Introduction
Social networks have made global changes in the sphere of political activity due to the wide availability of various types of information and the increase in its diversification. People began to receive information much faster and the field of political news and election campaigns was no exception. The speed of obtaining data by each voter has noticeably increased, as has the range of quality and reliability. However, the importance of each separate news feed in the influence of a decision on elections does not always depend on its reliability. In this regard, this issue requires a serious assessment. The impact of views of content on social media on campaign and election campaigns can be assessed in various ways. One of the most effective is the observational crossover research approach. This paper proposes an observational study based on the theory of causality between the frequency of viewing political election content and the direct result of the election. The study is observational, as the researchers do not influence or control the change in the independent variable in any way. The cross-sectional study was selected due to each election’s different political, social, and economic contexts; therefore, statistically reliable data can only be obtained within the framework of one election.
Theory
Election-related content is highly numerous and varied, making it impossible to assess individual content within a reasonable timeframe. In this regard, the frequency variable was chosen for the theory, reflecting the cumulative effect of information on the voter. The quality of content, in turn, is a pressing social issue due to the dominance of fake news, provocations, propaganda, and much more, but this paper examines its cumulative impact along with information from reliable sources. In other words, the essential importance of the research issue is dictated by the understanding of the mechanism of influence on society, which determines its political choice based on mechanisms dependent on the current policy. If the research is confirmed, society may be more critical of the overall flow of content and seek other, more reliable sources of information for more informed choices. In fact, the theory of causality is that if there is a change in the independent variable – the frequency of viewing election-related content – the dependent variable changes accordingly, reflecting the outcome of the election. The confounding variable in this study is the voting rules in certain states.
Observational Research
First of all, it is necessary to draw up a research plan, which will be as follows. First, it is necessary to use aggregate data, then sampling within one country or state, if the confounding variable is controlled for each iteration. Secondly, this research is cross-sectional: the election results will be assessed among consumers of various pre-election and electoral content to varying degrees, controlling the confounding variable by states and the rules for holding elections in them. The differentiation of the degree of assessment of the frequency of viewing content can be assessed by the views of individual news and news stories from a particular party, the dynamics of which will be compared with the number of votes received by the party, both in general statistics and in each state. Consequently, the operationalization of variables into quantitative indicators moves from theory to hypothesis.
Therefore, the more views a selected content has concerning each party, the more votes the corresponding party gets – this is the theory’s hypothesis. It is worth making a reservation that the news assessment for belonging to a particular party is assessed by the content directed for or against the hero of the news. The study is carried out on a state-by-state basis to reduce the negative impact on statistics by confounding variables. The timeline refers to one specific 2016 U.S. election to preserve the political, economic, and social contexts of that time. In addition, this content retrospective lacks dynamics in views and news dissemination, as there is a more urgent agenda for 2020. Only one confounding variable will be highlighted for this study to obtain more accurate results, namely states with varying degrees of stringency in election rules. It will be set through an exceptional coefficient that reduces and increases, respectively, the influence of the content and the media on the election results. Ideally, this model should be extended to each state to obtain a complete critical correlation picture.
For this study, the following linear regression model will be built, which will assess the degree of dependence of the variables and the reliability of the theory as a whole. Views of certain news items are a causal variable in theory that influences the dependent variable of election results, adjusted for the degree of freedom and rigor of campaign rules and the election itself. Below is a linear regression formula that reflects this dependence according to the indicated variables, in which i reflects the serial number of the news in question. A cross-sectional study is being conducted in parallel for two rival parties of Republicans and Liberals.
Discussion
The causality is explained by the connection between the awareness of citizens and their civic position regarding the elections. With the help of information, it is possible to manipulate the opinion of the population and, consequently, the results of elections, undermining the foundations of democracy. Consequently, this study proves the relevance of critical thinking, as well as the dependence of the party on the mechanisms of information channels. Confounding variables exist in this study and may include, for example, the time individual Internet users watch the news: less content viewed may carry more weight compared to a more critical analysis of more news. In addition, certain ideological traditions prevailing in the states, which predominantly support one party every election, can also influence the outcome. In this case, this variable is unobservable due to the lack of the possibility of objective representation in quantitative terms. The direction of the bias will depend on the pole of tradition and can be represented as a statistical outlier in iterative counts by state.
There is a minimal likelihood of reverse causation in this situation since the election outcome will not affect the effect of using social media in political campaigns when the election is over, making any opposite change in variables meaningless. However, this can impact the long term, as future politicians can use the election results to influence their campaign through social media, which should be considered a separate implicit variable whose influence grows over time. Consequently, the main disadvantage of this study is the presence of unobservable and observable variables that can, in a single case, interfere with the confirmation of the hypothesis. However, most of them can be avoided with an iterative approach to control the confounding variable for specific states by introducing appropriate mathematical constraints for traditionally republican or liberal geographic regions. Further development and extrapolation of the study for other years will significantly improve the predictive function of the regression, which can more accurately predict the results of the next elections based on news views. The statistical deviations that appear during such studies can reveal hidden indirect variables dictated by the social, political, international, economic, or global context, which must be taken as assumptions or ways of operationalization in quantitative equivalents for application in a given model must be sought.
Conclusion
The flow of information thanks to the Internet, social networks are growing every day, which complicates the separation of information into reliable and unverified. Dissemination, verification began to be individual and at the same time complex, which is extremely difficult to investigate. The importance of this study is that it can prove the relevance of critical thinking in the context of elections concerning daily news reading and the formation of citizenship. In fact, the study can draw attention to significant problems of the country, higher involvement of the population in political life and the situation, and, as a result, responsibility. The incidents of fake news in 2016 reflect the urgency of the social issue, which is surrounded by an aura of manipulation by parties against the population. In the end, this study draws attention to a significant national problem, the solution of which is dictated by the foundations of democracy. The population should know how the influence mechanisms are arranged to make the most informed and correct choice.