The role of opinion diversity in the hostile media effect: Partisan exposure on social media,affective polarization,and political participation

Abstract

This study examines the moderating role of the context of social opinion in hostile media perception and its effect on partisan audiences in polarized politics. An online experiment (N = 574), conducted in the US, manipulated the number of congruent/incongruent comments and emojis on social media posts discussing abortion (i.e., pro-choice versus pro-life Facebook posts) to create three distinct opinion contexts (i.e., congruent, balanced, and incongruent). The results indicate that perceived bias gaps between pro-attitudinal and counter-attitudinal posts were reduced in the condition of incongruent context. Furthermore, the study found that the incongruent context mitigates discomfort toward out-party supporters and political participation intention through reducing the perceived bias, whereas the congruent context intensifies them. Implications for media bias perceptions and political polarization are discussed in terms of intergroup relations.