Born and brought up in Great Britain, I’m completely au fait with not discussing certain issues in public – especially those of politics and salary, a recent survey has shown that I’m not too far off the norm – especially when it comes to views being perceived as in the minority.
Similar in a lot of ways to politics, Edward Snowden’s 2013 revelations of US government surveillance of phone and email records were divisive amongst the general public and that’s what the Pew Research Center selected as their issue to better understand human behaviour when it comes to minority views.
Our behaviour as human beings hasn’t changed when it comes to expressing views that we believe are in the minority. Before the advent of the Internet, we also tended not to publicly share our opinions when our own point of view wasn’t generally shared. Many supporters hoped that the growth of the Internet and the birth of social media platforms might have changed this – providing discussion venues where minority view holders would feel more comfortable sharing their opinions. It was a further investigation on this that the survey concentrated on at a time when polls were showing that American’s were divided as to whether Snowden’s leaks were in the public interest or harmful to it.
While 86% of those surveyed were willing to have an in person discussion on Snowden and the NSA, only 42% of Facebook and Twitter users were willing to post about it on the platforms. Significantly, of the 14% of American’s unwilling to have a discussion about Snowden-NSA, only 0.3% were willing to post about it on social media. This turns upon it’s head the idea that social media might be used as a discussion venue when individuals were not comfortable sharing in person.
In both face to face and online discussions individuals were more willing to share views if they believed that their audience was in agreement with them. This phenomenon, of unwillingness to discuss views if the individual believes that they may be in the minority, is known as the “spiral of silence”, it’s not new with social media or the Internet, it’s standard human behaviour, however, it applies fully in a social media environment. The social individual was, however twice as likely to discuss opinions within Facebook if they believed that their network agreed with them. The average Facebook users was only 50% as likely as other people to discuss views in a face to face environment, however, if their online network agreed with them, this increased to 74%.
The traditional view as to why the spiral of silence exists is that individual’s fear isolation if their expressed opinion is not that of their connections. In an increasingly social world there are many more valid reasons that a spiral of silence might exist
The fear of electronic surveillance by government bodies
The survey itself discussed Snowden’s leaks regarding NSA surveillance of the individual American, it goes without saying that there is likely to be a concern that surveillance will be ongoing.
The fear of disappointing new and prospective friends
Social networks enable us to stay in touch, befriend and communicate with many more than a small close circle of friends. The definition of “friend” in social terms does not necessarily match that which we would equate it to in a personal face to face relationship. Many online friendships may be between complete strangers and the social environment allows for much concealment and masking of true identities. Sharing opinions that may be in the minority brings with it a fear of alienating new and prospective friends.
A lack of understanding of friends beliefs
With a wider circle of friends and acquaintances in a social context it is not always possible to fully comprehend their beliefs and views. The survey from Pew Research identified that many did not truly understand their social friend’s beliefs.
On the Internet, information persists
Increasingly education institutions, employers, financial institutions, law enforcement and government departments are turning to social platforms to undertake reference checks for employment, enrolment, verification and confirmation. The individual user of social media platforms has become much savvier in recent years about the sharing of content that may be used against them in the future and this, for me, is perhaps that pervading reason why social users might not share their views on political issues such as Snowden’s NSA leaks.
It is to speculation that we turn again as to why this spiral of silence on social media platforms leaks over into a spiral of silence in a face to face setting. The report from the Pew Research Center hazards a guess that those social media users may have experienced issues with sharing minority views online and now believes that there is a higher risk of opinion sharing in alternative settings.
Social is not where individuals sought information on Snowden-NSA
Regardless of their usage of social media platforms, it wasn’t there that individuals turned to for their information on Snowden. To the blessed relief, no doubt, of the broadcast news services, this was the most common source, Facebook and Twitter were the least common source identified:
- 58% of all adults got at least some information on the topic of Snowden-NSA from TV or radio.
- 34% got at least some information from online sources other than social media.
- 31% got at least some information from friends and family.
- 19% got at least some information from a print newspaper.
- 15% got at least some information while on Facebook.
- 3% got at least some information from Twitter.
While the very nature of the topic identified for the survey may have impacted the results of the survey and led individuals to be more circumspect about their opinion sharing, it may also have impacted where they had the discussion.
In seeking to share opinions with like-minded individuals, the social platform user is more likely to turn to a specific environment. It may be a community group, it may be a family group, in an online context it may be a platform or group designed to host that content. That platform may be a particular social platform, it may be a “private” group within a social business platform hosted at an employer, or by a membership organization, it is unlikely to be a generic social platform, where there is little commonality between users.
What is clear though is the fact that while social media might alter the way in which we gather some information and share it, it doesn’t affect a long-established human attribute – where those who believe that they hold minority opinions will censor themselves.
This has perhaps interesting consequences for the adoption and roll out of social business platforms – if those who believe that their view will not be supported do not speak out, then their opinion will not be heard. However, these folks would not be speaking out either in public meetings or face to face environments, so does that actually change anything? Social doesn’t change our fundamental human behaviour, it just allows us to undertake it in an electronic environment.
What about you? What would you NOT discuss in a social environment? What’s taboo on Facebook for you? Is Twitter different? Is that the same IRL(in real life)?
Guest blogger, social media guru, and citizen of the world Sarah Carter regulary shares her nomadic travel experiences and social insights here with our blog audience. To learn more about Sarah and her exciting travels, follow @SarahActiance on Twitter.
The post A Spiral of Silence encompasses Social Media: When opinions aren’t mainstream – mainstream social isn’t where they are shared. appeared first on Actiance.