With the widespread use of the Internet, social networks have become an integral part of our lives. Today, almost everyone with internet access spends a certain part of their day “hanging out” on social networks. A new study has revealed that YouTube, the world’s most popular online video and live streaming platform, is trying to influence our political views.
A group of researchers from New York University’s Center for Social Media and Policy conducted a study with 1,063 adults. The purpose of this research was to better understand YouTube’s recommendation algorithm. To reach the conclusion, the researchers identified 25 videos, political and non-political, and asked participants to start watching one of these videos at random, and then choose one of the top five suggested videos to continue watching. Each participant performed this procedure 20 times.
Regardless of your political affiliation, YouTube is trying to “darken” you
The researchers, who also conducted surveys about the political views of the participants within the scope of the research, reached very remarkable results. So much so that YouTube was acting according to the political view of the user. The suggested videos were shifting more to the left for left-wingers and more to the right for right-wingers over time. In other words, YouTube was reinforcing the user’s political opinion. However, according to experts, it was intended to affect “very mildly”.
The research conducted in the USA revealed another remarkable result. Averaging all user data, the experts found that YouTube generally favors right-viewing and is trying to attract users to right-viewing. Moreover, this was happening regardless of the user’s political views. However, experts could not understand why.
There was no explanation from Google or YouTube on the subject either…
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