Replication Data for: "Partisan Enclaves and Information Bazaars: Mapping Selective Exposure to Online News"

Many now attribute increased political polarization to an increasingly segregated market for online news. Indeed, experimental studies in political science and psychology seem to confirm that partisans are more interested in reading attitude-reinforcing information. Yet, observational studies of web browsing behavior have consistently downplayed the differences between the online news diets of Democrats and Republicans. In this paper, we present two new pieces of evidence showing how partisans selectively approach congenial news online. First, using a descriptive analysis of observational web browsing data from the 2016 U.S. general election (Aug.-Nov. 2016), we show that Democrats and Republicans split their news consumption between left- and right-leaning sources, respectively, and moderate/mainstream sources. The lion's share of partisan convergence that we observe occurs at portal sites --- such as Yahoo!, MSN, and AOL --- that primarily deliver non-news and non-political content. Second, using high profile scandals during the 2016 election (Access Hollywood and the Comey Letter), we show that partisans consume more news when an event benefits their preferred candidate, but consume no less when their preferred candidate was the subject of the scandal.如今，学界普遍将日益加剧的政治极化归因于在线新闻市场的愈发分化割裂。诚然，政治学与心理学领域的实验研究似乎证实，党派支持者更倾向于阅读能够强化自身政治立场的信息。然而，针对网页浏览行为的观察性研究却始终表明，民主党与共和党支持者的在线新闻消费构成差异并不显著。本文提出两项全新的实证证据，用以揭示党派支持者如何有选择性地接触与自身政治立场相符的在线新闻。其一，通过对2016年美国大选（2016年8月至11月）期间的观察性网页浏览数据开展描述性分析，我们发现民主党与共和党支持者的新闻消费分别集中于左翼、右翼信源，以及温和派/主流信源。我们观察到的两党支持者新闻消费重合度最高的部分，集中于雅虎（Yahoo!）、MSN、AOL等门户网站——这类平台主要提供非新闻、非政治类内容。其二，借助2016年大选期间的两起重磅丑闻——《走进好莱坞》（Access Hollywood）录音事件与科米信函（Comey Letter）事件，我们发现：当某一事件对己方支持的候选人有利时，党派支持者会增加相关新闻的消费；而当己方支持的候选人成为丑闻的主角时，他们的新闻消费并未出现明显下滑。