Democracy in the Digital Age: What Do We Know About the Impact of Social Media and AI on Public Discourse?
Over the past two decades, information and communication technologies have transformed the way people communicate, organize, and engage in public debate. Increasing interconnectedness has enabled new forms of self-organized discourse, while digital platforms and their algorithms have gained unprecedented influence over the flow of information. More recently, generative AI has made the creation and dissemination of content easier than ever before.
At the same time, these developments have provided researchers with powerful new tools to study the dynamics of public communication. Detailed data from social media platforms allow scientists to measure and model information flows, network structures, and patterns of collective behavior at an unprecedented scale.
In this lecture, Philipp Lorenz-Spreen examines what is actually changing in our digital information environment and what scientific evidence tells us about the relationship between social media, AI, and contemporary challenges to democracy. The talk will conclude with a methodological outlook on how researchers are working to address the remaining open questions and deepen our understanding of digital public spheres.
