The opinions are much more radical on social media than on other media. This leads to people getting stronger opinions, but not in an informative way, more emotionally. The difference between the different sides opinions (vänster och högern) getting more hateful on social media. For example, if you like the left (vänstern, left side in Swedish politics) more, then you hate the right (Högern, right side Swedish politics) more. It’s less focus on political facts and more focus to get people to one side. 

Different parties are using feelings and emotions in their content to affect the younger generation, so they get engagement and start to get opinions. They have more extreme content to evoke feelings, which then shapes people’s opinions. If you stay on the video, does it cause the algorithm to show you more videos afterwards. Younger people and teenagers believe in these videos, information and content because their brain have not finished developing, which makes it harder for them to be critical of sources. People are more easily influenced and more likely to believe things when the party itself post things on social media because it seems more real since it’s from a “true source”. Now when AI is used a lot, is it even harder to know what’s true or not.

I have interviewed some teenagers at the age of 16-18. This is what one girl has said about some examples of deceptive and emotionally manipulative content och social media.

- I have seen different videos on TikTok when there is a slideshow and it says “your political party, your personality and look”. In the slideshow, it was ugly and negative things about Social demokraterna and there was good and positive stuff about Moderaterna and Sverige Demokraterna. I think this makes younger people believe in these things and get affected by feelings, which make them like a party only for an emotional effect. I think they think that they don’t want to “be ugly”, so that’s why they starting to like a party. I think people don’t know what the different political parties stand for, since teenagers get most of their political facts and information from social media which is not the same as the information on the news and websites, said a 16-year-old girl.

Do you think or have noticed any difference between political information from social media and other media, like the news or a political debate?

- Yes, I believe that there is a quite big difference between the different media. I get most of my political information from social media and TikTok, and a bit from Aftonbladet (a news site) and other news sites. I think that it’s a bit similar politics on social media than on news sites. For example, Aftonbladet sometimes posts about politics on TikTok, but they can’t have their own opinions in that. However, when I get videos of a politician on TikTok, it’s more strong opinions and it’s more reasoning from one side. I think that you must see politics from both sides, before going down a certain path, said an 18-year-old girl.

Can you give an example of a content or video that you have seen that can affect kids and teenagers?

- Yes. One example is a model and an influencer who is very pretty. She posted many things about politics from the right side. She is telling things that are not true and extremely condescending about women. I think mostly young boys can get affected by what she’s telling because they find her sexy, and then they starting to like her political thoughts or parties only because she likes them, said the girl.

To summarize, it’s extremely important now to read about and educate yourself about the different parties before the election. Most important for the youngest age group, since they are new voters and TikTok is not the best source to get all information from.