The reaction on Twitter to major political events and policy decisions often differs a great deal from public opinion as measured by surveys. This is the conclusion of a year-long Pew Research Center study that compared the results of national polls to the tone of tweets in response to eight major news events, including the outcome of the presidential election, the first presidential debate and major speeches by Barack Obama.
At times the Twitter conversation is more liberal than survey responses, while at other times it is more conservative. Often it is the overall negativity that stands out. Much of the difference may have to do with both the narrow sliver of the public represented on Twitter as well as who among that slice chose to take part in any one conversation....
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This is a groundbreaking study in understanding how social media, and Twitter in particular, might impact public opinion. I think many of us in communication would have assumed that the Twitter-verse is younger and leans more Democratic. Therefore it is not surprising that the trending on any given topic on Twitter would not always mirror public opinion.
However, the researchers were also able to dig up a number of other interesting factors that contribute to the disconnect between Twitterites and the general public. One is simply numbers: there are far fewer people on Twitter relative to the voting public as a whole. Twitter also reaches beyond voters to people under the age of 18, non-U.S. citizens and others. It is also clear that Twitter records nearly instant reaction to a given issue without the benefit of the further reflection. Reactionary might be the right word.
The question I have is how much do these knee-jerk pronouncements on Twitter actually shape public opinion. One might suggest "not a lot" based on this study.