Latinos, younger males, non-college-educated white folks, suburban ladies. The exit polls and political evaluation invariably focuses on the altering habits of demographic teams.
That ignores an enormous determinant of political habits: the place folks get their information and data. It is odd how little consideration has been given to this, given that previously decade we’ve had a revolution in how info flows.
The exit polls didn’t ask about media consumption, so we have to search for oblique clues. NBC requested the query in April when President Joe Biden was nonetheless within the race, and the outcomes had been dramatic. Amongst individuals who bought their information from “newspapers,” Biden was profitable 70-21. Amongst individuals who bought their information from “YouTube/Google,” Trump led 55-39.
The exit polls this week did present that a few of the largest shifts in voting patterns got here amongst younger folks and Latinos, two teams whose media consumption differs from the nationwide common.
Biden gained 18- to 21-year-olds by 60-36 p.c; Harris gained solely 55-42 p.c. There’s no group the place the knowledge consumption has modified greater than younger folks. Whereas 3 p.c of seniors get their info from social media, 46 p.c of 18- to 29-year-olds do.
Trump gained 45 p.c of Latinos in 2024 in contrast with 32 p.c in 2020 — and Hispanic individuals are extra probably to make use of social media than white folks, based on a survey by PRRI.
The reliance on social media as a information supply amongst these teams might be an even bigger think about 2024 than in 2020, partially as a result of a brand new cohort of voters raised on social media as youngsters entered the voters, and Latino voters are disproportionately younger. In 2020, 23 p.c of adults bought their information from YouTube; in 2024, 32 p.c did. The portion turning to TikTok jumped from 3 p.c to 17 p.c.
The character of those platforms has modified too — as extra of their customers come to depend on them for information. In 2020, 28 p.c of standard Instagram customers bought their information there; in 2024, 40 p.c did, based on Pew Analysis Middle. In 2020, 22 p.c of TikTok customers bought information there; in 2024, 52 p.c did.
The opposite massive issue that modified was one of many largest platforms, X, previously Twitter, having its proprietor (with 200 million followers) go all-in for one candidate.
These research reveal an attention-grabbing fault line. Whereas most girls get their information from TikTok, most younger males get their information from YouTube, Twitter and Reddit, Pew discovered. This confirms that women and men usually act on totally different sources of knowledge. But whereas we spill many phrases analyzing whether or not New York Instances headlines normalize unhealthy habits, we all know little or no about what information and data rises to the highest on Reddit and YouTube.
Trump supporters will argue that this re-sorting of media consumption was a optimistic improvement, permitting folks to get info unfiltered by the (biased) elite media. Certainly, Elon Musk declared that with this election, “Legacy media is useless. Lengthy stay citizen journalism!”
However there’s a lot proof that info on social media is extra prone to embrace misinformation and supply information that reinforces preexisting beliefs than conventional mainstream media. And in 2020, research confirmed that individuals who relied on social media for information had been much less educated. We’ll see if that continues to be true in 2024. At a minimal, we have to higher perceive the dynamics.
One meta-cause of the change is apparent: the rise of social media. The opposite is extra oblique however nonetheless vital: the collapse of native information. We’ve misplaced one-third of our native newspapers; the variety of reporters has dropped 60 p.c in twenty years. Research have proven that the contraction of native information has created a vacuum — which has been crammed by partisan information sources and social media (each polarizing and extra prone to unfold misinformation).
I’m definitely not arguing that points like inflation or immigration weren’t essential elements, or that if folks simply had totally different info they may have voted in a different way. But when we wish to grasp the which means of this election, we are able to’t ignore one of many largest forces that formed the voters — or how the collapse of native information has modified the political equation.
