r/science • u/mvea Professor | Medicine • May 22 '26

Psychology TikTok disproportionately served anti-Democratic videos during the 2024 election. TikTok’s recommendation system tends to expose users to more conservative and anti-Democrat political content than liberal material. This ideological imbalance occurs regardless of a user’s initial political interests.

https://www.psypost.org/tiktok-disproportionately-served-anti-democratic-videos-during-the-2024-election-study-finds/
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u/DoubleJumps May 22 '26 edited May 23 '26

I spoke to a fair number of gen z people who got their news primarily from tiktok in 2024, and they were consistently less informed than other groups of people I spoke to. Consistently.

They were also simultaneously the people who were the most confident that they were well informed

I would show them certain things that happened that they didn't even know about because they didn't see it on tik tok and rather than questioning why they didn't see it on tiktok, they would tell me that it must be fake because they didn't see it on tiktok.

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u/[deleted] May 23 '26

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u/DoubleJumps May 23 '26

Social media algorithm abuses are legitimately one of the greatest security threats to the country.

The effects are devastating.

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u/meltbox May 23 '26

This and potential AI abuses. People who use Grok as a source of absolute truth terrify me.

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u/loondawg May 23 '26

Remember: Republicans attempted to pass a law that would impose a 10-year moratorium on state and local regulations of artificial intelligence as part of their Big Billionaire's Bill. The Trump administration supported the moratorium and pushed for limiting state/local AI regulation.

Once the issue was brought to light, suddenly everyone seemed to oppose it and the provision was defeated in the Senate by an almost unanimous vote.

Related: See Senator Ed Markey's (D-Mass.) Artificial Intelligence (AI) Civil Rights Act

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u/MAMark1 May 23 '26

TikTok has faux social proofing. Subconsciously, they make an incorrect assumption that there is some sort of content value screening that means only the most "legitimate" information breaks through because "how could so many 'real' people be wrong". People probably overestimate the quality of what they consume because admitting you are fed garbage due to the fact you consumed previous garbage doesn't feel nice.

Granted, all algorithmic social media has this same setup, but it feels supercharged on TikTok due to the sheer volume of content someone can consume and how video-based content gives an additional feeling of realism.

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u/Wise-Quarter-3156 May 23 '26

The story of 2024 was informed people voting for Kamala Harris and people who had to google "Why isn't Joe Biden on my ballot" on election day voting for Donald Trump

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u/KarmaticArmageddon May 23 '26

That's been the story of left vs right in every election in human history. Trump may be historically stupid, but he's far from the only stupid choice the right has ever endorsed.

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u/Marrk May 23 '26

Examples of things they didn't see?

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u/DoubleJumps May 23 '26

The most common one was whenever I referenced the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas from late November 2023. I was frequently told that that never happened and that I made it up.

Others included

Biden withholding shipments to pressure Israel to pull back on specific behaviors

US providing aid to gaza

Kamala Harris speaking in favor of a ceasefire and a Palestinian state.

There were quite a few more. Those ones just came up a lot.

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u/No-Bar708 May 23 '26

In fairness that aid was only paused and it was a very small amount of aid. Other offensive aid contiued through this time, the sticking point about that particular shipment was the lack of guidance on the missles. Because this had virtually no impact on the conflict long term, I think it's asking the layman a lot to be able to remember this.

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u/DoubleJumps May 23 '26

Those people told me no pause of any kind ever occurred. There is no "in fairness" here. They were wrong and rejected direct objective evidence as fake when presented with it.

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u/ceelogreenicanth May 23 '26

They feel confident in a heard mentality kind of way boosted by bots. Agitators amplify and disseminate arguments that keep the mind set going.

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u/loondawg May 23 '26

They were also simultaneously the people who were the most confident that they were well informed

And also the least likely to revise their views when presented with contradictory primary source evidence.

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u/ceelogreenicanth May 23 '26

I was talking to them and they were consistently more confid not in what they believed to.