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What does the growing popularity of audio-visual platforms and vertical video mean for visual political communication? I address the opportunities and challenges of TikTok and related platforms for news media, political actors, citizens and researchers, and briefly discuss possible avenues for future academic work. These include questions related to source credibility and media literacy, the assessment of attention versus exposure, political learning and personalization. I argue that how our field engages with these questions will be decisive in the near future.

Even though right-wing populist parties have grown to become considerably relevant electoral forces in Western Europe, hardly anything is known about their political advertising strategies. This study is the first to address the political content prominent in right-wing populist poster advertising of the Austrian FPO from a longitudinal perspective. Results reveal that the construction of inclusionary elements is a relevant advertising strategy for the Freedom Party, whilst issues of migration and crime are of minor relevance but growing in importance since the turn of the century. Adapted from the source document.

"Obwohl rechtspopulistische Parteien mittlerweile in vielen Staaten Westeuropas eine wichtige Rolle spielen, existieren bislang nur wenige Studien, die sich mit den Inhalten ihrer Werbekommunikation auseinandersetzen. Das Plakat als dominantes Wahlkampfmedium verdient in diesem Kontext besondere Beachtung und wird in der vorliegenden Studie erstmals einer Langzeitanalyse unterzogen, die die Themenstrukturen und populistischen Inhalte von Wahlplakaten der Freiheitlichen Partei Österreichs (FPÖ) in den Blick nimmt. Es zeigt sich, dass die FPÖ stärker zu populistischen Mitteln der Inklusion greift, die Konstruktion von Feindbildern jedoch eine untergeordnete Rolle spielt: Die Bewerbung ausländerfeindlicher Inhalte rückt erst in den letzten Jahren in den Vordergrund und stellt keine dominante Werbestrategie der Partei dar." (Autorenreferat)

This article investigates the impact of pan-European candidates in European Parliament election campaigns. It focusses on the two 2019 nominees for the European Greens, who were Dutch and German, respectively. We conducted a pre-registered experiment in the Netherlands and Germany in early April 2019 to test the effects of (non-)personalized campaign posters on (a) turnout intention and (b) vote intention for the Greens alongside possible mediating effects of campaign and candidate evaluations. Our results suggest that while personalized campaigns as opposed to non-personalized campaigns may not matter per se for turnout and vote intention, individual candidates can make a difference in European elections, particularly with respect to vote intention. As such, the results have important implications for our understanding of European Parliament election campaigns.

AbstractThe present study investigates whether or not reading about corrupt politicians influences peoples' subsequent judgments toward political actors' supposed corruptness. We expected this media stereotype priming effect to be dependent on pre-existing implicit stereotypes. It was hypothesized that only those participants would show a media priming effect who already have a strong automatic association between 'politicians' and 'corrupt' in memory prior to reading a further facilitative article ("politicians are corrupt"). Conversely, people who do not have a comparable biased cognitive association should not. Data from an experiment support this hypothesis: We found pre-existing implicit stereotypes to moderate the media priming effect on explicit stereotypes, but only when the newspaper article covered the "corrupt politician" media stereotype with sufficient salience. Furthermore, the experiment showed that antagonistic media primes ("politicians are honest") did not produce a media priming effect at all. Antagonistic articles were simply not able to prime corruption-related memory traces.

Exposure to cross-cutting versus like-minded political advertising is highly relevant in terms of deliberative democratic theory. However, few efforts have been made to shed light on the effects of such opinion-incongruent and -congruent political advertisements. By analyzing data from a representative panel survey, and hence identifying effects over time, we found that exposure to opinion-congruent advertising enhanced political participation. Opinion-congruent advertising also accelerated the timing of voting decisions when citizens were low in ideological strength. However, contrary to our expectations, exposure to opinion-incongruent political advertising had no effects on political participation and the timing of voting decisions. These findings suggest that opinion-congruent advertising is a strong mobilizer, whereas opinion-hostile advertising is a weak cross-pressure. Implications of these findings for the study of political advertising effects are discussed.

Abstract
In the current media landscape, it is becoming increasingly difficult for citizens to rely on trustworthy information, not least because reliable facts are mixed with dubious claims, unsubstantiated opinions, or outright lies. The ability to distinguish factual from other types of mediated information is becoming increasingly crucial, but we know little about how well-equipped citizens are to make these distinctions. In an original survey study conducted in ten European countries, we asked respondents whether they considered six different statements relating to the European Union to be factual or opinion statements. Our results show that citizens have considerable difficulties in correctly identifying both factual information and opinions. Next to pre-existing judgements, we identify media-related, political, and sociodemographic factors that influence categorisation accuracy. We discuss our findings in relation to citizens' perceptions of journalistic credibility and their information literacy as well as ongoing debates about the effectiveness of fact-checkers on social media.

Young citizens increasingly turn to social media platforms for political information. These platforms enable direct communication between politicians and citizens, circumventing the influence of traditional news outlets. We still know little about the consequences of direct contact with politicians on such platforms for citizens' political participation. Here, we argue that the interplay of different actors in the political news diet of citizens should be investigated from a networked communication perspective. Relying on a cross-sectional survey of young Danes (15–25 years old, n = 567), we investigate the relationship between following politicians on social media and: (a) the composition of young citizens' political media diet; and (b) their civic messaging and campaign participation. Following political actors on social media relates to increased campaign engagement and can be a catalyst for young people's exposure to campaign news, but their friends and followers function as the main node of their political online networks. We document a process of the de-mediation of politics on social media: Established news media lose influence as primary information sources for young citizens. We discuss these results in the context of users' active curation and passive selection of their political social media diet.

Young citizens increasingly turn to social media platforms for political information. These platforms enable direct communication between politicians and citizens, circumventing the influence of traditional news outlets. We still know little about the consequences of direct contact with politicians on such platforms for citizens' political participation. Here, we argue that the interplay of different actors in the political news diet of citizens should be investigated from a networked communication perspective. Relying on a cross-sectional survey of young Danes (15–25 years old, n = 567), we investigate the relationship between following politicians on social media and: (a) the composition of young citizens' political media diet; and (b) their civic messaging and campaign participation. Following political actors on social media relates to increased campaign engagement and can be a catalyst for young people's exposure to campaign news, but their friends and followers function as the main node of their political online networks. We document a process of the de-mediation of politics on social media: Established news media lose influence as primary information sources for young citizens. We discuss these results in the context of users' active curation and passive selection of their political social media diet.

Abstract
We test the role of like-minded and cross-cutting political discussion as a facilitator of online and offline political participation and examine the role of strong versus weak network ties. Most prior research on the topic has employed cross-sectional designs that may lead to spurious relationships due to the lack of controlled variables. The findings of a two-wave panel survey controlling the autoregressive effects suggest that cross-cutting talk with weak ties significantly dampens online but not offline political participation. However, no such effects were detectable for cross-cutting talk with strong ties. In addition, we found no effect of discussions involving like-minded individuals in either weak or strong network connections on online and offline forms of political engagement. Implications are discussed.

During election times, societal actors frequently employ specific get-out-the-vote campaigns to mobilize young voters' turnout and engagement with the election. Although such campaigns receive praise in society, little is known about how effective they are and if they shape longer lasting types of political engagement. This study presents novel evidence about the differential effects of a multi-platform get-out-the-vote campaign in Denmark, and investigates how such campaigns can help to address the important democratic problem of youth disengagement. Based on a two-wave panel study among high school- and university students in Denmark (n = 275), the effects of classroom interventions, political event participation, and social media use on political interest, knowledge, and political efficacy are explored. The results suggests that get-out-the-vote campaigns are able to strengthen youths' political engagement, but that civic education and political events may be more important than communication via social media.

AbstractDigitally networked and new, unconventional activities allow citizens to participate politically in activities that are low in the effort and risks they bear. At the same time, low-effort types of participation are more loosely connected to democratic political systems, thereby challenging established modes of political decision-making. This can set in motion two competing dynamics: While some citizens move closer to the political system in their activities (upstream effects), others engage in political activities more distant from it (downstream effects). This study investigates non-electoral participation trajectories and tests intra-individual change in political participation types over time, exploring whether such dynamics depend on citizens' exposure to political information. Utilizing a three-wave panel survey (n = 3490) and random intercept cross-lagged panel models with SEM, we find more evidence for downstream effects but detect overall diverse participation trajectories over time and a potentially crucial role of elections for non-electoral participation trajectories.