How does political efficacy condition clicks on politics? Understanding information-selection behavior in algorithmic feeds over time

This study uses political efficacy to explain individual differences in selecting political information on algorithmic feeds. Combining survey data and 186 Dutch individuals’ usage histories of Google Discover, a fully algorithmically curated feed, we examined both within-person changes of information-selection behavior over time and between-person differences conditioned by political efficacy in three aspects: the proportion of political information selected by users, exposure diversity as manifested via sources, and proportion of negative political information. While we did not find any longitudinal change conditioned by external efficacy on information-selection patterns, we found that internally efficacious users are more resilient to prevalent concerns about algorithms’ negative influence on political information consumption and exposure diversity. We observed their stable proportions of political information consumption and consumption from increasingly diverse sources over time. Alarmingly, there is a growing divide in exposure diversity between less and more efficacious users over time. Altogether, our study not only highlights users’ agency in navigating algorithmic environments but also underscores the importance of empowering users with account of different vulnerabilities.