Social Media and Politics is a podcast bringing you innovative, first-hand insights into how social media is changing the political game. Subscribe for interviews and analysis with politicians, academics, and leading digital strategists to get their take on how social media influences the ways we engage with politics and democracy. Social Media and Politics is hosted by Michael Bossetta, political scientist at Lund University. Check out the podcast's official website: https://socialmediaandpolitics.org.
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episode 121: Information Theory, Algorithms, and Political Polarization, with Prof. Martin Hilbert
Martin Hilbert, Professor of Communication at UC-Davis, discusses his research on algorithms and polarization. Prof. Hilbert introduces information theory and how it can be applied to studying the transfer of emotions via algorithms. We break down some of Prof. Hilbert's recent studies, as well as his current thinking around detaching from social algorithms.
The studies discussed in the episode:
Behavioral Experiments With Social Algorithms: An Information Theoretic Approach to Input-Output Conversions
Do Search Algorithms Endanger Democracy? An Experimental Investigation of Algorithm Effects on Political Polarization
Communicating with Algorithms: A Transfer Entropy Analysis of Emotions-based Escapes from Online Echo Chambers
Prof. Hilbert's seven part Medium series on Social Media Distancing.