New research shows that a person’s ideological leaning might affect what videos YouTube’s algorithms recommend to them. For right-leaning users, video recommendations are more likely to come from channels that share political extremism, conspiracy theories and otherwise problematic content.

YouTube Video Recommendations Lead to More Extremist Content for Right-Leaning Users, Researchers Suggest::New research shows that a person’s ideological leaning might affect what videos YouTube’s algorithms recommend to them. For right-leaning users, video recommendations are more likely to come from channels that share political extremism, conspiracy theories and otherwise problematic content.

  • flying_gel@lemmy.worldEnglish
    37·
    2 years ago

    I’m not sure it’s just right leaning users. I’m pretty far to the left and I keep ketting anti-trans, anti-covid right wing talking points quite frequently. I keep pressing thumbs down but they keep coming.

    • Stovetop@lemmy.worldEnglish
      18·
      2 years ago

      What YouTube sees:

      “These videos keep eliciting reactions from users, which means that they prefer to engage with this content. This bodes well for our advertisers.”

    • whenigrowup356@lemmy.worldEnglish
      1·
      2 years ago

      Yeah I’ve gotten similar results too. Fwiw, I don’t think downvoting is a good way to change your results. It seems to key into any interaction at all and also watch time. As soon as I see certain people I started just swiping immediately