Over three-quarters of respondents feel Facebook is making American society worse, with nearly half claiming to know someone who has been persuaded to believe in a conspiracy theory as a result of the site’s content, according to a recent CNN survey done by SSRS.
As per the report, 76 per cent of Americans believe Facebook makes society worse, not better. Another 13% believe it has no influence in either direction. This generally negative assessment is shared by people of all genders, ages and races. Even frequent Facebook users believe that the social network hurts rather than helps US society, with 70 per cent to 14 per cent believing that it does. Despite the fact that majorities across the political spectrum believe Facebook is doing more harm than good, Republicans (82 per cent) are particularly concerned.
However, among the majority of those who believe Facebook is wreaking havoc on society, there is less agreement on whether or not the site is to blame: The way some individuals use Facebook is blamed by 55 per cent of respondents, while the way Facebook is operated is blamed by 45 per cent. Overall, almost one-third of the public, including 44 per cent of Republicans and 27 per cent of Democrats, believe that Facebook is wreaking havoc on American society and that Facebook is more to blame than its users.
Nearly half of Americans (49 per cent) say they know someone who has been convinced to believe in a conspiracy theory as a result of Facebook material. Younger Americans are more likely to accept conspiracy theories based on Facebook postings, with 61 per cent of those under 35 stating they know someone who has done so, compared to just 35 per cent of those 65 and older.
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Following the revelation of the Facebook Papers, a compilation of internal business papers that shed light on the company’s culture, its dissemination of divisive content, and its failure to address cases of disinformation and extremism festering on the platform, Facebook is facing a new round of scrutiny. Last month, Frances Haugen, the whistleblower who leaked the records, testified before the Senate, pressing Congress to tighten the platform’s regulations. Facebook stated in October that the company’s name will be changed to Meta.
Just over half of Americans (53 per cent) believe the federal government should regulate Facebook more, while 11 per cent believe it should regulate it less and 35 per cent believe it should not change. Increased regulation of Facebook is now supported by a 55 per cent majority of Democrats, with 48 per cent of Republicans agreeing. About 44 per cent of Americans who use Facebook at least multiple times a week believe the government should tighten its grip on the social media network, compared to 66 per cent of those who use it less regularly.
A 54 per cent majority of Americans who use Facebook at least a few times a month report that Facebook has recommended content to them that they found unacceptable. Sixty-five per cent of frequent Facebook users under the age of 35 claim the site has suggested harmful information to them.
More broadly, Americans have low faith in major technology companies’ good intentions, with 38 per cent saying they don’t trust corporations like Google, Facebook, or Amazon to do what is best for their consumers, up from 29 per cent in March 2019. Only 34 per cent of Americans feel they have some faith in major tech corporations, a slight decrease from 40 per cent two years ago.
A majority of people in both parties say they have little or no faith in big internet corporations to work in their customers’ best interests, although Republicans are more likely than Democrats to believe this: 71 per cent of Republicans believe this, compared to 58 per cent of Democrats. This is a wider ideological divide than it was two years ago when Republicans were just 5 percentage points more likely than Democrats to have disdain for such firms.
The CNN Poll was conducted by SSRS from November 1 to 4 among a nationwide sample of 1,004 persons who were recruited using probability-based procedures and polled online. The margin of sampling error for the entire sample is plus or minus 4.0 percentage points.
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