Search engine manipulation effect: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 19:58, 17 May 2018

Revision as of 21:55, 9 July 2018

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| access-date = 2016-02-28

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On election day in 2010, Facebook sent ‘go out and vote’ reminders to more than 60 million of its users. The reminders caused about 340,000 people to vote who otherwise would not have. In&nbsp;another 2014 Facebook experiment for a period of a week, 689,000 Facebook users were sent news feeds that contained either an excess of positive terms, an excess of negative terms, or neither. Those in the first group subsequently used slightly more positive terms in their communications, while those in the second group used slightly more negative terms in their communications.&nbsp;Both experiments were conducted without the knowledge or consent of the participants.<ref name=":1" />

Later research suggested that search rankings impact virtually all issues on which people are initially undecided around the world. Search results that favour one point of view tip the opinions of those who are undecided on an issue. In another experiment, biased search results shifted people’s opinions about the value of [[Hydraulic fracturing|fracking]] by 33.9 per cent.<ref name=":1" />