Online Influence? Social Media Use, Opinion Leadership, and Political Persuasion

Opinion leaders can be influential in persuading their peers about news and politics, yet their potential influence has been questioned in the social media era. This study tests a theoretical model of attempts at political persuasion within social media in which highly active users (‘‘prosumers’’) consider themselves opinion leaders, which subsequently increases efforts to try and change others’ political attitudes and behaviors. Using two-wave U.S. panel survey data (W1⁄4 1,816; W1⁄4 1,024), we find prosumers believe they are highly influential in their social networks and are both directly and indirectly more likely to try to persuade others. Our results highlight one theoretical mechanism through which engaged social media users attempt to persuade others and suggest personal influence remains viable within social media. The growing prominence of the Internet and social media in contemporary society has coincided with gradually smaller segments of the population who actively engage with news and political information, while more individuals opt instead for nonpolitical or entertainment-oriented content (Prior, 2007). At the same time, there is evidence that individuals are becoming increasingly reliant on others in their online social networks for news recommendations and political information, and that their knowledge, opinions, and behaviors are All correspondence concerning this article should be addressed to Brian E. Weeks, Department of Communication Studies, University of Michigan, 5370 North Quad, 105 S State Street, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA (beweeks@gmail.com). International Journal of Public Opinion Research Advance Access published December 31, 2015 at V inna U niersity L irary on Jauary 4, 2016 http://ijpoordjournals.org/ D ow nladed from affected by the information stream and social dynamics within these sites (Bode, 2015; Bond et al., 2012; Messing & Westwood, 2014; Turcotte, York, Irving, Scholl, & Pingree, 2015). Taken together, these two phenomena suggest that individuals who are highly active with news and political information in social media have the potential to be influential in shaping the political attitudes and behaviors of their online peers. Despite the possible sway these engaged individuals may hold with their less-active peers, some have questioned whether these users who are actively involved with the news and act as opinion leaders remain influential in today’s media environment. Given the media’s ability to microtarget messages to specific individuals, coupled with the society’s trend toward becoming more socially isolated on a face-to-face level, the degree of influence these engaged individuals have over others may be waning (Bennett & Manheim, 2006). However, this critique of contemporary personal influence does not fully consider the extent to which certain individuals may be influential within online social media. Traditional opinion leaders in offline contexts were often defined by their consumption of news, whereas social media allow individuals myriad ways to engage news beyond consumption, including the production and sharing of content. It may be that opinion leaders’ influence in traditional and interpersonal settings has diminished, but they may still be impactful in the context of social media. There is evidence that a small percentage of people continue to carry influence over others in their online networks (Graham & Wright, 2014; Himelboim, Gleave, & Smith, 2009; Huffaker, 2010), which indicates persuasion online is still possible at times. Yet, online persuasion processes require more exploration, including whether certain uses of social media increase the likelihood that engaged individuals try to change other people’s minds politically and, if so, how this process unfolds theoretically. However, for persuasion to occur and influence to be wielded, one must first typically attempt to change others’ minds. The dynamics regarding opinion leaders and the effects of political persuasion attempts have been studied in offline contexts (e.g., Thorson, 2014), but social media have changed the way citizens engage in politics, providing them low-cost routes into the broader political discussion (Gil de Zúñiga, Puig-i-Abril, & Rojas, 2009). In addition, social media have lowered barriers to political participation and may help reduce inequality in engagement (Xenos, Vromen, & Loader, 2014). Furthermore, social media allow citizens to consume, produce, distribute, and comment on news and political information (Gil de Zúñiga, Molyneux, & Zheng, 2014; Pew, 2014a; Weeks & Holbert, 2013), thereby creating new opportunities to attempt to persuade politically. These unique tools associated with social media may therefore change the nature and impact of political and news opinion leaders today. I N T E R N A T I O N A L J O U R N A L O F P U B L I C O P I N I O N R E S E A R C H 2 at V inna U niersity L irary on Jauary 4, 2016 http://ijpoordjournals.org/ D ow nladed from The purpose of this study is to better understand how social media facilitate certain individuals’ efforts to persuade others about politics. It addresses these important, lingering theoretical questions by examining the relationships between social media behaviors, self-perceptions of opinion leadership, political participation, and political persuasion efforts. Taking advantage of twowave, demographically diverse panel survey data collected in the United States, we first identify whether certain clusters of individuals are more likely to use the multiple tools available in social media to interact with others, as well as to consume, produce, and share political content. We find that approximately 12% of our sample—a cluster of individuals we have labeled ‘‘prosumers’’—are highly engaged in these social media behaviors. We next examine the consequences of prosumers’ social media behaviors on political participation, self-perceptions of opinion leadership, and political persuasion. We find that prosumers are more likely to participate in politics and see themselves as opinion leaders. Based on their self-perceptions of opinion leadership, social media prosumers subsequently tend to be more likely to attempt to persuade others about politics. Our results demonstrate the influence of social media use on the political persuasion process and provide a unique theoretical model of how citizens attempt to persuade others in the digital media environment. Opinion Leaders in a New Context: Prosumers and Social Media Although much research has investigated the impact of political opinion leaders in the pre-Internet era, there remain several important questions about whether and how citizens politically impact others within social media. During the past decade, the number of users of social networking sites (SNSs) has grown quickly, such that 74% of online adults in the United States now use a SNS (Pew, 2014b). This raises the possibility that the nature of political influence and opinion leadership has also changed. Some have challenged the notion of opinion leaders in a media environment in which fewer messages are intended for mass audiences but are instead directed at individuals based on demographics or lifestyles (Bennett & Manheim, 2006). This raises the question of how influential opinion leaders can be if they are no longer the mediators between media content and their less-engaged peers? Furthermore, Bennett and Manheim (2006) argue that people are increasingly fragmented and less social, and thus less reliant on interpersonal influence in the areas of politics and public affairs (p. 218). Though provocative, this perspective has received criticism, and empirical evidence challenges it. These technological changes in the media environment also create new and, perhaps, easier opportunities for people to attempt to persuade or influence others in their social networks. As Turcotte et al. (2015) S O C I A L M E D I A A N D P O L I T I C A L P E R S U A S I O N 3 at V inna U niersity L irary on Jauary 4, 2016 http://ijpoordjournals.org/ D ow nladed from argue, social media are inherently social and bring people together digitally, which provides new opportunities for opinion leaders to influence others in their networks. As they note, in an increasingly fragmented media environment, socially shared information by opinion leaders may be more influential, as people are increasingly dependent on the suggestions and information provided by others in their social network (Mutz & Young, 2011) and tend to trust that information more than when received directly from media outlets (Turcotte et al., 2015). Further, whereas the influence of opinion leaders in the traditional media environment was constrained to those in their immediate discussion networks, online leaders are able to reach a much larger audience using a variety of platforms and behaviors. As Fogg (2008) notes, SNSs combine the power of interpersonal persuasion and the reach of mass media to allow for ‘‘mass interpersonal persuasion. ’’ This suggests that the reach of opinion leaders online may be broad and that their behaviors can drive communication and social interaction with others, as well as set agendas for a much larger network (Graham & Wright, 2014; Himelboim et al., 2009; Huffaker, 2010). In fact, prior research suggests that online social influence is powerful and can impact a range of political behaviors, such as the media outlets people select (Messing & Westwood, 2014), what they learn on social media (Bode, 2015), and even whether they vote (Bond et al., 2012). Thus, it appears online influence remains strong, and justifies the investigation of how social media use, opinion leaders, and political persuasive attempts are related. If we are to examine the potential influence of opinion leaders in social media, we must next evaluate who is considered influential or an online opinion leader. Within social media, opinion leaders may be identified by t