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SINGAPORE: The COVID-19 “flight to safety” instinct, if it existed, likely dissipated towards the end of the election, according to a survey after the 2020 general election.
“I think it’s safe to say that the biggest assumption of GE2020 is that there will be a leakage effect to safety among voters, so much so that opposition parties, in the early days of the campaign, would generally fear annihilation,” the analyst said Analytix Labs’ Chief Data Officer Chua Chin Hon.
But a closer look at the Facebook data would have raised “serious questions” about this assumption, he added.
Daily user interactions with COVID-19 Facebook posts had fallen “very dramatically” since the April peaks, Chua said. By nomination day and voting day, public interest in COVID-19 on Facebook had “fallen to levels not seen since the beginning of the year.”
The results, which were presented on Thursday (October 8) in an Institute for Political Studies (IPS) forum held via Facebook Live, were derived from more than 32,000 COVID-19-related Facebook posts from seven media outlets. local between January 1 and July. 12.
The news portals are CNA, Straits Times, Mothership, TODAY, Zaobao, Wanbao, and Shin Min.
The study also obtained data from more than 8,000 general election-related Facebook posts from 15 public pages between June 22 and July 11.
Pages include those belonging to the People’s Action Party (PAP), Workers Party (WP), Singapore Progress Party (PSP), Singapore Democratic Party (SDP), Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, Mr. Pritam Singh, Dr. Tan Cheng Bock and Mr. Lee Hsien Yang.
READ: Social Media Sites, Instant Messaging, Most Popular Modes of Political Participation at GE2020 – IPS Survey
READ: Clear messages sent by voters in GE2020, ‘soul searching and reflection’ needed: Shanmugam
The study used only data from Facebook, as it is Singapore’s largest social media platform and the most efficient for generating news and news-related traffic to websites, Chua said. According to another IPS survey, Facebook also ranked “way ahead” of other platforms among respondents, he added.
However, he cautioned that Facebook’s data “does not establish any link” between eventual voting behavior, and Facebook is only a “limited power” for public opinion.
“But the Facebook data itself suggests that Singaporeans were sending a lot of interesting signals on Facebook before and during GE, signals that I think were not overlooked by the parties and many of us who watched the elections,” he said.
ELECTIONS “SURPRISES”
The study cited “surprises” such as the controversy over former PAP candidate Ivan Lim, as well as Sengkang’s victory for the WP and the turn of votes toward the opposition.
Lim withdrew from running in the elections after criticism surfaced online about his conduct during his time in the National Service, among other allegations.
Lim announced his decision on June 27, the same day the PAP released its manifesto. Facebook posts about Mr. Lim received 8.65 times more total engagement than the launch of the PAP manifesto, according to the data.
READ: GE2020: PAP candidate Ivan Lim will not participate in elections after criticism online
This was the “first major sign” that voters were “paying attention to a lot of other issues,” Mr. Chua said.
While acknowledging the “fair points” that online users might be drawn to drama and controversy and that social media reaction to election manifestos would be low, Chua said an engagement gap “of this size” it should have “sounded some red flags for the PAP that their employment message was not registering with voters as well as they thought.”
READ: A higher percentage of ‘undecided voters’ voted for the opposition in GE2020 in reverse of 2015 findings: IPS poll
The signals on Facebook were clear “from the early stages” of the election and pointed towards WP’s victory in Sengkang, Chua said, noting that the PAP team “failed to register much public interest” on Facebook during the campaign period. .
“On average, the WP Sengkang team had around 32,700 Facebook interactions per day during the campaign period, while the PAP team only achieved an average of 4,200 Facebook interactions per day,” he added. That’s almost an eight-fold gap.
While Chua cautioned that those who reacted to Facebook posts were not necessarily Sengkang voters or even Singaporeans, the significant gap showed that Sengkang’s team “garnered much more recognition and name recognition” than their PAP rivals, he said.
READ: GE2020: PAP, PSP, WP and SDP Candidates Take Part in General Election Debate ‘Live’
READ: It’s vital to frame difficult conversations in a considerate and responsible way, says WP’s Raeesah Khan after police warning
In general, there was an “enthusiasm gap” between the PAP and opposition campaign messages, Chua said.
“Facebook’s interactions with posts related to the PAP jobs message peaked very early and waned when it ended,” he added.
“But, on the contrary, the interaction for the opposition message reached its peak at the end of the campaign, just before the day of cooling and voting.
READ: GE2020: PAP wins with 61.24% of the votes; WP claims two GRCs, including the new Sengkang GRC
ATTITUDE OF “FIRE AND FORGETTING”
Political parties are getting better at producing content for social media, Chua said, but most of them were still “scratching the surface” of what modern election campaigns do by analyzing data and targeting on social media.
“For the next GE and beyond, I think they really have to go beyond just thinking about creating and delivering content. To do it well, they just need to better analyze the data that they themselves generate and that is also generated in the media, “he added.
“Clearly, there are a lot of questions about the authenticity of social media data, and I think we should be very skeptical. Indeed, social media data can be manipulated or misleading, but it is a completely different thing to say that you are skeptical and then ignore the signals that come from dozens and sometimes hundreds of thousands of users. “
Since Singapore is a “low signal” environment due to a lack of public polling and a “fairly passive media environment”, those who can “precisely select the correct signal from noise on social media” will have a huge competitive advantage. in future polls, “he said.
