Publication Type: Conference Paper/Unpublished Manuscript
Abstract: The increasing presence of the Internet across the spectrum of political communication has fed debates about media use, political discussion, and exposure to political difference. This study explores the intersection of these topics through a focus on the heterogeneity of people’s political discussion networks. It is addressed to the question of how Internet use affects people’s overall exposure to political difference, either by providing the means for high selectivity in online discussion partners, which could affect overall experiences with political difference, or by weakening various social boundaries, which could potentially broaden the heterogeneity of people’s political discussion networks. Through the use of nationally representative survey data, the current study therefore develops and tests an integrated regression model of political discussion network heterogeneity, bringing the “face-to-face” and “online” worlds together. The results suggest that beyond the influence of “face-to-face” mechanisms, online political discussion (directly) and online hard news (both directly and indirectly) contribute to the overall heterogeneity of political discussion networks and that the variables predicting frequency of political discussion at online and offline forums differ in theoretically meaningful ways.