The Echo Chamber Effect

By Dreadsen on February 13th, 2016

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The Echo Chamber Effect

What David Byrne says is true, but this is not limited to Trump supporters. By describing the “echo chamber” effect only in terms of Trump supporters, one may inadvertently reinforce the echo chamber created by non-Trump supporters — committing the error of assuming this phenomenon is exclusive to Trump supporters or their opposition.

Read this piece and replace “Trump” with Hillary, Sanders, Carson, Liberals, Conservatives, chemtrail conspiracy theorists, Sandy Hook conspiracy theorists, Santa Claus sightings (yes, fully grown adults claim to see Santa Claus every December), environmentalists, pro-fossil fuel advocates, Libertarians, natural cures proponents, anti-racists, racism deniers, Men’s Rights advocates, feminists, etc.

None of us can be right all the time. We are all fallible. Some groups may be far more fallible than others, but even those who are more accurate than not will rarely — if ever — know when they are wrong if they only surround themselves with people, news sites, blogs, Facebook pages, and YouTube channels that confirm their existing beliefs. When they do this, they stop having to think critically. It may not be in the interest of the people and sources they surround themselves with to inform them when something they’ve been sharing has been undermined by contrary evidence or information.

Just think — hasn’t there been something that someone from an opposing ideology has been passing around that you saw debunked weeks, maybe months, ago?

You may criticize others for the “echo chamber” effect, but you could be guilty of the same thing. I’ll give you an example from a recent political campaign.

I’ve seen liberals and Sanders supporters pointing out how gullible Trump supporters are for believing things that were debunked long ago. Yet those same Sanders supporters were still sharing a photo of Sanders allegedly marching with Dr. Martin Luther King — a photo that had already been debunked weeks earlier as not actually being him. The reason they had no idea it was false is that they only surround themselves with pro-Bernie Sanders information. The likelihood of them ever encountering a statement from his own campaign clarifying that it wasn’t him in the photo was greatly diminished. Essentially, we have people in one echo chamber criticizing people in a different echo chamber.

Here’s another example. There are pro-gun advocates who are very critical of gun regulation and always argue that gun bans contribute to more crime. Many of them were still sharing memes based on the premise that Chicago had a handgun ban and did not allow concealed carry — even though that ban was overturned nearly three years prior and Chicago had since adopted concealed carry. Many of these people still had no idea, and kept posting criticism of Chicago’s gun ban.

The deeper problem is that people who are heavily invested in a belief have the least interest in seeking out information that might challenge it. They trust that their echo chamber is filled with sound and reasonable arguments. That is suspending reasoning in favor of faith.

Here’s a link to the original story

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