Seminario de Economía Regional y Políticas Públicas - Where do angry birds tweet? Income inequality and online hate in Italy
El Seminario de Economía Regional, Urbana y de Políticas Públicas del Banco de la República es un espacio para discutir trabajos en progreso en el ámbito de la economía regional, la economía urbana y/o el diseño de políticas públicas.
Alessandra Faggian: Profesora de Economía Aplicada, Gran Sasso Science Institute, L'Aquila (Italy)
Resumen del documento: Do spatial socioeconomic features influence a digital behaviour like cyberhate? Our contribution provides an answer to this question, showing how high levels of income inequality determine high volumes of hate tweets in Italy. Our findings are robust to potential endogeneity problems of income inequality, as well as to the inclusion of confounding factors and to competing estimation strategies. Additionally, we find that education does not act as a protective factor against cyberhate in unequal places, aligning with existing evidence showing that inequality may trigger intolerance, including among educated people, threatening the perceived stability of social positions. Also, in the Italian case, the perception of economic insecurity fuels cyberhate, alongside the transmission of self-interest values along family generations. The latter finding relates to existing evidence supporting the role of persistent social norms in shaping people’s attitudes.
Coautores: Daria Denti
Tiempo de exposición: 1 hora
Idioma de la exposición: Inglés
