Abstract

When citizens lack exposure to media sources which offer contrasting perspectives, biased information consumption diets risk undermining democracy. This might especially be the case in dominant party settings where many citizens lack familiarity with credible media sources from across the political spectrum. In the context of Turkey, we implement a randomized control trial that induces citizens’ exposure to politically non-aligned (discordant) online media sources over the course of half a year. Our results indicate that discordant online media is very persuasive. Pro (anti) government discordant media lead to increased/decreased (decreased/increased) support for the incumbent/opposition, while pro-government discordant media also improves perceptions about incumbent performance. The results are mainly driven by increased knowledge about and trust in anti-government discordant media, and a decreased perceived bias of pro-government discordant media. The results indicate a deduction in polarization, but not affective polarization, and no evidence of a disruption of echo-chamber effects. Ultimately, pro-government, but not anti-government, discordant media improves perceptions about the extent to which Turkey is a democracy, but this is not driven by an improvement in the perception of Turkish democratic institutions.

Reference

Horacio Larreguy (Institute for Advanced Study in Toulouse), “How Does Exposure to Discordant Media Sources Affect Political Attitudes and Behavior? Experimental Evidence from Turkey”, IAST Lunch Seminar, Toulouse: IAST, May 31, 2022, 12:45–13:45, room Auditorium 4.