem like if we may hit “reset” and redesign social media from scratch by a first-of-its-kind experiment on a brand new social media platform constructed for scientific analysis.

Providing data-driven suggestions for strengthening our social media connections, Breaking the Social Media Prism exhibits how to fight on-line polarization with out deleting our accounts.