Quantifying Political Behavior on Mobile Devices over Time: A User Evaluation Study

Abstract

The way citizens use technology has changed dramatically in just the last decade; nearly one-third of American adults own tablets, and almost a half own smartphones. But it is not just ownership that is on the rise; citizens are increasingly using such technology to communicate about and participate in politics. The present study utilized a multimethod approach to tap into how technology affects citizens’ political behaviors online in the context of the 2012 U.S. Presidential primary season. Compiling survey data with tablet-tracking behavior in a field experiment, results showed that users spent more days with online aggregators (such as Google and Yahoo), recreational sites (like games), and social interaction sites than news and politics. But when they did spend time with news and politics, they spent an average of 10 minutes on each news page, and national/regional news was the most visited subtopic. User-specific descriptive analyses provide portraits of each user’s demographic makeup and online political behavior. Finally, we linked user ideology to user behavior through accurate, real-time behavioral observations. Results suggest that participants are more likely to view news from their own ideological perspective than the other, demonstrating evidence for selective exposure.

KEYWORDS:

• Big data
• mobile technology
• political behavior
• selective exposure
• tablets
• user evaluation

Notes

1. We did not include respondents who did not use much or any technology—such as cell phones or cable TV—and who reported being very low on comfort with technology.

2. The nine major categories were: Online Aggregator, Recreational Usage, Social Interaction Site, Professional Networking and Job Search, News and Politics, Financial, Informational Resource, Blog, and Filter (which were removed). News and Politics subcategories were: Liberal, Moderate-to-Liberal, Moderate, Moderate-to-Conservative, Conservative, International, National, Delaware region, Regional, and Financial. Other subtopics are available upon request.

3. Active was measured as a user visiting at least one non-filtered site that day.

4. Sites could be coded as either National or Regional or BOTH, as was the case with State and Local News.

5. Although, this should be interpreted with caution since there are only 20 subjects.

6. These categories were combined for ease of analysis. The average hours per day per user on Conservative and Moderate-to-Conservative sites was 5.80 hours.

7. The average hours per day per user on Liberal and Moderate-to-Liberal sites was 5.28 hours.

8. User 10 was excluded from these analyses because no ideological sites were visited.

9. This included participants who reported being “somewhat” liberal or conservative.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Lindsay H. Hoffman

Lindsay H. Hoffman is an associate professor of communication, and research coordinator for the Center for Political Communication at the University of Delaware. Her research examines the intersection of politics and technology.

Hui Fang

Hui Fang is an assistant professor of computer and electrical engineering at the University of Delaware. Her research interests include information retrieval, knowledge base, and data mining.