Digital Platforms and Media Use: An Exploratory Research on Trust, Gender Stereotypes and Bias in Turkey

Abstract

Media use and news consumption occur throughout digital platforms as a rising trend worldwide. These digital infrastructures serve as channels through which users access content and as gatekeepers that curate the content figured by algorithmic selection. Thus, this research is designed to step inside the digital media use and aims to understand what kind of stereotypes and biases users face in digital platforms. To that end, a group of international university students from Turkey were interviewed about their experiences from several digital platforms. Accordingly, the participants were asked about the preferred source of the news, whether they trust the content they encounter on platforms, the stereotypes they face in their social media use, the most disturbing content in terms of bias and discrimination, if they feel free on their social media accounts, the awareness about the concepts “stereotypes”, “representation”, “algorithmic selection”, “algorithmic bias”. The research has shown that gender is the most common category of stereotype, followed by political, religious, nationality, and social class. In parallel with the concept of intersectionality, it has been observed that other forms of social discrimination are also encountered along with gender on digital platforms.