Browsing by Author "Scherman, Andres"

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    "The more official, the less I believe": Using focus groups to explore public opinion formation in politically polarized contexts
    (2024) Pavez, Isabel; Saldana, Magdalena; Cabalin, Cristian; Scherman, Andres
    IntroductionPublic opinion studies have traditionally relied on survey analyses. However, a qualitative approach is needed to address opinion formation's multidimensional and contextual nature. In this study, we argue that focus groups are a technique that addresses these unique challenges.MethodsWe test this argument by looking at the case of Chile, a country marked by a streak of eight elections in three years, including two national referendums for a constitutional proposal. In this politically polarized setting, and over the course of the latter election year, we conducted 10 focus groups comprising a diverse sample in terms of gender, age, socioeconomic status, and occupation. As participants shared news diets, political views, and values, data suggest a tendency to independently verify information regardless of the source, and highly influenced by their close ones.ResultsFrom a methodological perspective, our findings show that focus groups enable the assessment of the context-situated opinion formation process, reveal emerging themes, and promote open discussion. These results also reflect the multifaceted nature of public opinion formation in a dynamic media landscape and can inform other countries undergoing a crisis of institutional legitimacy.
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    Youth environmental activism in the age of social media: the case of Chile (2009-2019)
    (ROUTLEDGE JOURNALS, TAYLOR & FRANCIS LTD, 2021) Scherman, Andres; Valenzuela, Sebastián; Rivera, Sebastian
    Between 2009 and 2019, Chile experienced the rise and fall of a powerful and influential environmental movement. This movement spurred massive protests against large-scale energy and mining projects, successfully blocking many of them. Although these demonstrations brought together people of all ages and backgrounds, youth were particularly active in advocating for the environment. As digital natives, young people may experiment with new ways of engaging in participatory actions, especially through social network sites, instant messaging and other social applications. We use data from the annual Youth, Participation, and Media Use surveys fielded between 2009 and 2019 to study the individual-level relationship between social media and environmental activism among young Chileans. As expected, we find that social media use is positively associated with participation in environmental issues. Nevertheless, this relationship is dynamic, gradually weakening over time. Thus, our results suggest that social media effects on environmental activism are contingent upon the specific stage of the protest cycle. We close with a discussion of the relevance of our findings as well as their limitations.