15:30 - 17:45
Thursday-Panel
Chair/s:
Simon Friedrich Ellerbrock
Discussant/s:
Simon Friedrich Ellerbrock
Meeting Room P

Manuel Neumann
Who Wants to Talk? Gender Differences in Motivation to Engage in Everyday Political Talk

Simon Ellerbrock
What Drives us Apart? Disentangling Political Dissimilarities as Impediments to Political Conversations among Ordinary Citizens

David Moore
Start Spreading the (fake)News: Explaining how negative emotive language increases the spread of conspiracy theories online.

Monica Ferrin Pereira, Gema García-Albacete, Irene Sanchez-Vitores
Making time to be informed: A panel approach to the transition to adulthood and media consumption
Who Wants to Talk? Gender Differences in Motivation to Engage in Everyday Political Talk
Manuel Neumann
Mannheimer Centre for European Social Research, Universität Mannheim

Norms of deliberative democracy mandate the inclusion of all affected citizens in spheres of formal and informal political discourses. However, previous research has identified substantive differences in participation between citizens, including differences between men and women. While these differences have been thoroughly investigated in spheres of formal political discussions, we know very little about men and women’s behavior regarding everyday political talk. Since participation in informal political talk is mainly limited by individuals’ autonomous choices to engage in it, this study focuses on individuals’ willingness to do so. As previous research has shown, their willingness is dependent on individuals’ motivation, based on their political interest, knowledge-seeking, and internal efficacy, as well as the strength of their relationship to discussion partners. In this study, I present to what degree we can observe differences in the willingness of men and women to talk about politics to strong or weak ties and investigate whether differences in motivations account for the gaps. Drawing on a unique data set from a local face-to-face survey concerning the deliberative practices of citizens in Germany, I show that women are more reluctant to talk about politics than men, especially in respect to discussions with weak-tie counterparts. While the gap disappears for talk with strong-tie counterparts when motivational factors are taken into account, it remains pronounced in respect to weak ties. The results help us to assess the role gender plays in everyday political talk and to what degree this poses a challenge for the norms of deliberative democracy.