A series of eight studies revealed that social media virality amplifies societal threats, fueling moral panics and increasing expressions of outrage. This work was published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.
The concept of “moral panics,” a term coined in the 1970s by sociologist Stanley Cohen to describe the societal outrage towards perceived threats like marijuana use or Rock and Roll music, has found a new breeding ground on social media platforms. These platforms amplify potential societal threats, leading to daily outrage over various issues, from economic collapse to climate change.
The amplification is attributed to the mechanics of social media, where virality—measured through shares and likes—serves as a psychological signal, highlighting which issues should concern the public. This phenomenon, termed as the “social amplification model of moral panics,” combines human vigilance against threats with the viral nature of social media, creating a feedback loop that magnifies these concerns and leads to widespread moral outrage.
Empirical studies support this model, showing that content related to potential societal threats becomes more likely to provoke outrage as it gains virality. This relationship is further intensified when the threats align with users’ ideological concerns or target political opponents, suggesting that social media not only spreads but also deepens the impact of moral panics by tapping into pre-existing societal divisions and fears.
In a comprehensive investigation into how virality on social media influences public sentiment, researchers Curtis Puryear and colleagues began with an analysis of Twitter posts related to climate change, immigration, and COVID-19. This initial study revealed that posts that received a high number of shares, making them viral, often attracted more replies expressing anger.
Building on this, the research team conducted a series of experiments involving nearly 1,500 participants. They studied how individuals reacted to tweets that were manipulated to appear either highly or minimally shared, assessing whether increased visibility led to increased perceptions of threat and a greater propensity to respond with anger. In one part of the study, participants were shown tweets from political groups they either agreed or disagreed with, altering the share counts to observe changes in perceived danger and anger-driven responses. Another segment of the study focused on reactions to clearly prejudiced tweets, varying the level of virality to gauge differences in emotional and behavioral responses.
The research team compared reactions to tweets that were merely annoying against those that were harmful or prejudiced, to see whether serious issues prompted stronger reactions than minor annoyances in the context of obvious popularity. The researchers invented a completely new social media trend, “#dizzydogging,” to test whether an unfamiliar issue would still be perceived as a threat if it became widely discussed, thereby examining if the reaction was to the content or the mere fact of its virality.
The final experiment expanded the scope by not only assessing intentions to express anger but also exploring other possible reactions such as worry or sadness. It further sought to understand participants’ perceptions of what made a tweet influential, be it widespread approval (likes) or its perceived impact on public opinion.
Throughout these experiments, participants evaluated the extent to which tweets invoked feelings of societal danger and their likelihood to respond with anger or other emotions. By manipulating likes and retweets, the studies probed how these metrics influenced people’s perceptions.
Through eight different investigations, including both analysis of real Twitter conversations and controlled experiments, this research provided evidence that posts becoming viral on social media are more likely to elicit responses of moral outrage. Viral content was consistently associated with increased perceptions of threat and a higher likelihood of eliciting angry responses.
The studies also suggested that virality is particularly effective in amplifying threats that resonate with users’ existing concerns—for instance, liberals showed a pronounced reaction to viral tweets about climate change. These findings collectively highlight that the widespread expression of outrage on social media is not just noise but often stems from genuine concerns over viral threats, emphasizing the role of social media dynamics in shaping public discourse and reactions to perceived societal dangers.
The authors note that their focus was mainly on explicit metrics of virality (including shares and likes) as signals of social amplification on platforms like Twitter. They suggest that future research could investigate additional features that indicate virality, such as trending topics or the volume of posts about a specific issue.
The research, “Moral Panics on Social Media Are Fueled by Signals of Virality”, was authored by Curtis Puryear, Joseph A. Vandello, and Kurt Gray.
