Does ‘clicking’ matter? The role of online participation in adolescents’ civic development

Vol.11,No.4(2017)

Abstract

This study focuses on the role of online civic participation in the civic development of adolescents. We build on the assumption that online civic participation differs from more traditional offline civic participation in several key characteristics, namely lacking proximity to other actors, possible disconnection between civic actions and their outcomes, and a reduced hierarchy within the online environment. Considering these specifics, the study examined the longitudinal effect of online participation on the development of civic identity, political self-efficacy, and attitudes toward social authorities. Concurrently, we contrasted the impact of online participation with the impact of offline civic participation. Data from a survey-based two-wave panel study conducted in Spring 2014 and Autumn 2015 in the Czech Republic were utilized. The sample comprised 768 adolescents (aged 14-17 in T1; 54% females). The results showed that online participation predicted increased challenging attitudes towards social authorities, while offline participation had the opposite effect. Furthermore, online participation had no effect on political self-efficacy or civic development, but offline participation positively predicted civic identity. The findings are discussed with regard to the specific benefits and limits of online civic participation.


Keywords:
Online participation; adolescence; civic development
References

Akdeniz, Y. (2002). Anonymity, democracy, and cyberspace. Social Research: An International Quarterly, 69, 223-237.

Alwin, D. F., & Krosnick, J. A. (1991). Aging, cohorts, and the stability of sociopolitical orientations over the life span. American Journal of Sociology, 97, 169–195. https://doi.org/10.1086/229744

Atkins, R., & Hart, D. (2003). Neighborhoods, adults, and the development of civic identity in urban youth. Applied Developmental Science, 7, 156-164. https://doi.org/10.1207/S1532480XADS0703_6

Bakker, T. P., & de Vreese, C. H. (2011). Good news for the future? Young people, Internet use, and political participation. Communication Research, 38, 451–470. https://doi.org/10.1177/0093650210381738

Bandura, A. (1997). Self-efficacy. New York: W. H. Freeman.

Bandura, A. (2006). Guide for constructing self-efficacy scales. In F. Pajares & T. Urdan (Eds.), Self-efficacy beliefs of adolescents (pp. 307-337). Greenwich, CT: Information Age Publishing.

Bargh, J. A., & McKenna, K. Y. (2004). The Internet and social life. Annual Review of Psychology, 55, 573-590. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.psych.55.090902.141922

Beaumont, E. (2010). Political agency and empowerment: Pathways for developing a sense of political efficacy in young adults. In L. R. Sherrod, J. Torney-Purta, & C. A. Flanagan (Eds.), Handbook of research on civic engagement in youth (pp. 525-558). Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons.

Beaumont, E. (2011). Promoting political agency, addressing political inequality: A multilevel model of internal political efficacy. The Journal of Politics, 73, 216-231. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022381610000976

Bennett, W. L. (2008). Civic life online: Learning how digital media can engage youth. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press.

boyd, d. (2010). Social network sites as networked publics: Affordances, dynamics, and implications. In Z. Papacharissi (Ed.), Networked self: Identity, community, and culture on social network sites (pp. 39–58). New York, NY: Routledge.

Brundidge, J. (2010). Encountering “difference” in the contemporary public sphere: The contribution of the Internet to the heterogeneity of political discussion networks. Journal of Communication, 60, 680-700. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1460-2466.2010.01509.x

Buckingham, D. (Ed.). (2008). Youth, identity and digital media. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Buckingham, D., & Willett, R. (2006). Digital generations: Children, young people, and the new media. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Caprara, G. V., Vecchione, M., Capanna, C., & Mebane, M. (2009). Perceived political self‐efficacy: Theory, assessment, and applications. European Journal of Social Psychology, 39, 1002-1020. https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.604

Chen, Y., Conroy, N. J., & Rubin, V. L. (2015). Misleading online content: Recognizing clickbait as “false news”. In Proceedings of the 2015 ACM on Workshop on Multimodal Deception Detection (pp 15-19). https://doi.org/10.1145/2823465.2823467

Český statistický úřad. (n. d.). Informační technologie v domácnostech a mezi jednotlivci [ICT in households and among individuals]. Český statistický úřad. Retrieved from https://www.czso.cz/csu/czso/domacnosti_a_jednotlivci

Cheung, G. W., & Rensvold, R. B. (2002). Evaluating goodness-of-fit indexes for testing measurement invariance. Structural Equation Modeling, 9, 233-255. https://doi.org/10.1207/S15328007SEM0902_5080/02671522.2014.908408

Christensen, H. S. (2011). Political activities on the Internet: Slacktivism or political participation by other means? First Monday, 16(2). https://doi.org/10.5210/fm.v16i2.3336

Cicognani, E., Zani, B., Fournier, B., Gavray, C., & Born, M. (2012). Gender differences in youths’ political engagement and participation. The role of parents and of adolescents’ social and civic participation. Journal of Adolescence, 35, 561-576. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.adolescence.2011.10.002

Costello, M., Hawdon, J., Ratliff, T., & Grantham, T. (2016). Who views online extremism? Individual attributes leading to exposure. Computers in Human Behavior, 63, 311-320. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2016.05.033

Dahlberg, L. (2007). The Internet, deliberative democracy, and power: Radicalizing the public sphere. International Journal of Media & Cultural Politics, 3, 47-64. https://doi.org/10.1386/macp.3.1.47_1

Dahlgren, P. (2005). The Internet, public spheres, and political communication: Dispersion and deliberation. Political Communication, 22, 147-162. https://doi.org/10.1080/10584600590933160

Dahlgren, P. (2009). Media and political engagement: Citizens, communication and democracy. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

Duckitt, J. (2009). Authoritarianism and dogmatism. In M. R. Leary & R. H. Hoyle (Eds.), Handbook of Individual Differences in Social Behavior (pp. 298-317). New York, NY: Guilford Press.

Economist Intelligence Unit (2017). The Economist Intelligence Unit's Democracy Index. Retrieved from: https://infographics.economist.com/2017/DemocracyIndex/

Edwards, A. R. (2002). The moderator as an emerging democratic intermediary: The role of the moderator in Internet discussions about public issues. Information Polity, 7, 3-20. https://doi.org/10.3233/IP-2002-0002

Ekström, M., & Östman, J. (2013). Information, interaction, and creative production: The effects of three forms of Internet use on youth democratic engagement. Communication Research, 42, 796–818. https://doi.org/10.1177/0093650213476295

Ekström, M., Olsson, T., & Shehata, A. (2014). Spaces for public orientation? Longitudinal effects of Internet use in adolescence. Information, Communication & Society, 17, 168-183. https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2013.862288

Fenton, N., & Barassi, V. (2011) Alternative media and social networking sites: The politics of individuation and political participation. The Communication Review, 14, 179-196. https://doi.org/10.1080/10714421.2011.597245

Finkel, S. E., Sigelman, L., & Humphries, S. (1999). Democratic values and political tolerance. In J. P. Robinson, P. R. Shaver, & L. S. Wrightsman (Eds.), Measures of political attitudes (pp. 203-296). San Diego: Academic Press.

Flanagan, C. A., Bowes, J. M., Jonsson, B., Csapo, B., & Sheblanova, E. (1998). Ties that bind. Journal of Social Issues, 54, 457–475. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-4560.1998.tb01230.x

Flanagan, C. A., Jonsson, B., Botcheva, L., Csapo, B., Bowes, J., Macek, P., Averina, I., & Sheblanova, E. (1999). Adolescents and the ‘Social Contract’: Developmental roots of citizenship in seven countries. In M. Yates & J. Youniss (Eds.), Roots of civic identity. Community service and civic engagement in youth: International perspectives (pp. 135-155). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Freedom House (2017). Freedom in the World 2017.Czech Republic Profile. Retrieved from: https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/2017/czech-republic

Funke, F. (2005). The dimensionality of right-wing authoritarianism: Lessons from the dilemma between theory and measurement. Political Psychology, 26, 195-218. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9221.2005.00415.x

Garrett, R. K. (2009). Echo chambers online?: Politically motivated selective exposure among Internet news users. Journal of ComputerMediated Communication, 14, 265-285. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1083-6101.2009.01440.x

Gibson, R., & Cantijoch, M. (2013). Conceptualizing and measuring participation in the age of the Internet: Is online political engagement really different to offline?. The Journal of Politics, 75, 701-716. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0022381613000431

Hargittai, E. (2010). Digital Na(t)ives? Variation in internet skills and uses among members of the “net generation”. Sociological Inquiry, 80, 92-113. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1475-682x.2009.00317.x

Hirzalla, F., & Van Zoonen, L. (2011). Beyond the online/offline divide how youth’s online and offline civic activities converge. Social Science Computer Review, 29, 481-498. https://doi.org/10.1177/0894439310385538

Hooghe, M., & Quintelier, E. (2014). Political participation in European countries: The effect of authoritarian rule, corruption, lack of good governance and economic downturn. Comparative European Politics, 12, 209-232. https://doi.org/10.1057/cep.2013.3

Chadwick, A., & Howard, P. N. (Eds.) (2010). Routledge handbook of Internet politics. New York, NY: Routledge.

Jugert, P., Eckstein, K., Noack, P., Kuhn, A., & Benbow, A. (2013). Offline and online civic engagement among adolescents and young adults from three ethnic groups. Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 42, 123-135. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10964-012-9805-4

Kahne, J., Lee, N. J., & Feezell, J. T. (2013). The civic and political significance of online participatory cultures among youth transitioning to adulthood. Journal of Information Technology & Politics, 10, 1-20. https://doi.org/10.1080/19331681.2012.701109

Kahne, J., Middaugh, E., Lee, N. J., & Feezell, J. T. (2012). Youth online activity and exposure to diverse perspectives. New Media & Society, 14, 492-512. https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444811420271

Kenski, K., & Stroud, N. J. (2006). Connections between Internet use and political efficacy, knowledge, and participation. Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 50, 173-192. https://doi.org/10.1207/s15506878jobem5002_1

Kim, Y., Hsu, S. H., & de Zúñiga, H. G. (2013). Influence of social media use on discussion network heterogeneity and civic engagement: The moderating role of personality traits. Journal of Communication, 63, 498-516. https://doi.org/10.1111/jcom.12034

Krosnick, J. A., & Alwin, D. F. (1989). Aging and susceptibility to attitude change. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 57, 416-425. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.57.3.416

Lampe, C., Zube, P., Lee, J., Park, C. H., & Johnston, E. (2014). Crowdsourcing civility: A natural experiment examining the effects of distributed moderation in online forums. Government Information Quarterly, 31, 317-326. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.giq.2013.11.005

Lenhart, A. (2015). Teens, social media & technology overview 2015. Pew Research Center. Retrieved from: http://www.pewinternet.org/2015/04/09/teens-social-media-technology-2015/

Little, T. D., Cunningham, W. A., Shahar, G., & Widaman, K. F. (2002). To parcel or not to parcel: Exploring the question, weighing the merits. Structural Equation Modeling: A Multidisciplinary Journal, 9, 151-173. https://doi.org/10.1207/S15328007SEM0902_1

Livingstone, S., Couldry, N., & Markham, T. (2007). Youthful steps towards civic participation: Does the internet help? In B. Loader (Ed.), Young citizens in the digital age: Political engagement, young people and new media (pp. 21-34). London: Routledge.

Livingstone, S. (2009). Children and the Internet. Cambridge: Polity Press.

Lutz, C., Hoffmann, C. P., & Meckel, M. (2014). Beyond just politics: A systematic literature review of online participation. First Monday, 19(7). https://doi.org/10.5210/fm.v19i7.5260

Macková, A., & Macek, J. (2015). Old and New media and Participation in Czech Society [Research Report]. Brno: Masarykova univerzita. Retrieved from: https://is.muni.cz/repo/1306297/Old_and_New_Media_and_Participation_in_Czech_Society.pdf

Marsh, A., & Kaase. M (1979). Measuring political action. In S. H. Barnes & M. Kaase (Eds.), Political action: Mass participation in five Western democracies (pp. 57-96). Beverly Hills: Sage.

Metz, E., McLellan, J., & Youniss, J. (2003). Types of voluntary service and adolescents’ civic development. Journal of Adolescent Research, 18, 188-203. https://doi.org/10.1177/0743558402250350

Min, S.-J. (2010). From the digital divide to the democratic divide: Internet skills, political interest, and the second-level digital divide in political internet use. Journal of Information Technology & Politics, 7, 22-35. https://doi.org/10.1080/19331680903109402

Morozov, E. (2011). The net delusion. New York, NY: PublicAffairs.

Mossberger, K., Tolbert, C. J., & McNeal, R. S. (2007). Digital citizenship: The Internet, society, and participation. Cambridge: MIT Press.

Nagy, P., & Neff, G. (2015). Imagined affordance: Reconstructing a keyword for communication theory. Social Media + Society, 1(2). https://doi.org/10.1177/2056305115603385

Oser, J., Hooghe, M., & Marien, S. (2013). Is online participation distinct from offline participation? A latent class analysis of participation types and their stratification. Political Research Quarterly, 66, 91-101. https://doi.org/10.1177/1065912912436695

Östman, J. (2012). Information, expression, participation: How involvement in user-generated content relates to democratic engagement among young people. New Media & Society, 14, 1004-1021. https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444812438212

Pajares, F., & Urdan, T. C. (Eds.). (2006). Self-efficacy beliefs of adolescents. Greenwich, CT: IAP.

Park, H. M. & Perry, J. L. (2008). Do campaign Web sites really matter in electoral civic engagement? Empirical evidence from the 2004 post–election Internet tracking survey. Social Science Computer Review, 26, pp. 190–212. https://doi.org/10.1177/0894439307309026

Pauwels, L., & Schils, N. (2016). Differential online exposure to extremist content and political violence: Testing the relative strength of social learning and competing perspectives. Terrorism and Political Violence, 28, 1-29. https://doi.org/10.1080/09546553.2013.876414

Quintelier, E., & Vissers, S. (2008). The effect of Internet use on political participation an analysis of survey results for 16-year-olds in Belgium. Social Science Computer Review, 26, 411-427. https://doi.org/10.1177/0894439307312631

Quintelier, E., & Van Deth, J. W. (2014). Supporting democracy: Political participation and political attitudes. Exploring causality using panel data. Political Studies, 62(S1), 153-171. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9248.12097

Savigny, H. (2002). Public opinion, political communication and the internet. Politics, 22, 1-8. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9256.00152

Sears, D. O. & Brown, C. (2013). Childhood and adult political development. In L. Huddy, D. O. Sears, J. S. Levi (Eds.), The Oxford handbook of political psychology (2nd ed.)(pp. 59-95). Oxford University Press: New York.

Šerek, J., & Machackova, H. (2014). Online only: Which Czech young adults prefer online civic participation?. Cyberpsychology: Journal of Psychosocial Research on Cyberspace, 8(3), article 6. https://doi.org/10.5817/cp2014-3-6

Shah, D. V., Cho, J., Eveland, W. P., & Kwak, N. (2005). Information and expression in a digital age modeling Internet effects on civic participation. Communication Research, 32, 531-565. https://doi.org/10.1177/0093650205279209

Sherrod, L., Torney-Purta, J., & Flanagan, C. (Eds.). (2010).Handbook of research on civic engagement in youth. Hoboken, N.J: Wiley & Sons.

Smith, A. W., Schlozman, K. L., Verba, S., & Brady, H. (2009). The Internet and civic engagement. Washington, DC: Pew Internet & American Life Project. Retrieved from: http://www.pewinternet.org/files/old-media/Files/Reports/2009/The%2520Internet%2520and%2520Civic%2520Engagement.pdf

Sohl, S., & Arensmeier, C. (2015). The school’s role in youths’ political efficacy: Can school provide a compensatory boost to students’ political efficacy? Research Papers in Education, 30, 133–163. https://doi.org/10.1080/02671522.2014.908408

Štětka, V., & Mazák (2014). Whither slacktivism? Political engagement and social media use in the 2013 Czech Parliamentary elections. Cyberpsychology: Journal of Psychosocial Research on Cyberspace, 8(3), article 7. https://doi.org/10.5817/CP2014-3-7

Subrahmanyam, K., & Smahel, D. (2011). Digital youth: The role of media in development. New York, NY: Springer.

Suler, J. (2004). The online disinhibition effect. CyberPsychology & Behavior, 7, 321-326. https://doi.org/10.1089/1094931041291295

Tandoc, E. C., Ling, R., Westlund, O., Duffy, A., Goh, D., & Wei, L. Z. (2017). Audiences’ acts of authentication in the age of fake news: A conceptual framework. New Media & Society. Advanced online publication. https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444817731756

Ťápal, A. (2012). Kognitivně-motivační dispozice autoritářství [Cognitive-motivational dispositions of authoritarianism] (Unpublished diploma thesis). Brno: Masaryk University. Retrieved from https://is.muni.cz/th/357607/fss_b?lang = en

Tsitsika, A. K., Tzavela, E. C., Janikian, M., Ólafsson, K., Iordache, A., Schoenmakers, T. M., . . . & Richardson, C. (2014). Online social networking in adolescence: Patterns of use in six European countries and links with psychosocial functioning. Journal of Adolescent Health, 55, 141-147. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jadohealth.2013.11.010

Valenzuela, S. (2013). Unpacking the use of social media for protest behavior the roles of information, opinion expression, and activism. American Behavioral Scientist, 57, 920-942. https://doi.org/10.1177/0002764213479375

Valkenburg, P. M., Peter, J., & Walther, J. B. (2016). Media effects: Theory and research. Annual Review of Psychology, 67, 315-338. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-psych-122414-033608

Verba, S., Schlozman, K. L., & Brady, H. E. (1995). Voice and equality: Civic voluntarism in American politics. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

Vissers, S., & Stolle, D. (2014). The Internet and new modes of political participation: Online versus offline participation. Information, Communication & Society, 17, 937-955. https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2013.867356

Warren, A. M., Sulaiman, A., & Jaafar, N. I. (2014). Facebook: The enabler of online civic engagement for activists. Computers in Human Behavior, 32, 284-289. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2013.12.017

Wojcieszak, M. E., & Mutz, D. C. (2009). Online groups and political discourse: Do online discussion spaces facilitate exposure to political disagreement? Journal of Communication, 59, 40–56. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1460-2466.2008.01403.x

Wright, S., & Street, J. (2007). Democracy, deliberation and design: the case of online discussion forums. New Media & Society, 9, 849-869. https://doi.org/10.1177/1461444807081230

Xenos, M., Vromen, A., & Loader, B. D. (2014). The great equalizer? Patterns of social media use and youth political engagement in three advanced democracies. Information, Communication & Society, 17, 151-167. https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2013.871318

Yates, M., & Youniss, J. (1998). Community service and political identity development in adolescence. Journal of Social Issues, 54, 495-512. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1540-4560.1998.tb01232.x

Youniss, J., McLellan, J. A., & Yates, M. (1997). What we know about engendering civic identity. American Behavioral Scientist, 40, 620-631. https://doi.org/10.1177/0002764297040005008

Zaff, J. F., Malanchuk, O., & Eccles, J. S. (2008). Predicting positive citizenship from adolescence to young adulthood: The effects of a civic context. Applied Development Science, 12, 38-53. https://doi.org/10.1080/10888690801910567

Metrics

web of science logo


2662

Views

833

PDF views