Chapter 2. Literature Review
2.4 Heterogeneous Information Exposure and Attitude Certainty
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2.4 Heterogeneous Information Exposure and Attitude Certainty
Opinion polarization is found associated with information seeking and attitude strength.
It has been reported to have a detrimental effect on communities, societies, and democracies. It separates individuals into confronting sides with little or no communication, and even reinforce their pre-existing perspectives. Receiving only attitudinally consistent information and interacting exclusively with like-minded others could turn the online network into more fragmented. Compared to traditional media, social media has been discovered to mitigate opinion polarization on online networks (Gentzkow & Shapiro, 2010). Traditional media such as television, broadcasting, and newspapers provide individuals with particular content and viewpoint on different channels. However, social media are based on the internet, where users are more easily exposed to all sorts of information on a single platform without boundaries and limitations. Joint research launched in 2014 demonstrated that television and broadcasting are the media facilitating polarization among users, instead of social media (Veenstra, Hossain, & Lyons, 2014). Even though algorithms on SNSs mostly present the congenial information to users, it is not possible to completely filter out attitude-challenging information.
As a result, studies have focused on ways to decrease attitude extremity and opinion polarization. For instance, raising awareness of the opposite arguments and exposing individuals to different perspectives can moderate extreme attitudes and intensify network heterogeneity (Mutz & Mondak, 2006; Matakos, Terzi, & Tsaparas, 2017; Lee & Choi, 2019). Heterogeneity is defined as the extent of exposure to disagreements, including different races, gender, religions, political ideologies, and opposing arguments (Choi et al., 2013; Lee & Choi, 2019). It is convinced to effectively moderate the existing attitudes and reduce polarization by exposing users to dissimilar
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information (Munson & Resnick, 2010; Munson et al., 2013; Vydiswaran et al., 2015;
Matakos, Terzi, & Tsaparas, 2017). Some studies also concentrated on proposing mechanisms that will expose social media users to contents that are not primarily aligned with their prior beliefs.
Informational use on SNSs referred to searching for information and news, posting messages, and exchanging information (Lee et al., 2014). The default settings of SNS allow users to share their opinions and to comment on others’ posts. Information can be handily forwarded and responded to by others. According to the findings of Lee and Myer (2016), SNSs use is significantly related to political view change and issue involvement through information seeking, cross-cutting information exposure, and discussion with disagreements. However, the positive role of heterogeneous information exposure in decreasing attitude certainty remains disputable. Some have argued that individuals are motivated to seek out attitudinally consistent information due to the cognitive dissonance theory (Festinger, 1957). Some even end up in a confirmation bias, and show more certain about their pre-existing attitudes after being exposed to diverse information, thereby aggravating opinion polarization (Taber &
Lodge, 2006). In terms of controversial topics such as gun control (Taber & Lodge, 2006), sexual minority rights (Wojcieszak & Price, 2010), and stem cell research (Shih, Scheufele & Brossard, 2012), individuals are more aligned with their predilections after confronting disagreements.
From a rational perspective, individuals are supposed to consume all available information relevant to the topic owing to the information utility ( Knobloch-Westerwick & Meng, 2009). However, based on the cognitive dissonance theory, people are inclined to seek consistent information while encountering attitude-challenging viewpoints. If individuals confront highly counter-attitudinal arguments,
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dissonance may thus increase, resulting in avoidance of the information. This phenomenon has been traditionally termed as selective exposure and subsequently labeled as confirmation bias (Jonas et al., 2001; Brannon, Tagler & Eagly, 2007).
Selective exposure is found more pronounced for stronger attitudes than weaker attitudes. People with definite attitudes prefer to receive information that supports their viewpoints and are resistant to change their attitudes and behavior (Krosnick & Petty, 1995; Mutz & Martin, 2001; Brannon, Tagler & Eagly, 2007). Owing to the confirmation bias, attitude certainty is likely to lead to individuals’ selective exposure, thereby fostering extreme attitudes and opinion polarization in the long term.
Otherwise, theorists proposed that exposure to disagreements can stimulate individuals’ understanding of the opposite. “Ambivalence and confusion stem from the challenging viewpoints will lead people to access the conflicting arguments in a balanced way” (Sniderman, 1981; Lee & Choi, 2019). It makes people realize that there is not only a dichotomous view of an issue (Mutz, 2002). Through a deliberative process, individuals are expected to respect different perspectives and eventually reach a social consensus (Lowell, 1913). Several empirical findings are in line with this argument. In an investigation of political discussion by Mutz and Mondak (2006), they discovered that exposure to heterogeneous information could prompt an understanding of disagreements and raise political tolerance. According to surveys conducted in Germany, Spain, and the U.S. (Barbera, 2014), being exposed to various information will ease political polarization. Furthermore, researchers suggested that even though most individuals prefer viewpoint-reinforcing information, they do not demonstrate a systematic bias against the attitude-challenging information (Garrett, 2006). The findings infer that it is common for individuals to seek out information with a consistent attitude, whereas constant avoidance of dissimilar viewpoints is rare (Garrett, 2006).
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Individuals may even seek out disagreements in a few circumstances. For instance, when individuals are not certain about their attitude, they are willing to look roughly at dissimilar information (Knobloch-Westerwick & Meng, 2009). In an online behavioral investigation, Jang (2014) also found out that apart from the existing religious belief and prerequisite information, people tend to check out the scientific information that challenges their pre-existing positions.
Consequently, social media nowadays is highly penetrated in people’s daily life in Taiwan. Discussion and information exposure regarding controversial social issues have gradually transferred to social media platforms. Individuals have the opportunity to be pervasively exposed to heterogeneous information on SNSs. Drawing from the past studies, informational use and exposure have been proven to facilitate political attitude change. Therefore, it is predictable that heterogeneous information exposure on SNSs will influence individuals’ attitude certainties on controversial social issues.
People who insist on their pre-existing attitudes might be moderated after approaching the dissimilar information, resulting in a decrease of attitude certainty. While people with ambivalent attitudes could be more certain within the exposure of diverse viewpoints. On the other hand, according to the cognitive dissonance theory, individuals prefer to be aligned with attitudinally consistent information. In this way, attitude certainty might increase because people are more clear with their attitudes on a specific issue. Since there were conflicting arguments in existence, it still lacks enough empirical evidence in the Taiwanese context. Hence, exploring the association between heterogeneous information exposure on SNS and individuals’ attitude certainty on controversial social issues becomes noteworthy. The author thus proposed the following research question.
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RQ1. How is heterogeneous information exposure on SNSs associated with attitude certainty on controversial social issues in Taiwan?