A new study held by the scientists at Facebook has established that a lesser amount of diverse news feed at Facebook is the outcome of people’s networks of friends and their stories being directed towards the users’ inclinations of their own ideologies.
The researchers evaluated and examined almost 10 million users over the past six months and established that their news feeds are not as impervious as it was predicted.
It has been reported that the profuse and conventional users are open to religious and political views that are in direct contradictions to their opinions, and the stories exhibited on Facebook News Feed conflicts to their creeds.
Researchers have found that the users’ choice of stories effects the news feeds more than the Facebook’s filtering mechanism. The news were conflicting to their ideologies due to their own choice of stories, clicked. Facebook filtering mechanism had little to do here as the algorithm aids and directs users to contents relating to their clicked stories, earlier.
The researchers have clinched that 23.23% of Facebook users have friends who relate to topics that contradicts to each other’s ideologies. As a result, news feed displays news that oppose their professed beliefs, to their predicament.
Despite the researchers’ illustrations on blaming the users for their un-liked news on their news feed on Facebook, a lot of criticism have been received, saying that Facebook study is flawed in interpreting issues like this.
The results of the study were received this week on the journal Science. “This is the first time we’ve been able to quantify these effects,” said Facebook data scientist and study lead Eytan Bakshy in a statement. “You would think that if there was an echo chamber, you would not be exposed to any conflicting information, but that’s not the case here.” Bakshy’s comment could raise a debate regarding the question – is internet really able to create an echo chamber?
Twitter usage in 2012 suggested the same thing and reported that social Medias displays only what users offer, and is constant with their own ideologies.
