5.1.2 Procedure
The procedure in Experiment 4 was identical to that of Experiment 1, except that only one TM appeared in the Twitter feed. It appeared in position 2 for each bias group, and the blue checkmark was Given the obvious preoccupation that participants had with negative TM content in Experiments 1 through 3, in Experiment 4 we looked at how positive and negative TMs impacted participants in the bias groups. Because people saw only one TM in this experiment, it was well suited for comparing the impact of positive and negative TMs. In the Pro-Morrison group, the TM could either be a pro-Morrison tweet (content: “Scott Morrison awarded an honorary doctorate from the University of Melbourne, in recognition for his humanitarian efforts during the Australian wildfires”) or an anti-Shorten tweet (content: “Bill Shorten charged with driving under the influence while vacationing in Adelaide”). In the Pro-Shorten group, the TM could either be a pro-Shorten tweet (content: “Bill Shorten has been nominated for The Innovation in Politics Award, which recognizes creative politicians who have the courage to break new ground to find innovative solutions for today’s challenges”) or an anti-Morrison tweet (content: “Scott Morrison caught spending taxpayer money on lush vacation in Mexico”); again, one or the other appeared at random.