Purpose

Traditionally, most readers' news access and consumption were based on direct intentional news seeking behavior. However, in recent years the emergence and popularization of social media platforms have enabled new opportunities for citizens to be incidentally informed about public affairs and politics as by-product of using these platforms. This article seeks to shed light on how socio-political conversation attributes may explain incidental exposure to information.

Design/methodology/approach

Drawing on US and UK survey data, the authors explore the role of political discussion and discussion network heterogeneity in predicting individuals' levels of incidental exposure to news. Furthermore, the authors also test the role of social media news use as a moderator. A hierarchical OLS regression analysis with incidental news exposure as dependent variable was conducted as well as analyses of moderation effects (heterogeneity*social media and political discussion*social media) using the PROCESS macro in SPSS.

Findings

Findings reveal that heterogeneous networks are positively related to incidental news exposure in the UK, while sheer level of political discussion is a positive influence over incidental news exposure in the US. Social media news use moderates the relationship between political discussion and incidental news exposure in the UK. That is, those who are highly exposed to news on social media and discuss less often about politics and public affairs, they tend to be incidentally exposed to news online the most. Meanwhile, the interaction of social media news and discussion heterogeneity showed significant results in the US with those exhibiting high levels of both also receiving the biggest share of INE.

Originality/value

This study contributes to closing research gaps regarding how and when people are inadvertently exposed to news in two Western societies. By highlighting that beyond the fate of algorithmic information treatment by social media platforms, discussion antecedents as well as social media news use play an integral part in predicting incidental news exposure, the study unravels fundamental conditions underlying the incidental news exposure phenomenon.

中文翻译：

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超越社交媒体新闻的使用算法：政治讨论和网络异质性如何澄清偶然的新闻曝光

目的

传统上，大多数读者的新闻访问和消费都是基于直接的有意新闻搜索行为。但是，近年来，社交媒体平台的出现和普及为公民提供了新的机会，使他们可以偶然地了解公共事务和政治，这是使用这些平台的副产品。本文旨在阐明社会政治对话属性如何解释偶然暴露于信息中的情况。

设计/方法/方法

作者利用美国和英国的调查数据，探讨了政治讨论和讨论网络异质性在预测个人偶然接触新闻的水平方面的作用。此外，作者还测试了社交媒体新闻作为主持人的作用。使用SPSS中的PROCESS宏，进行了以偶然新闻曝光为因变量的分层OLS回归分析，以及对调节效果（异质性*社交媒体和政治讨论*社交媒体）的分析。

发现

调查结果表明，异构网络与英国的偶然新闻曝光呈正相关，而纯粹的政治讨论水平则对美国的偶然新闻曝光具有积极影响。社交媒体新闻的使用可缓和英国政治讨论与偶然新闻曝光之间的关系。也就是说，那些在社交媒体上经常接触新闻并且很少讨论政治和公共事务的人，往往会在网络上偶然接触最多的新闻。同时，社交媒体新闻和讨论异质性之间的互动在美国显示出显著成果，同时表现出较高水平的社交媒体新闻和讨论也获得了INE的最大份额。

创意/价值

这项研究有助于缩小有关两个西方社会人们如何以及何时无意间接触新闻的研究空白。通过强调社交媒体平台进行算法信息处理的命运之外，讨论前因和社交媒体新闻的使用在预测偶然新闻曝光中起着不可或缺的作用，该研究揭示了偶然新闻曝光现象的基本条件。