Does digital information and news consumption endanger democracy?

This project investigated two main questions. First, it provided an in-depth description of the online news consumption habits and the exposure to online political information among Swiss citizens. Second, it analysed the mechanisms that link information exposure to civic knowledge, opinion formation and information processing among voters, as well as the resulting impact on political fragmentation, polarisation and political trust.

Switzerland is undergoing significant changes in the way citizens inform themselves about politics. In fact, the digitalisation of information consumption has been perceived as a threat to democracy, but the impact of these transformations on Switzerland was not known. In this project, we thus embarked on studying the consequences of digitalisation for individuals’ democratic behavior.

The project aimed to understand the relationship between exposure to information and political attitudes and behavior in the context of the digitalisation of political information. The research team followed an ambitious research design and applied four data collection strategies. They combined two-wave panel surveys (in the context of regional (Bern) and national elections) with tracking data (clickstream data plus digital data donations) of respondents’ online information consumption. In addition, they also conducted survey experiments and asked respondents to use a special version of an online voting aid tool that tracks its usage in detail.

This project showed that the digital transformation of information represents a real challenge to the trustworthiness of information and institutions, as well as to the polarisation of decisions and attitudes. However, it also represents a clear opportunity for voters to navigate complex information environments and make political decisions more in line with their preferences and ideological predispositions. Emphasising these efforts and communicating the existence of (personalised) digital tools to the public could strengthen the institutions of representative democracies and limit biases in access. Furthermore, keeping traditional media as the primary source of political information can mitigate the polarisation process observed among voters who consume only more ideologically biased sources of information.

Three main messages

1. The digital transformation of political information seems inevitable in view of changing consumer habits.
   While traditional sources of information remain the most important for political information, younger generations of voters rely more on the internet and social media. Thus, the digital transformation of political information is an ongoing process. Despite this clear paradigmatic change in information-seeking behavior, newspapers, TV and radio (the more traditional sources of information) remain the most important sources of information for voters of all age groups.
2. Challenges and opportunities of the digitalisation of political information.
   The digital transformation of political information represents a key challenge for modern societies and representative democracies. It has the potential to erode trust in political institutions and in information as such, leading to an increase of misinformation and a reduced ability to correct misperceptions about the truthfulness of information. Furthermore, the algorithmic nature of digital information, as well as its abundance, strengthens the risk of selective exposure to congruent information, i.e. information matching an individual’s personal convictions. Nevertheless, the digitalisation of political information also represents an opportunity for modern societies. Information is more easily available, which reduces its cost of access. In addition, the digitalisation of political information enables the creation of software that provides personalised information to voters, helping them to make consistent political decisions in a complex information environment.
3. Importance of public media in meeting the challenges of digitalising information.
   Public and national media play an important unifying role for political information in Switzerland. These media have a broad readership in terms of ideology, mirroring the ideological distribution, and they are consulted by citizens throughout the whole country, thus reducing the risk associated with increased selective exposure related to the digitalisation of political information. Public media consumers also have more trust in political institutions, and their content generates more trust in information than other sources. Public media are also more effective at correcting voters’ misperceptions than other sources.

Online News Exposure: A Threat to Democracy? How Digital Transformation Affects Opinion Formation, Political Polarization and Trust