How Social Media Algorithms Organise Our Political Anger

Imagine your social media feed is a party host who only introduces you to the loudest, angriest guests in the room just to keep you from leaving. This is how standard social media algorithms operate, filtering our digital world to maximise attention.

Today, our political conversations happen in spaces ruled by these invisible hosts. We know they feed us drama, but researchers wanted to measure exactly how much they warp our perception of reality.

How Social Media Algorithms Warp Reality

To find out, scientists built custom feed algorithms and assigned them to 2,000 users during the 2024 US election. They compared three distinct styles:

• Standard engagement-based feeds that prioritise clicks.
• Simple chronological feeds that show posts in order of time.
• Feeds designed to quieten extreme voices.

The study measured a massive spike in toxic, moralised, and emotional content for those on standard engagement feeds. This group also perceived far more hostility from the opposing political party. However, these feeds did not actually change how users behaved or posted.

A Better Way to Organise Our Feeds

The good news? The feed designed to quieten extreme voices successfully lowered exposure to toxic outrage and corrected skewed perceptions of social norms. Importantly, users enjoyed the platform just as much as those on standard feeds.

This suggests we do not have to choose between a boring feed and an angry one. Platforms could design healthier digital spaces simply by turning down the volume on their loudest, most extreme users.