Cited by 123Social Media and PoliticsElectoral Systems and Political ParticipationPolitical Theory and Democracy

The Incidental Pundit: Who Talks Politics with Whom, and Why?

Minozzi, William, Song, Hyunjin, Lazer, David M. J., Neblo, Michael A., Ognyanova, Katherine·2020·American Journal of Political Science

Abstract

Informal discussion plays a crucial role in democracy, yet much of its value depends on diversity. We describe two models of political discussion. The purposive model holds that people typically select discussants who are knowledgeable and politically similar to them. The incidental model suggests that people talk politics for mostly idiosyncratic reasons, as by‐products of nonpolitical social processes. To adjudicate between these accounts, we draw on a unique, multisite, panel data set of whole networks, with information about many social relationships, attitudes, and demographics. This evidence permits a stronger foundation for inferences than more common egocentric methods. We find that incidental processes shape discussion networks much more powerfully than purposive ones. Respondents tended to report discussants with whom they share other relationships and characteristics, rather than based on expertise or political similarity, suggesting that stimulating discussion outside of echo chambers may be easier than previously thought.

Integrity signals

Registry

Crossref · 10.1111/ajps.12469

Cites

65 of 65 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

Statistics

Recomputing p-values needs the paper’s full text.

Claims the paper makes

This paper’s full text isn’t openly available, so its claims and self-check weren’t run. The registry and citation checks still apply.

Cites

Flagged first, then by citations

Cited by

Sorted by citations

Authors
Minozzi, W., Song, H., Lazer, D. M. J., Neblo, M. A., & Ognyanova, K.
Affiliations
  • The Ohio State University (US)
  • University of Vienna (AT)
  • Northeastern University (US)
  • Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey (US)
Venue
American Journal of Political Science
Publisher
Wiley
Published
2019-09-16
Volume
64
Issue
1
Pages
135-151
ISSN
  • 0092-5853 (ISSN-L)
  • 1540-5907
OpenAlex
W2974505787
Cited by
123
References
65
Citations by year
2026: 7 · 2025: 11 · 2024: 14 · 2023: 13 · 2022: 48 · 2021: 12 · 2020: 17 · 2019: 1
FWCI
41.33
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
closed
Locations
American Journal of Political Science (publishedVersion)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Communication › Social Media and Politics
  • Social Sciences › Political Science and International Relations › Electoral Systems and Political Participation
  • Social Sciences › Political Science and International Relations › Political Theory and Democracy
Keywords
political debate, discussion networks, political similarity, expertise, echo chambers, social networks

About these checks

Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.

Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.

Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.

What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›

Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review