Hyunjin Song, Jaeho Cho and Grace A. Benefield published their paper "The Dynamics of Message Selection in Online Political Discussion Forums: Self-Segregation or Diverse Exposure?" in Communication Research. Congratulations!

While the online sphere is believed to expose individuals to a wider array of viewpoints, a worry about self-reinforcing political echo chambers also persists. The authors join this scholarly debate by focusing on individual motives for political discussion and dyadic- and structural-level mechanisms that can drive one’s message-selection decision in online discussion settings. Using unobtrusively logged behavioral data matched with panel survey responses, their temporal exponential random graph model (TERGM) analysis indicates that message selection in online discussion settings is largely driven by the similarity of one’s candidate evaluative criteria and various endogenous structural factors, whereas the impact of overt partisan preference in shaping message selection is much more limited than is often assumed.

Song, Hyunjin, Jaeho Cho and Grace A. Benefield (2018). The Dynamics of Message Selection in Online Political Discussion Forums: Self-Segregation or Diverse Exposure? Communication Research. https://doi.org/10.1177/0093650218790144

Find the full paper here: http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0093650218790144