Most people understand how social media works. The algorithm pushes things you interact with. So when conservatives shouted that TikTok only showed them underage content, we knew that was what they were interacting the most with. TikTok is the worst offender of this engagement model. It has gotten so bad that I can’t even scroll on there for any length of time. Moments when I think about checking it out again, it quickly reminds me that I shouldn’t be there. However, some group believed it was necessary to study something we all knew was happening.

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) published a report confirming what we all knew. It let’s us know that Twitter’s algorithm (never calling it by that other name) prioritizes ragebait in order to juice engagement. One, that helps their internal numbers to keep users active, even though they have fallen behind Threads. Two, many of the “blue checkmarks” get paid based on engagement. The study also found that this content was served up more to people who identify as Democrats.

Ziv Epstein, told 404 Media that they know this is “not the most surprising headline ever” but that they wanted to get to the ‘why’ of it all. “X’s feed algorithm, like a lot of these social media algorithms, is optimized for engagement [but] it turns out that not all types of engagement are considered equally,” the Stanford researcher said.

Some 715 American X users took part in the study. They all installed a browser extension that collected their For You and Following feeds. Users, also, filled out a survey that would gauge their views, as well as political standings.

X-Twitter pushes ragebait for engagement

The study found that the algorithm was “more likely to amplify” content that didn’t align with those self-reported values. This isn’t something new. Musk himself said that he wanted to do that when he took over the company. Yet, they found that much of this content is gauged at “Democrats”, because of course it does. The researches claim that actually engaging in the content weighs more heavily than simply liking something. Which makes a lot of sense.

“Replying is only a fraction of engagement, but there does seem to be some evidence that these algorithms are prioritizing and learning more from this kind of rarer form of engagement,” he said. “So it’s this feedback loop of outrage baiting. The algorithm learns that you get outraged and then continues to serve more content in that direction.”

This isn’t something earth-shattering. X-Twitter has been losing users since Musk took over. It is true that Musk pushes more right-wing content and censors more liberal. The site has gotten so bad that I seldom engage with anyone, including views that I support. Many longtime liberals remain on the site because of how many followers they have. That isn’t a reason to remain on a site that reality can’t even get a foothold.

File this study under: yeah, we already knew that.