Reynolds

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EIP LINK: http://hayleyseip.weebly.com
Tab 1 (About me)
I.

Social media, and Politics

Hello! My name is Hayley Reynolds, and I am researching social media and its

affects on Political elections. In other words: how do things like Facebook and twitter,
affect the way citizens vote for presidential nominees?
II.

Introduction to my topic.
I am a political science major and the University of North Carolina at Charlotte.

As any individual born in the millennial generation, I use technology as a part of my

daily life and this includes things such as twitter and Facebook. Being a political science
major and having ambitions to become a political campaign manager, I question what
affect the use of social media has on the way people vote. There is two things in the
United States of America that will never vanish; politics and the use of technology and
social media.
Tab 2 (Facts and Figures)
What is a millennial?
The Millennial Generation can also be known as Generation Y, according to Ruth
Bolton the author of Understanding Generation Y and Their Use of Social Media: a
Review and Research Agenda. There is not exact date that this generation starts. It is said
that the birth year ranges from the early 1980s to the early 2000s. This generation is
known for being technologically savvy, and for how social media and technology plays
into their everyday live I wake up and check my phone, and before I roll out of my bed I

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look to see what has happened on Twitter the night before; you can not tell me that you
dont do that too!
What is Social Media?
Social media consists of websites that allows its users to create a profile that they
then create and share content of their thoughts or events of their daily lives. This allows
them to have a social network through the Internet, and to easily access friends from all
over the world.
What does it mean to vote?
To vote in this particular research study it is narrowed down to just the United
States. Individuals are allowed to put forward their choice, and in my presentation and
context the term vote will mean to vote for the next president. The action of voting is
expressed by putting your personal choice down on a ballot and then ballots are counted
to choose a winner of the election. It is necessary to define vote in this case, because how
voting is affected is what we will be studying.

25% of voters heard about a presidential candidate via Twitter. Thats 25% of
voters who might not had voted if family and friends had not contacted them and

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urged them to vote.

About 45% of voters who were encouraged to vote by family and friends via
social media were a part of the Millennial generation, and 29% of those voters
announced their vote via social media. This means that social media is a huge
factor in the voter turnout. Social media MATTERS in the political world,
particularly when it comes to voting.

SOURCE: Neylon, Michele. Facebook & CNN Election Insights.
This is an example of how people use Facebook to talk about whom they want to
vote for. This allows CNN to rank the candidates by popularity and determine

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how Americans will vote as a whole. Social media might just be the next best way
to do pre- polling predictions.

SOURCE: LAR WILLNAT, POLITICAL ACTIVITIES ON FACEBOOK
23% of people discovering which presidential candidate their friends will vote for
that year, is a big deal. The millennial generation is easily influenced by our peers
through social media according to Bolton who states that people between the ages
of 18 and 34, (which is a majority of this age range includes the Millennial
generation) are more likely to value other's opinions on social media. That is 23%
of people who have a change of voting the same way their friends are going to
due to seeing a friends voting preference on social media. Seeing the way your
friends and family will vote via social media, can affect the way the millennial
generation votes

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SOURCE: LARS WILLNAT, POLITICAL ACTIVITIES ON TWITTER.

Presidential campaign dissections weren't as popular on twitter as they were

Facebook, and that could be due to during this election half of the Millennial
Generations were not old enough to vote. Still this image/ graph shows that social
media is a tool for my generation to educate themselves about the elections, and
this does matter.

SOURCE: LARS WILLNAT, POLITICAL ACTIVITIES ON SMARTPHONES.
During my research I learned from this image that there are political apps such as
"Obama for America" and another called "Romney-Ryan". There are now Social

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Media Apps that are made to help nominees relate messages to their supporters

Social Media Impact on Election Prediction Models. MSA Digital Analytics
Tab 3(Voters use of Twitter and Facebook)
In 2012 the United States held the Presidential election. Sadly I was only 15 at the
time and was unable to vote, however that did not keep me from being an active part in
the campaign itself. The GOP in Wilmington was seeking help for citizens to participate
in canvassing . I volunteered for four hours, but that did not fulfill my growing need to
express my views and the platform for which I supported. I myself used twitter to follow
several political groups such as the GOP, Mitt Romney, and even our president Barack
Obama. The reason I did this was to stay connected to what was going on and to try to
personally connect to what they had to say. After following this Presidential Nominees, I
used both Facebook and Twitter to push my views upon my family and friends. I wanted
them to either vote the way I wish I could have or simply just to get involved themselves.
I once read a scholarly article Understanding Generation Y and Their Use of
Social Media: a Review and Research Agenda, written by Dr. Ruth N. Bolton who is a
professor of Marketing at Arizona State University and was the Executive Director of the

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Marketing Science Institute (2009-2011) and was the Editor of the Journal of Marketing
(2002-2005). Bolton states that people between the ages of 18 and 34 years old are
more likely to value other's opinion on social media. Also they feel more valued when
they provide feedback about a certain post, brands, and or products that they have used.
Which seems valid even from where I stand, because when my friends post something
about something that intrigues them I tend to be intrigued too. Does this mean that, since
23% of people studied by Lars Willnat (see Political Activities on Facebook image) see
what their friends post on social media about which president they will vote for during
election season that an individual may become more active because the their friends are?

Yes it does! This shows one way that social media affects the way people vote, because
social media is correlated to the voting turnout numbers.
There have also been several studies done to see what teenagers do with their
technology. For example, the survey done by Michael Xenos of the University of
Wisconsin, Ariadne Vromen of the University of Sydney, and Brian D. Loader of the
University of York studied political engagement among young people in the United
States, Australia and Great Britain. They surveyed a representative sample of people aged
16 to 29 in each country, asking about social media use and the relations to civic and
political engagement. This does not include asking about voting. In their study published
in Information, Communication & Society, they write, We find a strong, significant, and
robust positive relationship between social media use and political engagement. This
correlation interests me, because this is my generation, and I believe that technology can

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be used by teenagers for more than what it has been used for in past. Almost 50 percent
of social network users between the ages of 18 and 29 polled by Pew declared they had
used social media to discover their friends' political interests or affiliations, to receive
campaign information, to sign up as a "friend" of a candidate, or to join or start a political
group, claims Matthew R. Auer who is Dean of the Hutton Honors College and
Professor of Public and Environmental Affairs at the School of Public and Environmental
Affairs at Indiana University. This statistic means that this generation uses social media
to be informed not just socially but politically.
Does social media enhance an individual's connection to the political world in the
millennial generation? According to Bogdan Patrut , there are 1.6 billion Facebook users
and approximately 65% of those individuals use Facebook to speak publicly about their
political views. A case study done by S. McClelland a political scientist
and contributor to the book Facebook Use in the 2012 USA Presidential Campaign,
shows that in 2012 that politicians used the data from social networking sites to persuade
voters in one direction or another. Almost in the same way I used my Facebook post to
get people to vote for Mitt Romney since I could not. During the 2012 election Mitt
Romney the Republican presidential candidate said Twitter tries to create a firsthand,
immediate experience for the audience that takes out the middlemanthe media...
Romney reminded readers of the situation while also guiding his readers to his specific
policy plans and stances on social issues (Rainie).
Meanwhile both candidates used Facebook as a huge communication source, and
used it to post their platform. Data was also presented, and it showed that in the 2011

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election Mitt Romney used a lot more attack methods than Barack Obama did, and the
negativity could have been his downfall. Mitt Romney could be seen as that high school
girl who always had something negative to post about girls she didn't like. But what
happens to girls like this? No one wants to be their friends, and that is the situation Mitt
Romney put himself in. Then after ballots were cast, Obama ultimately received more
votes then Romney. There is a correlation in the use of social media and the way the
Millennial Generation votes.
Social media affects the votes that Generation Y votes in two specific ways. My
generations use of social networks such as Facebook and Twitter allow us to see the way
our presidential candidates act and portray themselves to the public, and the way our
peers, friends, and families view and vote for candidates. At this age we are
impressionable of the people surrounding us, so if there is a twitter post saying
(hypothetically) Vote Jeb Bush, he wants to give us the right to bear arms, people
reading this will be more likely persuaded to vote for Jeb Bush just because their friends
want them to. If an individual from this Millennial Generation is more politically active
they will still be influenced by social media; because of the ads and social media posts of
particular candidates. Whether posts are positive or negatively directed at their
opponents, it will sway my generations votes. Just like how Obamas ads were more
positive and focused on his platform, so this allowed us to see what he was planning to do
with Americas future. It also made people see him having better morals than Romney
who was bashing Obama left and right, so people thought more highly of him and voted
that way. For instance according to Doctor. David Painter, some people might have

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simply Mitt Romney, due to his negative ads towards Obama or the negativity could have
simply turned them away and caused them to vote for Obama. Social media doesnt just
make an individual vote one way it also pushes them away from a particular candidate.
Tab 4 (Interview)
Social media is a big part of politics. Due to the influence of peers have on each
other. Doctor David Painter's interview states that social media adds a social
pressure especially in teen, and it makes people more active in politics. "And through the
social consumption of television and through social media young people are feeling much
more confident about their ability to participate in politics the cast and informed them and
also feeling more urgency about voting and participating," painter later explains "young
people who are exposed to a combination of both positive and negative ads to express
themselves on social media much more likely to participate in politics to engage in
politics and discussion." Earlier in the video he explains that some people may
see negative ads and it turns them away from voting, but it might be the sole reason
people go and vote. Whether the reason they go and vote is due to their being influenced
to vote by a negative add or voting for another candidate due to their dislike of a
particular nominees negative campaign ads. Social media does matter. This interview
does show how social media such as ads and pressure from peers affects peoples voting
habits and voting choices.