Exploring Engagement With EU News on Facebook: The Influence of Content Characteristics

Abstract: The EU is diagnosed with a participation deficit, rooted in a lack of public communication. While news media are the primary source of information about EU politics, social media have become an important channel for political information. Importantly, social media platforms offer unique opportunities for citizens to engage with information about the EU. Such engagement is under-researched despite users' responses offering valuable information about the potential effects of EU news on public engagement. Therefore, we systematically analyze social media users’ engagement with news about the EU. Drawing on the concepts of news values and shareworthiness, we investigate the proximity, conflictuality, negativity, and emotionality of EU news content posted on mainstream media Facebook accounts to explain the variation in reactions, shares, and number of comments. Using semi-supervised machine learning, we analyze articles from the largest newspapers in Austria for the period 2015-2019, a

Location
Deutsche Nationalbibliothek Frankfurt am Main
Extent
Online-Ressource
Language
Englisch
Notes
Veröffentlichungsversion
begutachtet (peer reviewed)
In: Politics and Governance ; 10 (2022) 1 ; 121-132

Event
Veröffentlichung
(where)
Mannheim
(who)
SSOAR, GESIS – Leibniz-Institut für Sozialwissenschaften e.V.
(when)
2022
Creator
Heidenreich, Tobias
Eisele, Olga
Watanabe, Kohei
Boomgaarden, Hajo G.

DOI
10.17645/pag.v10i1.4775
URN
urn:nbn:de:101:1-2023010407075584878722
Rights
Open Access; Der Zugriff auf das Objekt ist unbeschränkt möglich.
Last update
25.03.2025, 1:55 PM CET

Data provider

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Associated

  • Heidenreich, Tobias
  • Eisele, Olga
  • Watanabe, Kohei
  • Boomgaarden, Hajo G.
  • SSOAR, GESIS – Leibniz-Institut für Sozialwissenschaften e.V.

Time of origin

  • 2022

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