Shifts in U.S. Social Media Use, 2020-2024: Decline, Fragmentation, and Enduring Polarization
2025/10/29 by Petter Törnberg, Törnberg, Petter · 32 voices
#cs.CY
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.2510.25417
Abstract
Using nationally representative data from the 2020 and 2024 American National Election Studies (ANES), this paper traces how the U.S. social media landscape has shifted across platforms, demographics, and politics. Overall platform use has declined, with the youngest and oldest Americans increasingly abstaining from social media altogether. Facebook, YouTube, and Twitter/X have lost ground, while TikTok and Reddit have grown modestly, reflecting a more fragmented digital public sphere. Platform audiences have aged and become slightly more educated and diverse. Politically, most platforms have moved toward Republican users while remaining, on balance, Democratic-leaning. Twitter/X has experienced the sharpest shift: posting has flipped nearly 50 percentage points from Democrats to Republicans. Across platforms, political posting remains tightly linked to affective polarization, as the most partisan users are also the most active. As casual users disengage and polarized partisans remain vocal, the online public sphere grows smaller, sharper, and more ideologically extreme.
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Discussions
- Is social media dying? How much has Twitter changed as it became X? Which party now dominates the conversation? Using nationally representative ANES data from 2020 & 2024, I map how the U.S. social me [bsky, 860 points, 18 comments]
- Shifts in U.S. Social Media Use, 2020–2024: Decline, Fragmentation, Polarization (2025) [hn, 212 points, 209 comments]
- Across social media sites, political posting is tightly linked to affective #polarization - the most partisan users post the most As casual users disengage & polarized partisans remain vocal, the onli [bsky, 36 points, 2 comments]
- 2️⃣ New research by Petter Törnberg @pettertornberg.com reveals a striking trend: between 2020 and 2024, both the youngest and oldest Americans began logging off social media entirely. The result? A d [bsky, 20 points, 1 comments]
- Handy research paper that confirms that US social media has become much more right-wing, angry and old arxiv.org/abs/2510.25417 [bsky, 3 points, 1 comments]
- Overall use of Twitter - by young and old - is slumping. It's yesterday's platform. But the people who continue to post are the most extreme and of ten right wing imaginable. arxiv.org/pdf/2510.25417 [bsky, 3 points, 0 comments]
- Shifts in US Social Media Use 2020-24: Decline, Fragmentation, and Polarization [hn, 3 points, 0 comments]
- its the endgame for social media arxiv.org/abs/2510.25417 [bsky, 3 points, 0 comments]
- Změny v používání sociálních médií v USA v letech 2020 až 2024: 📌úpadek, 📌fragmentace 📌a přetrvávající polarizace arxiv.org/abs/2510.25417 [bsky, 2 points, 0 comments]
- Lähdetiedot Atlantin takaa vuosilta 2020-24 arxiv.org/pdf/2510.25417 [bsky, 1 points, 0 comments]
- New research shows something unexpected: our social media landscape is quietly collapsing. Not with a bang, but through mass withdrawal—especially among the young and old. The implications run deeper [bsky, 1 points, 1 comments]
- ¿Están muriendo las redes sociales? ¿Cuánto ha cambiado Twitter desde que se convirtió en X? ¿Qué partido domina ahora la conversación? Utilizando datos representativos a nivel nacional de la ANES de [bsky, 1 points, 0 comments]
- Encontré un estudio que indica que las redes sociales empiezan a decrecer en usuarios, y que los que quedan convierten las redes en más “polarizadas/antes”. La muestra es de unos 16K (2020) y unos 10, [bsky, 1 points, 1 comments]
- ⚡ Hackernews Top story: Shifts in U.S. Social Media Use, 2020–2024: Decline, Fragmentation, Polarization [bsky, 1 points, 0 comments]
- A new paper on arXiv looks at how social media use has morphed over the years. Usage has been dropping. It doesn't say why but I think it's become less personal and more commercial, so reducing connec [bsky, 1 points, 1 comments]
- Shifts in U.S. Social Media Use, 2020–2024: Decline, Fragmentation, Polarization view on hacker news [bsky, 0 points, 0 comments]
- Shifts in U.S. Social Media Use, 2020–2024: Decline, Fragmentation, Polarization (2025) https://arxiv.org/abs/2510.25417 (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46938903) [bsky, 0 points, 0 comments]
- arxiv.org/abs/2510.25417 [bsky, 0 points, 0 comments]
- Shifts in U.S. Social Media Use, 2020–2024: Decline, Fragmentation, Polarization (2025) https:// arxiv.org/abs/2510.25417 # arxiv [mastodon, 0 points, 0 comments]
- https://bsky.app/profile/buzzing.cc.web.brid.gy/post/3mefcnpz5xem2 [bsky, 0 points, 0 comments]
- Shifts in U.S. Social Media Use, 2020–2024: Decline, Fragmentation, Polarization https://arxiv.org/abs/2510.25417 [bsky, 0 points, 0 comments]
- Shifts in U.S. Social Media Use, 2020–2024: Decline, Fragmentation, Polarization (2025) https://arxiv.org/abs/2510.25417 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46938903 [bsky, 0 points, 0 comments]
- Shifts in U.S. Social Media Use, 2020–2024: Decline, Fragmentation, Polarization #HackerNews https://arxiv.org/abs/2510.25417 [bsky, 0 points, 0 comments]
- Shifts in U.S. Social Media Use, 2020–2024: Decline, Fragmentation, Polarization [bsky, 0 points, 0 comments]
- Interesante estudio: Evolución de 2020 a 2024 del uso y de la orientación política de las diferentes plataformas de redes sociales: arxiv.org/pdf/2510.25417 Bajan Youtube, Facebook y Twitter/X. Twitte [bsky, 0 points, 0 comments]
- Shifts in U.S. Social Media Use, 2020–2024: Decline, Fragmentation, Polarization https://arxiv.org/abs/2510.25417 (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46938903) [bsky, 0 points, 0 comments]
- Is social media dying? How much has Twitter changed as it became X? Which party now dominates the conversation? Using nationally representative ANES data from 2020 & 2024, I map how the U.S. social me [bsky, 0 points, 0 comments]
- Interesting paper on social media trends, looks like more people left social media than joined a new network #atproto #atdev arxiv.org/abs/2510.25417 [bsky, 0 points, 0 comments]
- 📰 Shifts in U.S. Social Media Use, 2020–2024: Decline, Fragmentation, Polarization (2025) 🔗 https://arxiv.org/abs/2510.25417 💬 Discuss on HN [bsky, 0 points, 0 comments]
- Shifts in U.S. Social Media Use, 2020-2024: Decline, Fragmentation, and Enduring Polarization (Petter Törnberg/arXiv.org) Main Link | memeorandum Permalink [bsky, 0 points, 0 comments]
- Shifts in U.S. Social Media Use, 2020–2024: Decline, Fragmentation, Polarization (2025) https://arxiv.org/abs/2510.25417 [bsky, 0 points, 0 comments]
- Shifts in U.S. Social Media Use, 2020–2024: Decline, Fragmentation, Polarization https://arxiv.org/abs/2510.25417 (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46938903) [bsky, 0 points, 0 comments]
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