The Journal of Social Media in Society

Fall 2020, Vol. 9, No. 2, Page 275-305

thejsms.org

Social Media Uses, Political and Civic Participation

in U.S. Election 2016
Hongwei “Chris” Yang1*, Newly Paul2, and Jean L. DeHart1
1Department of Communication, Appalachian State University, Boone, NC, 28608
2Mayborn School of Journalism, University of North Texas, Denton, TX, 76203
*Corresponding Author: yangh@appstate.edu, 828-262-6972

Immediately after Election 2016, an online survey of Their online and offline political participation, and
3,810 US college students in a "swing state" shows civic engagement were closely related. Their online
that the general use of Facebook has a small, social capital led to political use of Facebook but did
negative effect on U.S. college students’ not predict online/offline political participation and
online/offline political participation and civic civic engagement. Additional interesting findings
engagement over and above six control variables and are also presented, theoretical and practical
four demographic variables. The participants’ implications discussed.
political use of Facebook is a much more important
and positive predictor than their general use of Keywords: social media use, online and offline
Facebook for online/offline political participation and political participation, civic engagement, political
civic engagement even after controlling for six self-efficacy, online social capital, trust
relevant variables and four demographic variables.

U
.S. presidential candidates made full use of the potential of social media
platforms in Election 2016: they turned social media into a powerful
mechanism for motivating voters, discouraging the opponent’s followers,
and raising campaign funds, while transforming Facebook and Twitter into
unfiltered sources of election news to the public. Both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton’s
campaigns spent large amounts of money online to reach U.S. Internet users and voters.
In October, Trump’s digital team spent $70 million (Green & Issenberg, 2016), while the
Clinton campaign spent $30 million (Lapowsky, 2016). Both candidates posted their
messages on social media at similar rates, i.e. five to seven posts per day on Facebook and
11-12 posts per day on Twitter (Pew Research Center, 2016). As of December 19, 2016,
Trump had more than 17.54 million followers on Twitter, while Clinton had 11.67 million
followers (Keegan, 2016). Many of their followers were active consumers of presidential

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 Social Media and Election 2016

campaign news and information. Pew Research Center (2016) found that 24% of U.S.
adults turned to the social media posts of Trump or Clinton for news and information
about the election. Digital fund raising has also become a norm since Election 2012.
Trump’s campaign raised $280 million via social media (Slefo, 2017). In contrast, Clinton’s
campaign mainly relied on conventional fund-raisers and big donors to collect $623.1
million (Narayanswamy, Cameron, & Gold, 2016).
The primary reason why practitioners and academicians value the use of social
media for political purposes is the shared belief that most social media users are politically
engaged and can be converted into online advocates, donors, and offline voters with digital
campaigning efforts. Pew Research Center found that 44% of U.S. adults learned about
the 2016 election in the past week from social networking sites (Gottfried et al., 2016).
Forbes reported that about 128 million U.S. users on Facebook generated 8.8 billion likes,
posts, comments and shares related to the 2016 presidential election from March 23, 2015
to November 1, 2016 (Feldman, 2016). According to the New York Times, by 10 pm on
Election Day, 40 million tweets had been sent on Twitter about the election (Isaac &
Ember, 2016). Studies show that citizens who use social media for political purposes are
more likely to vote or to donate to a campaign (e.g., Bode, Vraga, Borah, & Shah, 2014;
Kim & Geidner, 2008).
Research shows that well-educated young U.S. adults are more inclined to be heavy
users of social media, and to become active participants of political and civic activities
than their peers. A recent Pew survey reported that 82% of U.S. online adults with some
college education used Facebook, compared to 77% of those with high school degree or less
(Greenwood, Perrin & Duggan, 2016). Studies demonstrate that young adults with some
college education are much more civically and politically engaged than their non-college
counterparts (e.g., Cohen et al., 2012; Smith, 2013). In this regard, this paper explores
whether social media uses have positively contributed to young U.S. college students’
online/offline political participation and civic engagement in an extraordinary presidential
election year.
Existing studies of social media and politics fall short of validating the powerful
influence of social media on political communication and behavior. Many studies suggest
that both general and political uses of social media will enhance Internet users’ online and

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offline political participation, and civic engagement (e.g., Gil de Zúñiga, Copeland, &
Bimber, 2014; Gil de Zúñiga, Molyneux, & Zheng, 2014; Valenzuela, Park, & Kee, 2009).
However, there is no clear connection between the general use of social media and political
participation (e.g., Baumgartner & Morris 2010; Dimitrova & Bystrom, 2013; Groshek &
Dimitrova, 2011; Gil de Zúñiga et al., 2012). Two meta-analytical studies revealed that
over half of those positive effects were weak or negligible although there was a moderately
positive relationship between social media use and citizen engagement on average
(Boulianne, 2015; Skoric & Zhu, 2016). Few studies have found a link among online social
capital, online social trust, online/offline political participation, and civic engagement
directly. Additionally, whereas several studies have explored the motives behind young
people’s use of social media for political purposes (e.g., Gil de Zúñiga et al., 2014b), there is
a lack of research examining how political use of social media leads to online/offline
political participation and civic engagement (see for exceptions Bode et al., 2014; Yang &
DeHart, 2016a). As of today, we could not retrieve any published study that illustrated the
complicated relationships of general and political uses of social media, online social
capital, political self-efficacy, online trust, political ideology, online/offline political
participation, and civic engagement of U.S. college students in the 2016 election, although
a few studies found a connection between social media use and online/offline political
participation in the 2012 elections (Towner, 2013; Yang & DeHart, 2016a; Zhang, Seltzer,
& Bichard, 2013).
The present study explores the complicated relationships among these key
constructs of social media and politics (see Figures 1-3). It is intended to illustrate how the
influences of the general use and political use of Facebook on online/offline political
participation and civic engagement are mediated by online social capital, political self-
efficacy, and online trust. It also aims to demonstrate to what extent the general use and
political use of Facebook positively predict online/offline political participation and civic
engagement over and above six control variables and four demographic variables. We use
data gathered from an online survey of 3,810 college students in North Carolina, a
southeastern “swing” state, immediately after Election Day 2016 to validate the
conceptual model. In doing this, we build upon two previous studies on Election 2012
(Yang & DeHart, 2016a, Yang & DeHart, 2016b).

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THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
Online/offline political participation and civic engagement
Political participation is defined as the participation of citizens in activities that can
influence the structure of government, the selection of officials, and policies (Himelboim et
al., 2012). It can be operationalized as the frequency of engaging in political activities such
as attending a political rally, and participating in demonstrations, protests, or marches
(Gil de Zúñiga et al., 2012).
We define online political participation as political activities that occur in an online
context (Brady, 1999). These include but are not limited to (1) writing to a politician
online, (2) making a campaign contribution online, and (3) signing up to volunteer for a
campaign/issue online (Gil de Zúñiga et al., 2012). Increasingly, academic researchers
have realized that online political participation should be identified as a distinctive type of
political participation (e.g., Gibson & Cantijoch, 2013; Oser, Hooghe, & Marien 2013).
Civic engagement is the participation of citizens in various informal community-
based associational activities that do not involve political organizations, parties, or
officials, and that are conducted voluntarily for charitable or social purposes (Gil de
Zúñiga et al., 2014a). It is operationalized by five civic activities such as doing voluntary
work for nonpolitical groups and attending meetings to discuss neighborhood problems
(Gil de Zúñiga et al., 2012).
Studies have established that online and offline political participation, and civic
engagement are three closely and positively related concepts. Research shows that offline
political participation will lead to online political participation (e.g., Jung, Kim & Gil de
Zúñiga, 2011; Valenzuela, Kim, & Gil de Zúñiga, 2012; Yang & DeHart, 2016a), whereas
online political participation will facilitate offline political participation (e.g., Vitak et al.,
2011; Metzger et al., 2015; Yang & DeHart, 2016b). Studies also revealed a positive
relationship of civic engagement and online/offline political participation (e.g., Hargittai &
Shaw, 2013; Wicks et al., 2014; Yang & DeHart, 2016b). Therefore, the following
hypotheses were proposed:
H1: The (a) offline political participation and (b) civic engagement of U.S. college
students positively predict their online political participation.

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H2: The (a) online political participation and (b) offline civic engagement of U.S.
college students positively predict their offline political participation.
H3: The (a) online and (b) offline political participation of U.S. college students
positively predict their offline civic engagement.
Social media, social capital, political participation and civic engagement
It is widely accepted that social networking services (SNS) are used by Internet
users to accumulate online and offline social capital (e.g., Ellison et al., 2007). Putnam
(2000) defined social capital as social networks, and the norms of reciprocity and
trustworthiness that arise from them. In this study, we use Lin’s (2001) definition of social
capital as resources embedded in social networks accessible through one’s direct or
indirect ties.
Researchers demonstrate that social media use can significantly enhance Internet
users’ online and offline social capital, often operationalized as bonding and bridging social
capitals (e.g., Hofer & Aubert, 2013; Kim & Geidner, 2008; Sajuria et al., 2015). Bonding
social capital refers to resources embedded in close relationships (ties) such as family and
close friends and available to achieve many personal goals. Bridging social capital, the
utility of broad social networks, gained from loose connections (ties) between individuals,
can provide useful information or new perspectives for one another (Ellison et al., 2007;
Gil de Zúñiga, 2012). Recently, a meta-analysis revealed that the overall effect size of the
relationship between the use of social network sites (SNS) and bridging social capital was
r = .32, with the 95% CI of (.27, .37) in 50 studies, whereas the overall effect size between
SNS use and bonding social capital was r = .26, with the 95% CI of (.22, .31) in 43 studies
(Liu, Ainsworth, & Baumeister, 2016). Williams’ (2006) measures of bridging and bonding
social capitals were adopted by 19 studies and informed by Ellison et al.’s (2007) scales
that were employed by 20 studies (Liu et al., 2016). Hence, we adopted Williams’ (2006)
scales to measure online bridging and bonding social capital.
Research indicates that 79% of U.S. adults were Facebook users (Greenwood et al.,
2016). The use of Facebook is measured by the time spent using Facebook on a typical day
as time spent on SNS sites is the most widely used measure of social media use intensity
(e.g., Ellison et. al., 2007; Valenzuela et al., 2009). It is expected that the time spent on
Facebook positively predicts users’ online social capital. In addition, research shows that

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frequent social media users are more likely than others to engage in “casual” online
political activities such as liking a political candidate or post, and signing an online
petition (e.g., Hargittai & Shaw, 2013; Cohen et al., 2012, Yang & DeHart, 2016a),
especially young, college-educated U.S. adults aged 18-29 (e.g., Smith, 2013). Thus, we
hypothesized that:
H4: The more time U.S. college students spend on Facebook daily, the higher will be
their online social capital (bonding and bridging).
H5: The more time U.S. college students spend on Facebook daily, the more f
requent will be their political use of Facebook.
General use of social media served as a significant and positive predictor of
online/offline political participation and civic engagement in the current research
literature on social media and politics (e.g., Towner, 2013; Valenzuela et al., 2009; Xenos,
Vromen, & Loader, 2014; Zhang et al., 2013; for the meta-analytic reviews see Skoric et
al., 2016; Skoric & Zhu, 2016). Nevertheless, many studies could not validate the positive
influence of general social media use on online/offline political participation and civic
engagement (e.g., Baumgartner & Morris, 2010; Carlisle & Patton, 2013; Groshek &
Dimitrova, 2011; Hyun & Kim, 2015; Theocharis & Lowe, 2016). Perhaps the time
displacement theory applies. Time displacement theorists argue that a person’s use of
time and money is a zero sum game in which media use competes with important
activities in one’s life as consumers can only devote a limited amount of time and money to
media consumption, and civic and political engagement. If a person spends too much time
using media, he/she will have to cut his/her time spent studying, working, and getting
involved in community services and political activities (e.g., Flannery & O’Donoghue,
2013; Putnam, 2000; Williams, 2007).
Hence, the study posed the first three research questions regarding the influence of
general use of Facebook:
R1: To what extent does the time spent by U.S. college students on Facebook daily
predict their (a) online political participation, (b) offline political participation, and
(c) offline civic engagement?

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Political use of social media

The political use of Facebook consists of the frequency of sharing anything about
political issues, responding to friends’ political posts, commenting on friends’ political
posts, and encouraging friends to vote.
Studies show that the political use of social media can significantly enhance offline
political participation including protesting, voting intent, and voting behavior among
adults (e.g., Bode et al., 2014; Gil de Zúñiga et al., 2012; Kim & Khang, 2014; Yamamoto,
Kushin, & Dalisay, 2015; Yang & DeHart, 2016b). Similarly, the political use of social
network sites and blogs can intensify online political participation, such as contributing
money online to a candidate running for public office (e.g., Gil de Zúñiga et al., 2014b;
Housholder & LaMarre, 2015; Kim & Chen, 2016; Towner, 2013; Vitak et al., 2011; Yang
& DeHart, 2016a). Additionally, studies demonstrated the positive influence of political
use of social media on offline civic engagement such as doing voluntary work for
nonpolitical groups, and raising money for charity (e.g., Rojas & Puig-i-Abril, 2009; Shah
et al., 2005). The above discussion leads us to the following hypotheses:
H6: U.S. college students’ political use of Facebook positively predicts their (a)
online political participation, (b) offline political participation, and (c) offline civic
engagement.
Social capital, political participation, and civic engagement
Previous studies revealed a positive association of social capital and political
participation online or offline (e.g., Gibson & McAllister, 2013; Gil de Zúñiga et al., 2017;
Valenzuela et al., 2012). Moreover, research shows that online/offline social capital is
positively associated with online/offline civic engagement (e.g., Collins, Neal, & Neal,
2014; Gil de Zúñiga et al., 2012; Warren, Sulaiman, & Jaafar, 2015; Zhong, 2014). So, we
posited that
H7: U.S. college students’ online social capital positively predicts their (a) political
use of social media, (b) online political participation, (c) offline political
participation, and (d) offline civic engagement.
Political self-efficacy and political participation
Political efficacy consists of two related but distinct components: (1) internal efficacy
- the confidence in one’s capabilities to understand politics, and to participate in political

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activities effectively, and (2) external efficacy - the belief that government officials and
political institutions care about what citizens want and need (Niemi, Craig, & Mattei,
1991). The success of a democratic government relies on citizens’ confidence and
competence in governing and being governed by others. Political self-efficacy has been
consistently shown to positively predict traditional political participation (Chan, 2014;
Scheufele & Nisbet, 2002), civic engagement (Chan & Guo, 2013; Zhong, 2014), and voting
intent/behavior (Leshner & Thorson, 2000; Moeller et al., 2014).
As well-informed and confident citizens tend to be politically active offline, it follows
that these citizens should be more likely to get involved in online political activities than
others. Actually, recent studies found that political self-efficacy positively predicted the
political use of social media, online/offline political participation, and civic engagement
(Gil de Zúñiga et al., 2012; Jensen, 2013; Jordan, Pope, Wallis, & Iyer, 2015; Jung et al.,
2011; Kim, Lee, & Yoon, 2015: Yang & DeHart, 2016a). Therefore, we hypothesized that:
H8: U.S. college students’ political self-efficacy positively predicts their (a) political
use of social media, (b) online political participation, (c) offline political
participation, and (d) offline civic engagement.
Social trust, social capital and political participation
This study defines general social trust as an individual’s general attitudes toward
human nature, especially, one’s faith in people (Rosenberg, 1956). It is measured by the
extent to which most people in a given community, region or nation can be trusted (Burns
& Kinder, 2000). Many scholars consider social trust an integral component of social
capital (e.g., Burns & Kinder, 2000; Putnam, 2000). For example, Putnam (2000) shows
that the percentage of people agreeing that most people can be trusted was very highly
correlated with his elaborate index of social capital (r = .92). Recent studies have identified
a positive link between trust and online/offline bonding social capital (e.g., Bouchillon,
2014; Phua et al., 2017) but other studies have failed to corroborate the finding (e.g.,
Growiec & Growiec, 2014). Similarly, some researchers identified a positive correlation
between generalized trust and online/offline bridging social capital (e.g., Growiec &
Growiec, 2014; Mou & Lin, 2017), whereas other scholars did not find a positive
association (e.g., Bouchillon, 2014).

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Previous studies also found that generalized social trust was positively related to
civic engagement (e.g., Brown, Hoye, & Nicholson, 2014; Valenzuela et al., 2009; Warren
et al., 2015; Yang & DeHart, 2016b). However, other studies could not find a strong
positive link between general trust and civic engagement (e.g., Bekkers, 2012; van Ingen
& Bekkers; 2015). While researchers identified a weak, positive influence of social trust on
political participation (e.g., Burns & Kinder, 2000; Matthes, 2013), others contradicted the
connection of social trust and political participation (e.g., Uslaner & Brown, 2005; Yang &
DeHart, 2016b). Thus, we posed the following question:
R2: How does U.S. college students’ online general social trust predict their (a)
online social capital, (b) online political participation, (c) offline political participation, and
(d) offline civic engagement?

METHODS
An online survey was developed and fielded via Qualtrics.com on November 9, 2016
to recruit participants among college students at 14 higher education institutions in a
southeastern battleground state in the United States. The use of a college student sample
is appropriate because well-educated young adults are more likely to use social media
(Greenwood et al., 2016). Young voters probably cast the decisive votes in 2008 and 2012
Presidential elections (Pew Research Center, 2012). CIRCLE (2016) estimated that about
23.7 million young voters (50% of U.S. citizens ages 18-29) participated in the 2016
presidential election.
In October, we requested 27,358 email addresses from 14 public state universities.
After the initial contact of those prospective participants, 27,305 accounts were found to be
valid because of 49 bounces and clerical errors. Two prizes of a $50 Amazon gift card were
announced to encourage student participation in our survey and a random drawing. After
two reminders at a six-day interval, the survey was closed on November 23. Although
4,808 responses were received in 14 days, 3,810 cases were retained with little missing
data. The response rate is 17.6%, whereas the completion rate is 13.95%, comparable to
that of similar online surveys (e.g., Valenzuela et al., 2009; van Veen, Göritz, & Sattler,
2016).
The questionnaire consists of 64 questions including one measure of Facebook use
(Ellison et al., 2007), a four-item scale of political use of Facebook developed by the

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authors based on Pew surveys on social media and political engagement, one measure of
online trust (Valenzuela et al., 2009), a seven-item scale of political self-efficacy (Niemi et
al., 1991), a ten-item scale of online bonding and bridging social capitals (Williams, 2016),
a six-item scale of online political participation (Gil de Zúñiga et al., 2012), an eight-item
scale of offline political participation (Gil de Zúñiga et al. 2012), and a five-item scale of
offline civic engagement (Gil de Zúñiga et al. 2012). Finally, a three-item scale of political
ideology was also tapped (Lerman, Mccabe, & Sadin, 2015). All major scales are shown in
the Appendix.

RESULTS
The majority of 3,810 survey participants was female (70.7%) and white (59.2%)
with 81% of them aged 18-29 (mean = 24.8). Their family annual income was quite evenly
distributed. There were more light and medium users of Facebook than heavy users and
non-users among our participants: 70.2% of them reported to have spent less than 2 hours
using Facebook daily.
The reliability of 8 multi-item scales is satisfactory with all Cronbach values higher
than 0.70 (Nunnally & Bernstein, 1994): political use of Facebook (0.864), online bonding
social capital (0.798), online bridging social capital (0.895) political self-efficacy (0.760),
political ideology (0.907), online political participation (0.876), offline participation (0.890)
and civic engagement (0.715). In addition, the Average Variance Explained (AVE) of 6
constructs exceeded the recommended level of 0.50 (Fornell & Larcker, 1981), including
political use of Facebook (0.634), online bridging social capital (0.640), political self-
efficacy (0.760), political ideology (0.773), online participation (0.558), and offline
participation (0.520). Results of a confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) demonstrated that
the measurement model achieved satisfactory fit. All global fitness indexes have met four
conventional standards and a new standard: the normed chi-square (4.98, df = 607) in the
range of 1-5, the Root Mean Square Error of Approximation (RMSEA = 0.032) ≤ 0.06,
Tucker-Lewis Index (TLI = 0.963) ≥ 0.95, Comparative Fit Index (CFI = 0.968) ≥ 0.95
(Byrne, 2010; Hu & Bentler, 1999), and Standardized Root Mean Square Residual (SRMR
= 0.0424) ≤ 0.05 (Niemand & Mai, 2018). Thus, the measurement model was retained for
model testing with structural equation modeling (SEM).

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Partial correlations of 11 key variables were calculated and shown in Table 1 (see
Appendix) for future validation and meta-analysis. Hierarchical multiple regression
modeling was also used to determine what demographic, psychological and behavioral
factors predict U.S. college students’ online and offline political participation, civic
engagement, online social capital and political use of social media. The results are
presented in Tables 2-3. Five sets of multicollinearity statistics demonstrated that
multicollinearity was not a problem with the independent variables in all regression
models, as no tolerance was below .35 and no variance inflation factor (VIF) was higher
than 3 (Cohen, Cohen, West, & Aiken, 2003). The common method bias was first checked
by performing Harman’s one-factor test. Our principle component factor analysis of all
items measuring 11 key constructs did not yield one factor solution and no factor emerged
to account for most of the covariance among measures. Due to several limitations of
Harman’s single-factor test (Podsakoff et al., 2003), we conducted a full collinearity
assessment recommended by Kock (2015). We used WarpPLS to construct and test a SEM
model in which 11 key latent variables predicted a dummy variable with random values.
We found that VIF values ranged from 1.014 to 1.872. All the values are below the
suggested VIF threshold of 3.3 (Kock & Lynn, 2012). Based on the results of the two tests,
we concluded that common methods bias was not an issue in this study.
H1, H2 and H3 were firmly supported by the hierarchical regression results shown
in Table 2. As shown in Table 3, H4 was supported firmly. Results in Table 3 strongly
supported H5.
As demonstrated by Table 2, H6a was not supported, regarding the political use of
Facebook as a predictor of U.S. college students’ online political participation. H6b was
supported, as the political use of Facebook positively predicted their offline political
participation. H6c was rejected because students’ political use of Facebook was not a
positive predictor of their civic engagement.
H7a was evidently supported as our participants’ online social capital positively
predicted their political use of Facebook (see Table 3). H7b and H7c were rejected, whereas
H7d was supported by results in Table 2.

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The hypotheses concerning political self-efficacy were tested by Tables 2-3. H8a,
H8c and H8d were all supported but H8b was rejected by the findings.
Results in Table 2 were used to answer three research questions about the general
use of Facebook. No evidence supported any positive influence of general Facebook use on
online/offline political participation, and civic engagement. Conversely, general Facebook
use was identified as a negative predictor of civic engagement.
We examined the results in Tables 2-3 (see Appendix) to answer the last four
research questions about the influence of online general social trust. We found online trust
to be a strong positive predictor of students’ online social capital in Table 3. Table 2
revealed that online trust positively predicted students’ online political participation but
had no influence on offline political participation and civic engagement.
Figures 1-3 have displayed three best fitting Facebook models to predict U.S. college
students’ online & offline political participation, and civic engagement when demographic
and other control variables were not included. The covariance-based SEM (CB-SEM) with
maximum likelihood estimation was adopted via AMOS 22 to identify these three best
fitting models after testing many alternative models nested within the proposed model.
After allowing reasonable error terms to correlate, these three models had all yielded
satisfactory fit: their normed chi-square values are below 5, their RMSEAs < 0.06, their
TLIs > 0.95, their CFIs > 0.95 (Byrne, 2010; Hu & Bentler, 1999), and their SRMR < 0.05
(Niemand & Mai, 2018). Hence, these three models were retained and recommended for
validation by future researchers.

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Figure 1. The tested model of Facebook use, political and civic engagement (predicting online political
participation). Note. N = 3,810. Significance of the standardized path estimates are shown in parentheses
(critical ratio). †p < .10, *p < .05, **p < .01, ns = not significant, n/a = not applicable. Model fit: χ2 = 3352.76,
df = 684, p = .000; χ2/df = 4.902; RMSEA = 0.032; TLI = 0.961; CFI = 0.966; SRMR = 0.0385. The dotted
paths were removed.

Figure 2. The tested model of Facebook use, political and civic engagement (predicting offline political
participation). Note. N = 3,810. Significance of the standardized path estimates are shown in parentheses
(critical ratio). †p < .10, *p < .05, **p < .01, ns = not significant, n/a = not applicable. Model fit: χ2 = 3138.26,
df = 679, p = .000; χ2/df = 4.622; RMSEA = 0.031; TLI = 0.964; CFI = 0.969; SRMR = 0.0382. The dotted
paths were removed.

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Figure 3. The tested model of Facebook use, political participation and civic engagement (predicting civic
engagement). Note. N = 3,810. Significance of the standardized path estimates are shown in parentheses
(critical ratio). †p < .10, *p < .05, **p < .01, ns = not significant, n/a = not applicable. Model fit: χ2 = 3214.25,
df = 680, p = .000; χ2/df = 4.727; RMSEA = 0.031; TLI = 0.963; CFI = 0.968; SRMR = 0.0387. The dotted
paths were removed.

DISCUSSION AND IMPLICATIONS

We examined the influence of the general use and political use of Facebook on U.S.
college students’ online/offline political participation, and civic engagement over and above
four demographic variables and six control variables, and mediated by online social
capital, political self-efficacy, and online trust in Election 2016. We also investigated the
predictors of political use of Facebook and online social capital. This study offers four
major findings on the impact of Facebook usage on political participation and civic
engagement, among other things. First, the general use of Facebook has a small, negative
effect on U.S. college students’ online/offline political participation and civic engagement
over and above six control variables and four demographic variables.
Second, the political use of Facebook is a much more important and positive
predictor than the general use of Facebook for our participants’ online/offline political
participation and civic engagement even after controlling for six relevant variables and

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four demographic variables. Third, the general use of Facebook does not influence our
respondents’ online/offline political participation but its small, negative effect on civic
engagement persists in the final model. Finally, the positive impact of the political use of
Facebook on students’ offline participation endures but its positive effect on online
participation and civic engagement is subsumed by offline political participation in the
final model. Our findings carry important implications for political scientists,
communication scholars, political strategists, campaign organizers, and politicians. We
explain the implications of each finding in further detail below.
We provided additional empirical evidence to support the close, positive
relationships of online political participation, offline political participation, and offline
civic engagement. We identified a strong bi-directional influence between online political
participation and offline political participation in our 2016 survey data, which is
consistent with previous studies (e.g., Jung et al., 2011; Metzger et al., 2015; Valenzuela et
al., 2012; Vitak et al., 2011; Yang & DeHart, 2016b). Our study also revealed a strong bi-
directional influence of offline political participation and civic engagement and a weak but
positive bi-directional influence of online political participation and civic engagement,
corroborating past research (e.g., Hargittai & Shaw, 2013; Wicks et al., 2014). These
relationships did not change from 2012 to 2016 (see previous studies of Election 2012).
Our findings suggest that, for college students, online political participation may enhance
offline political participation sometimes, whereas, their offline political participation can
often extend into cyberspace. Offline civic engagement is more likely to lead to offline
political participation than online political participation. Offline political participation is a
better predictor of offline civic engagement than is online political participation. Political
campaign organizers, educators, and policy makers should encourage college students to
participate in political and civic activities offline. If students are willing to invest their
time, energy and resources on political and social causes in person, they will be valuable
assets for political and social movements, and will be more likely to become influential
opinion leaders and mobilizers online.
We discovered that U.S. college students’ Facebook use contributed to their online
social capital, which in turn facilitated their political use of Facebook. Our findings
substantiated that the SNS use, especially Facebook, can increase one’s online social

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 Social Media and Election 2016

capital, the claim of previous studies (e.g., Ellison et al., 2007; Liu et al., 2016). More
importantly, we found that U.S. college students’ online social capital led to their political
use of Facebook, whereas political use of Facebook benefited their online social capital.
This suggests that U.S. college students may be emboldened to discuss political/social
issues on Facebook after accumulating considerable online social capital. Perhaps political
interactions on Facebook have become increasingly acceptable in the echo chamber of
Facebook friends. These political interactions among like-minded people on Facebook may
enrich their online social capital.
This study does not support the positive influence of online social capital on U.S.
college student’s online/offline political participation, although it shows that online social
capital positively predicted their civic engagement. The findings are inconsistent with
some previous studies (e.g., Gibson & McAllister, 2013; Valenzuela et al., 2012; Warren et
al., 2015; Zhong, 2014) but corroborate other studies (e.g., Collins et al., 2014; Gil de
Zúñiga et al., 2012; Yang & DeHart, 2016b). The findings suggest that rich online capital
of U.S. college students does not directly leads to their active online and offline political
participation. Although some college students have thousands of online friends from
different walks of life, these social contacts do not automatically transform them into
political activists online or offline. On the other hand, students with plenty of online social
capital are more likely to share political news or information, respond to or comment on
political posts, and urge their friends to vote on Facebook. The mixed results suggest that
college students’ broad online social networks may benefit online casual political
communications and civic engagement. Loose online social ties may facilitate offline social
activism of college students. It is also likely that students who actively engage in civic
activities will have a broader online social network than others.
We found that the general use of Facebook did not positively predict online/offline
political participation and civic engagement of U.S. college students in 2016, consistent
with previous studies of Election 2012 (e.g., Yang & DeHart, 2016a). It is further evidence
to support the time displacement theory that many heavy users of Facebook spend too
much time and energy building social relationships with their online friends so that they
have to neglect political participation and civic engagement. In fact, Facebook use
negatively predicted their online/offline political participation and civic engagement after

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controlling for four demographic variables and six control variables. Its negative effect on
civic engagement persists in the final model. Just like Putnam (2000) blamed TV being
partly responsible for the strange disappearance of social capital, we may blame the heavy
use of social media for political and civic disengagement among digitally savvy youths.
Indeed, many studies could not find any positive influence of social media use on political
participation (e.g., Baumgartner & Morris 2010; Carlisle & Patton, 2013; Groshek &
Dimitrova, 2011; Hyun & Kim, 2015). Our findings suggest that political communicators,
campaign organizers, and fund-raisers should not target messages to heavy users of
Facebook unless they frequently use Facebook for social and political purposes.
Our survey has validated the positive influence of the political use of Facebook on
online/offline political participation and civic engagement over and above four
demographic variables and six control variables, as shown in previous studies (e.g., Bode
et al., 2014; Gil de Zúñiga et al., 2012, Yamamoto et al., 2015; Yang & DeHart, 2016b). In
addition, the direct effect of the political use of Facebook on offline political participation
endures even after online participation and civic engagement are entered into the
regression model. Finally, we found that the number of political figures followed on
Facebook positively predicted U.S. college students’ online and offline participation,
whereas Facebook friends positively predicted their civic engagement. It is hard for a
cross-sectional survey to determine whether their political use of Facebook preceded
offline political participation or whether their offline political activities extended into
Facebook. Likely, those Facebook discussants and followers of political figures are more
interested in politics than others. They might have been more involved participants in
political activities on and off the campus before they took their political causes to
Facebook. Nevertheless, the correlation between the political use of Facebook and offline
political participation proves to be consistently positive and stable over time. Therefore,
we recommend that political campaign organizers tailor messages to online adults who
tend to use social media for political purposes. It will be more effective and efficient to
reach out to those online political participants through social media than others as it is
more likely to convert them into political mobilizers, volunteers, activists, and donors in
reality. Political campaigns could also utilize them as viral agents by feeding mobilizing
messages to these political actors on social media.

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 Social Media and Election 2016

It is not surprising to find that U.S. college students’ political self-efficacy positively
predicted their political use of Facebook, offline political participation, and civic
engagement in 2016. The result has confirmed that political self-efficacy can encourage
traditional political participation and civic engagement as shown in many studies (e.g.,
Chan, 2014; Chan & Guo, 2013; Scheufele & Nisbet, 2002; Zhong, 2014). However, our
survey did not identify political self-efficacy as a positive predictor of online political
participation, inconsistent with past research (e.g., Gil de Zúñiga et al., 2012; Jensen,
2013; Jordan et al., 2015; Jung et al., 2011; Yang & DeHart, 2016a). It is possible that the
effect of political self-efficacy on online political participation was fully mediated by offline
political participation, civic engagement and political use of Facebook. We found that
political self-efficacy positively predicted the political use of Facebook. This means that
college students will participate in politics casually via Facebook, and get involved in
offline political and civic activities if they have adequate knowledge, interests, and faith in
participatory democracy and electoral politics. If educators and parents keep college
students well-informed about political and social issues, and if campaign organizers and
fund raisers bring relevant issues to the attention of college students, the students may be
motivated to take political actions online and offline. Moreover, if we convince students
that they can make a difference regarding political and social issues, they may become
politically active and civically engaged.
Interestingly, the online social trust of U.S. college students served as a positive
predictor of their online political participation but failed to predict their offline political
participation and civic engagement. In addition, their online trust positively contributed to
their online social capital. Confirming some studies (e.g., Bouchillon, 2014; Burns &
Kinder, 2000; Phua, Jin, & Kim, 2017; Matthes, 2013), our results are inconsistent with
other studies (e.g., Brown et al., 2014; Warren et al., 2015; Uslaner & Brown, 2005; Yang
& DeHart, 2016b). Our results suggest that online social trust is a distinct construct,
compared to offline social trust, and that two kinds of trust influence online/offline
political participation and offline civic engagement differently. It is likely that building
online social trust can encourage online political participation among U.S. college
students.

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Our additional findings on the influence of demographics and control variables

suggest that that it will be more cost-efficient and effective to focus political messages on
minority and/or younger college students to encourage offline political participation.
Online campaigns may work better for male and/or older college students, as they reported
more active online political participation than their female and younger counterparts. It is
good to know that social media can be used to reach male and older college students. To
recruit change agents for social causes, we should consider female and/or white and/or
older college students with higher family income in the U.S. Moreover, community
organizers and social activists should solicit the help of Facebook users with broad social
networks for their campaigns to expand their marketing reach online/offline. Political
ideology negatively predicted U.S. college students’ online/offline political participation
and civic engagement after controlling four demographic variables and 7 predictors,
whereas liberal students seem to be more likely to use Facebook for political purposes
than conservative students.

LIMITATIONS
Despite the contributions made by this paper, it suffers from a few limitations that
can be addressed in future studies on this topic. First, since we used a survey to gather
data, it is likely that more politically engaged participants were interested in taking the
survey. As a result, the sample might be skewed to reflect the opinions of those college
students who are more interested in politics on Facebook. Subsequent studies could avoid
this by using field experiments that can better replicate real-world settings. Future
researchers could also utilize a bigger, random sample across the country to strengthen
external validity. More male students could be included in the sample, as women were
overrepresented in our sample. New research should examine other social media platforms
such as Twitter, and other important factors that influence online/offline political
participation and civic engagement, such as political interest, political knowledge, and
partisanship. Our data analyses are based on a cross-sectional survey data and this study
is correlational by nature. Hence, longitudinal panel studies are also recommended to
establish causality.

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 Social Media and Election 2016

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Zhang, W., Seltzer, T., & Bichard, S. L. (2013). Two sides of the coin: Assessing the
influence of social network site use during the 2012 U.S. Presidential campaign.
Social Science Computer Review, 31(5), 542-551.
Zhong, Z. (2014). Civic engagement among educated Chinese youth: The role of SNS
(Social Networking Services), bonding and bridging social capital. Computers &
Education, 75, 263-273.

Funding and Acknowledgements

The authors declare no funding sources or conflicts of interest.

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 Social Media and Election 2016

Appendix: UNC 2016 Survey on Social Media and Civic Engagement

Facebook On a typical day, about how much time do you spend on Facebook?
Usage1 (1) 0. (2) 1-30 minutes. (3) 30 minutes - 1 hour. (4) 1- 1.5 hours. (5) 1.5-2
hours. (6) 2-2.5 hours. (7) 2.5-3 hours. (8) 3-3.5 hours. (9) 3.5-4 hours.
(10) 4-4.5 hours (11) 4.5-5 hours (12) More than 5 hours.
Facebook About how many total Facebook friends do you have?
Friends2 (1) 0. (2) 1-50 friends. (3) 51-100 friends. (4) 101-150 friends. (5) 151-200
friends. (6) 251-300 friends. (7) 351-400 friends. (8) 451-500 friends. (9)
501-550 friends. (10) 551-600 friends. (11) 601-650 friends. (12) 651-700
friends. (13) 701-750 friends. (14) 751-800 friends. (15) 801-850 friends.
(16) 851-900 friends. (17) More than 900 friends.
Political Figures How many political figures have you befriended on Facebook? Such as
Befriended on present and past presidents, presidential candidates, senators,
Facebook3 congressmen, news commentators, journalists, and activists etc.
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23,
24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, more than 30
Political Use of 1. On Facebook, how often did you share anything about political issues
Facebook4 (such as a photo, video or an article etc.) in 2016?
(1) Never. (2) Rarely. (3) Sometimes. (4) Usually. (5) Always.
2. How often did you respond to your friends’ posts about any political
issues on Facebook by clicking “like” or other emojis in 2016?
(1) Never. (2) Rarely. (3) Sometimes. (4) Usually. (5) Always.
3. How often did you comment on your friends’ posts about any political
issue on Facebook in 2016?
(1)Never. (2) Rarely. (3) Sometimes. (4) Usually. (5) Always.
4. How often did you encourage your friends to vote on Facebook in 2016?
(1)Never. (2) Rarely. (3) Sometimes. (4) Usually. (5) Always.
Online Bonding 1. There are several people online I trust to help solve my problems.
Social Capital5 2. There is someone online I can turn to for advice about making very
important decisions.
3. There is someone online who I can turn to for an emergency loan of
$500.
4. The people I interact with online would put their reputation on the line
for me.
5. I do not know people online well enough to get them to do anything
important. (reversely coded)
Online Bridging 1. Interacting with people online makes me feel connected to the bigger
Social Capital6 picture.
2. Interacting with people online makes me curious about other places in
the world.
3. Interacting with people online makes me want to try new things.
4. Interacting with people online makes me interested in things that
happen outside of my town.
5. Interacting with people online makes me feel like part of a larger
community.
General Online Generally speaking, I would say that people online can be trusted.
Social Trust7

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Political 1. Regarding political issues, where would you place yourself on a

Ideology8 scale from 1 to 10 where 1 means overall very politically liberal and 10
means overall very politically conservative?
(1) 1 (2) 2. (3). 3 (4).4. (5). 5. (6) 6. (7) 7. (8) 8. (9) 9. (10). 10
2. Regarding social issues, where would you place yourself on a scale
from 1 to 10 where 1 means overall very socially liberal and 10 means
overall very socially conservative?
(1) 1 (2) 2. (3). 3 (4).4. (5). 5. (6) 6. (7) 7. (8) 8. (9) 9. (10). 10
3. Regarding economic issues, where would you place yourself on a
scale from 1 to 10 where 1 means overall very economically liberal and
10 means overall very economically conservative?
(1) 1 (2) 2. (3). 3 (4).4. (5). 5. (6) 6. (7) 7. (8) 8. (9) 9. (10). 10
Political Self- 1. I consider myself well-qualified to participate in politics.
efficacy9 2. I feel that I have a pretty good understanding of the important political
issues facing our country.
3. I feel that I could do as good a job in public office as most other people.
4. I think that I am better informed about politics and government than
most people.
5. Sometimes, politics and government seem so complicated that a person
like me can’t really understand what's going on.
6. People like me don’t have any say about what the government does.
(reversely coded)
7. I don’t think public officials care about what people like me think.
(reversely coded)
Online Political During 2016, how often have you participated in the following activities
Participation110 online?
1. Written to a politician online
2. Made a campaign contribution online
3. Participated in a political listserv you subscribed
4. Signed up to volunteer for a campaign online
5. Sent a political message via email
6. Written a letter to the editor of a news website
(1)Never. (2) Once or twice in a year. (3) About once a month. (4) Several
times a month, but not every week. (5) About once a week. (6) Several
times a week. (7) Every day.

Civic During 2016, how often have you participated in the following activities
Engagement11 offline?
1. Done voluntary work for nonpolitical groups
2. Raised money for charity
3. Attended a meeting to discuss neighborhood problems
4. Purchased products for the social values advocated by the company
5. Boycotted a certain product or service because you disagreed with
the social values of the company
(1) Never. (2) Once or twice in a year. (3) About once a month. (4)
Several times a month, but not every week. (5) About once a week.
(6) Several times a week. (7) Every day.
Offline Political During 2016, how often have you participated in the following activities
Participation12 offline?
1. Attended a public hearing, town hall meeting, or city council

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 Social Media and Election 2016

meeting
2. Called or sent a letter to an elected public official
3. Spoken to a public official in person
4. Posted a political sign, banner, button or bumper sticker
5. Attended a political rally
6. Participated in any demonstrations, protests, or marches
7. Participated in groups that took any local action for social or
political reform
8. Been involved in public interest groups, political action groups,
political clubs, or party committees
(1) Never. (2) Once or twice in a year. (3) About once a month. (4) Several
times a month, but not every week. (5) About once a week. (6) Several
times a week. (7) Every day.
Note: All response options ranged from 1, “strongly disagree” to 7, “strongly agree” if not provided.
1, 2 Adapted from Ellison et al. (2007).
3 Developed by the authors based on previous studies.
4 Developed by the authors based on Pew surveys on political uses of social media.
5, 6 Adopted from Williams (2006).
7 Adapted from Valenzuela et al. (2009).
8 Adopted from Lerman, Mccabe, & Sadin (2015)
9 Adopted from Niemi et al. (1991).
10, 11, 12 Adapted from Gil de Zúñiga et al. (2012).

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Table 1

Partial correlation matrix of key variables with four demographic variables controlled

Facebook Use Facebook Political Political Use of Online Online Trust Political Self- Political Online Offline Civic
Friends Figures Facebook Social efficacy Ideology participatio Participation Engagement
Capital n
Facebook Use __

Facebook friends .311*** __

Political Figures followed on .225*** .223*** __

FK

Political Use of Facebook .386*** .294*** .372*** __

Online Social Capital .187*** .144*** .165*** .345** __

Online General Social Trust .106*** .063*** .082*** .218*** .542*** __

Political Self-efficacy .022 .053** .196*** .298*** .161*** .128*** __

Political Ideology -.017 .031 -.045** -.152*** -.151*** -.133*** -.025 __

Online Political .058*** .076*** .238*** .266*** .125*** .152*** .198*** -.102*** __
Participation

Offline Political .070*** .119*** .261*** .351*** .160*** .151*** .274*** -.114*** .714*** __
Participation

Offline Civic Engagement .031 .117*** .200*** .267*** .157*** .111*** .228*** -.089*** .493*** .630*** __

Note. N = 3,810. * p < 0.05. ** p < 0.01. *** p < 0.001.

Page 275
Table 2

Factors predicting US college students’ online & offline political participation, and civic engagement in Election 2016
Predictors of online political participation Collinearity Predictors of offline political participation Collinearity Predictors of offline civic engagement Collinearity
Statistics Statistics Statistics
Model 1 Model 2 Model 3 Model 4 Model 1 Model 2 Model 3 Model 4 Model 1 Model 2 Model 3 Model 4
Variable β β β β Tolerance VIF β β β β Tolerance VIF β β β β Tolerance VIF
Gender -.057*** -.087*** -.066*** -.048*** .946 1.057 -.013 -.052** -.029 -.002 .942 1.062 .030 .003 .020 .041** .944 1.059
Race .075*** .052** .065*** .010 .890 1.123 .096*** .067*** .086*** .060*** .898 1.114 -.017 -.037* -.020 -.072*** .897 1.115
Age .078*** .070*** .055*** .056*** .913 1.095 .019 .008 -.007 -.052*** .914 1.094 .064*** .056*** .052** .050*** .911 1.097
Family Income -.014 .010 .000 -.003 .895 1.117 -.012 .019 .001 -.011 .896 1.116 .032 .054** .035* .034** .897 1.115
Facebook Use -.054** -.055** .003 .746 1.340 -.078*** -.078*** -.019 .747 1.339 -.086*** -.095*** -.048** .749 1.336
Facebook Friends .000 -.023 .804 1.243 .029 .010 .804 1.244 .058** .042** .805 1.242
Political Figures Followed on .157*** .059*** .811 1.233 .139*** .026* .808 1.238 .103*** .015 .807 1.240
FK
Political Use of Facebook .291*** .180*** .000 .581 1.721 .387*** .256*** .105*** .591 1.691 .306*** .181*** .028 .581 1.720
Online Social Capital -.034 -.030* .637 1.570 -.012 -.011 .636 1.572 .047* .057*** .638 1.566
Online General Social Trust .102*** .057*** .697 1.435 .068*** .010 .694 1.441 .020 -.026 .694 1.440
Political Self-efficacy .108*** -.010 .818 1.222 .166*** .063*** .825 1.212 .146*** .048*** .821 1.219
Political Ideology -.058*** -.015 .929 1.077 -.061*** -.015 .929 1.077 -.048** -.011 .928 1.077
Offline Civic Engagement .070*** .589 1.697 .334*** .713 1.402 ___ ___ ___
Online Political Participation ___ ___ ___ .504*** .705 1.419 .087*** .476 2.100
Offline Political Participation .653*** .544 1.839 ___ ___ ___ .535*** .445 2.250
R2 .016 .088 .134 .527 .011 .137 .191 .635 .006 .083 .124 .414
F(df) for change in R2 150.39(2)*** 33.62(6)*** 1575.9 (2)*** 279.5 (2)*** 42.16 (6)*** 2304.86 (2)*** 159.48 (2)*** 29.35(6)*** 941.33 (2)***
Note. Hierarchical multiple regression results. N = 3,810. *p < .05. **p < .01. *** p < .001. Gender was dummy coded as 1 = male and 2 = female. Race was dummy coded as 1 = whites and 2 = non-whites.

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Table 3
Factors predicting US college students’ online social capital and political use of Facebook in Election 2016
Predictors of online social capital Collinearity Statistics Predictors of political use of Facebook Collinearity Statistics

Model 1 Model 2 Model 3 Model 4 Model 1 Model 2 Model 3 Model 4

Variable β β β β Tolerance VIF β β β β Tolerance VIF
Gender .048** -.003 .010 .006 .942 1.062 .129*** .074*** .080*** .081*** .952 1.051
Race -.010 -.048** -.037** -.032* .891 1.122 .096*** .050*** .069*** .052*** .894 1.119
Age -.059*** -.065*** -.046** -.046** .911 1.098 .031 .039** .031* .030* .909 1.100
Family Income -.044** -.009 -.013 -.015 .896 1.116 -.098*** -.070*** -.077*** -.074*** .903 1.107
Facebook Use .053** .046** .048** .748 1.336 .279*** .256*** .259*** .817 1.224
Facebook Friends .032 .041** .038** .805 1.242 .146*** .134*** .121*** .820 1.219
Political Figures Followed on .033* .030* .032* .807 1.238 .271*** .203*** .167*** .839 1.192
FB
Political Use of Facebook .310*** .185*** .185*** .600 1.668 ____ ____ ____ ____
Online Social Capital ____ ____ ____ ____ .177*** .169*** .657 1.523
Online General Social Trust .479*** .481*** .928 1.078 .027 .013 .694 1.441
Political Self-efficacy .036* .034* .819 1.221 .210*** .168*** .852 1.174
Political Ideology -.058*** -.058*** .933 1.072 -.105*** -.089*** .940 1.064
Online Political Participation -.040* .474 2.111 .000 .473 2.113
Offline Political Participation -.019 .365 2.738 .167*** .372 2.690
Offline Civic Engagement .062*** .588 1.701 .028 .586 1.706
R2 .007 .131 .361 .364 .045 .286 .390 .419
F(df) for change in R2 135.33 (4)*** 455.24(3)*** 5.70 (3)** 429.66 (3)*** 160.80(4)*** 63.74 (3)***
Note. Hierarchical multiple regression results. N = 3,810. *p < .05. **p < .01. *** p < .001. Gender was dummy coded as 1 = male and 2 = female. Race was dummy coded as 1 = whites and 2 = non-whites.

The Journal of Social Media in Society, Vol. 9, No. 2