Assembling the Networks and Audiences of Disinformation: How Successful Russian IRA Twitter Accounts Built Their Followings, 2015-2017

Yini Zhang; Josephine Lukito; Min-Hsin Su; Jiyoun Suk; Yiping Xia; Sang Jung Kim; Larissa Doroshenko; Chris Wells

doi:10.1093/joc/jqaa042

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Assembling the Networks and Audiences of Disinformation: How Successful Russian IRA Twitter Accounts Built Their Followings, 2015-2017

Journal article

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Assembling the Networks and Audiences of Disinformation: How Successful Russian IRA Twitter Accounts Built Their Followings, 2015-2017

Yini Zhang, Josephine Lukito, Min-Hsin Su, Jiyoun Suk, Yiping Xia, Sang Jung Kim, Larissa Doroshenko and Chris Wells

Journal of communication, Vol.71(2), pp.305-331

04/01/2021

DOI: 10.1093/joc/jqaa042

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Abstract

This study investigates how successful Russian Internet Research Agency (IRA) Twitter accounts constructed the followings that were central to their disinformation campaigns around the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Treating an account's social media following as both an ego network and an audience critical for information diffusion and influence accrual, we situate IRA Twitter accounts' accumulation of followers in the ideologically polarized, attention driven, and asymmetric political communication system. Results show that partisan enclaves on Twitter contributed to IRA accounts' followings through retweeting; and that mainstream and hyperpartisan media assisted conservative IRA accounts' following gain by embedding their tweets in news. These results illustrate how network dynamics within social media and news media amplification beyond it together boosted social media followings. Our results also highlight the dynamics fanning the flames of disinformation: partisan polarization, media fragmentation and asymmetry, and an attention economy optimized for engagement rather than accuracy.

Communication

Social Sciences

Details

Title: Subtitle: Assembling the Networks and Audiences of Disinformation: How Successful Russian IRA Twitter Accounts Built Their Followings, 2015-2017
Creators: Yini Zhang - University at Buffalo, State University of New York
Josephine Lukito - The University of Texas at Austin
Min-Hsin Su - University of Wisconsin–Madison
Jiyoun Suk - University of Wisconsin–Madison
Yiping Xia - University of Wisconsin–Madison
Sang Jung Kim - Univ Wisconsin, Sch Journalism & Mass Commun, Madison, WI 53706 USA
Larissa Doroshenko - Northeastern University
Chris Wells - Boston University
Resource Type: Journal article
Publication Details: Journal of communication, Vol.71(2), pp.305-331
DOI: 10.1093/joc/jqaa042
ISSN: 0021-9916
eISSN: 1460-2466
Publisher: Oxford Univ Press
Number of pages: 27
Language: English
Date published: 04/01/2021
Academic Unit: Center for Social Science Innovation; School of Journalism and Mass Communication
Record Identifier: 9984460327102771

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