Abstract
Putnam warned over a decade ago that the urge to associate with similar others online may lead to “cyberbalkanization,” fostering bonding capital at the expense of bridging capital. This study examines balkanization with respect to political blogs, investigating to what extent opinions in posts and comment sections on blogs associated with the left and right are ideologically polarized. We also investigate whether extreme opinions tend to co-occur with uncivil discourse aimed at political opponents. Finally, this study compares political blogs with a newer information source that bridges the gap between old and new media—newspaper blogs—asking whether polarization and incivility are reduced on that platform. A content analysis was conducted of blog discussions about a salient political event—Occupy Wall Street. In both posts and comments, political blogs were highly polarized and opinion extremity and incivility were correlated. However, content on newspaper blogs was largely unpolarized and civil.
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