High prevalence of antagonizing rhetoric in trending topics on Twitter/X
Disagreement between political opponents is a central element of democracy. This disagreement can be voiced in different ways. An opponent can be antagonized, i.e. portrayed as an enemy that needs to be overcome, or they can be criticized, i.e. treated as a legitimate adversary with whom one can engage. While the latter is a fundamental part of democratic exchange, the former can be detrimental to public discourse. Political disagreement increasingly takes place on social media, where negativity towards political out-groups has been found to drive engagement. However, existing research has largely treated such negativity as a single dimension, leaving open whether it is antagonization or ...
| Authors | Armin Pournaki, Eckehard Olbrich |
|---|---|
| Primary category | cs.SI |
| Published | 15 October 2026 |
| Last updated at source | 15 October 2026 |
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