Steven attended a community event hosted by the university to listen to a talk by a popular writer whose scholarship considers the interactions between technology and society. The speaker focused the discussion on how the algorithms that underpin social media platforms create and sustain political and ideological echo chambers, where social media users are often unconsciously sorted into invisible online communities where they more often interact with ideas and people that confirm their current thinking and worldview. The speaker cautioned about the individual, community and societal consequences of this phenomena of online segregation and offered suggestions as to how individuals might resist their own sorting into ideological echo chambers.
Steven is shocked by this information. While he is disturbed, he recognizes almost immediately in his social media feeds the one-sided disposition of his news content and the rhetoric of his social connections. Steven resolves to heed the speaker’s guidance and makes a commitment to diversify his news outlets and other sources of information. Steven begins “following” news sources across the political spectrum as well as following news media from around the world. In addition to following diverse news sources online, Steven commits to reading his news from printed papers and digital magazines that do not curate content for him.
Steven recognizes an impact on his information exposure almost immediately. As his information feeds change, Steven begins to achieve a greater awareness of the specificity of his experience as a resident of his region and as a citizen of the United States, and the breadth and depth of dialogue occurring around the world that he has not been accessing up until this point.
- The Issue: Steven is unaware that his exposure to diverse and global perspectives is being undermined and truncated by his reliance on social media-based news outlets and the algorithms that underpin them.
- The Deliberation: Steven is moved by the scholarship of a campus speaker who warns of the unknowing digital segregation of social media users into ideological echo chambers. As a result, Steven pursues new information sources on and off social media.
- The Growth: Steven recognizes an immediate shift in the breadth of information present in his social media feeds. Soon after, his consciousness grows to the uniqueness of his world view in relation to discourses from around the globe.