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This is, frankly, disgusting.
A new study from Dublin City University’s Anti-Bullying Centre shows that the recommender algorithms used by social media platforms are rapidly amplifying misogynistic and male supremacist content. The study, conducted by Professor Debbie Ging, Dr Catherine Baker and Dr Maja Andreasen, tracked, recorded and coded the content recommended to 10 experimental or ‘sockpuppet’ accounts on 10 blank smartphones – five on YouTube Shorts and five on TikTok. The researchers found that all of the male-identified accounts were fed masculinist, anti-feminist and other extremist content, irrespective of whether they sought out general or male supremacist-related content, and that they all received this content within the first 23 minutes of the experiment. Once the account showed interest by watching this sort of content, the amount rapidly increased. By the last round of the experiment (after 400 videos or two to three hours viewing), the vast majority of the content being recommended to the phones was toxic (TikTok 76% and YouTube Shorts 78%), primarily falling into the manosphere (alpha male and anti-feminist) category.
(tags: tiktok youtube hate misogyny dcu research social-media)