Could this U.S.-based study help other countries especially those that are culturally different like those in Asia, where local governments and members of Congress interact differently? This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. According to Malcom Waters, globalization causes geographical and cultural boundaries to disappear in one's mind, but these boundaries do not really disappear. Similarly, in most countries those who say technology has made people more accepting of diverse viewpoints are simultaneously more likely to say it has made people more divided in their political opinions. Competing interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist. In addition to the fairly substantive effect detected in the physical health scale, the emotional and short-form scales showed detectable post-election shifts albeit by much smaller increments (~.10). In particular, local government officials and members of Congress each advance their political success by ensuring their shared constituents are satisfied. A median of 57% and majorities in every country except for Vietnam and India say social media have increased the ability for ordinary people in their country to have a meaningful voice in the political process. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0262022, Editor: Dorothy Porter, University of California San Francisco, UNITED STATES, Received: May 17, 2021; Accepted: December 15, 2021; Published: January 14, 2022. On the other hand, local governments may care less about how well they serve the public because powerful politicians provide preferential access to federal resources. It is undoubtedly the best form of government which brings fairness of choices to every one alike. From 2014 to 2018, the share of adults in these countries saying the internet has had a good influence on politics has declined by 11 percentage points in Jordan, 9 points in Lebanon and 6 points in Tunisia. This allows a repeated measures, within-subjects research design to examine whether the perceived health costs of political engagement changed as a result of the election. . This political influence has the potential to harm society by hindering progress towards social justice and equality. These effects are reshaping politics and are the result of the nature of the online environment itself, where the combination of technology, information, and instinctive mental processes can unconsciously reshape how people think. In 10 of the 11 countries surveyed, those who believe technology has made people more informed are more likely than others to say technology has also made people easier to manipulate. In addition to the differences in individual items, the 10-item short form scale, the six-item physical impact health scale, and the eight-item emotional health impact scale all showed statistically significant pre- and post-election increases (all results reported in supplementary materials). It can also lead to sleep deprivation, as we stay . According to Pew Research, an 11-country median of 72% say the internet and social media make people easier to manipulate. Plus, regional parties increase the political competition and the chance of emerging of some great leaders. Dynasty politics One of the most negative things about politics is that it follows the dynasty nature. Over the last 25 years, the Democratic Party has moved more to the "left," while the Republican Party has moved more to the "right." 1. For the purpose of comparing education groups across countries, we standardize education levels based on the United Nations International Standard Classification of Education. These mostly null findings reinforce the general inference taken from the bivariate statistical tests: there simply was not much in the way of detectable differences in self-reported physical, psychological and social health costs attributed to politics between the 2017 and 2020 samples. This suggests that following the election someone with an average political knowledge score (4.03 on a 7-point scale) was reporting an increase of approximately .16 on the health scales compared to their pre-election scores. This analysis excludes Vietnam, which has a single-party system, and Jordan, where fewer than 100 people said they had a partisan identification. respondents indicated a greater toll on their health). Politicians and people belonging to strong political backgrounds and families hold all the power and can most likely make anything happen. However, we do not guarantee individual replies due to the high volume of messages. Thank you for taking time to provide your feedback to the editors. Younger Mexicans are especially likely to say technologies have made people less tolerant to people who hold different views: 41% hold this view, compared with 30% of Mexicans ages 50 and older. Experimental results strengthen this implication as they show that different types of negative information and different targets of attack trigger different reactions of the subjects. One of the few studies attempting to systematically assess the public health consequences of politics using nationally representative data is Smith et al [7], who proposed and psychometrically validated a 32-item survey specifically designed to measure the health-related impacts of political engagement. To assess the effects of the 2020 election on these same measures, pre- and post-election differences within subjects were analyzed using paired sample t-tests. This is done by many and is unfortunately the worst effect of politics. But just to be ambiguous. The pre- and post-election dummy was insignificant in the remaining three models, indicating no change on these scales. "The article suggests that the NYC subway system is not fully efficient in part due to the political connection between labor unions and local politicians," Professor Kim explains. Following that course of action might increase the health of the public, but risks decreasing the democratic health of the polity. The impact isn't limited to politics. Social media has left both positive and negative effects on politics as described below: News anytime of the day One of the manners in which online life has changed governmental issues is the sheer speed at which news, survey results, and gossips are shared. Politics is something fundamental in every country in the world. These attitudes also vary by education level.11 Across all 11 countries, adults with a secondary education or higher are more likely to say technology has made people more informed about current events relative to those who do not have a secondary education. "We augment this main measure of stewardship with a news-based measure by counting the number of news articles that mention a local government's corruption each year." Across these 11 countries, public opinion about the internets impact on politics is most negative in Jordan, Lebanon and Tunisia. For more on PEST(ELI . To assess the temporal aspect of politics and health, the full 32-item health battery, its four sub-scales, the 10-item short form, as well as all individual items were subject to difference of means tests (independent sample t-tests) between the 2017 and the pre-election 2020 samples (all scales had high internal consistency with Chronbachs alphas > .83 and were constructed as item averages with a theoretical range of 15; see supplementary materials for details). We become numb to the news, like the presidential campaigns in Mexico. Panel analysis of pre/post 2020 election health scores with interaction terms. estimated 94 million Americans perceived politics as a significant source of stress, 44 million had lost sleep because of politics, nearly 30 million reported politics had harmed their physical health, and 11 million had suicidal thoughts because of politics. For instance, people in these countries overwhelmingly feel mobile phones have improved peoples ability to obtain news. First created in 1917 when the U.S. was entering World War I, the debt ceiling has been raised by Congress (and occasionally the president, when authorized to do so by Congress) dozens of times since then. Second, the study provides evidence about a largely unexplored type of "political. Was the shift in partisan control of the White House correlated in any way with how people saw politics affecting their health? Adults in these countries also feel access to technology has had a variety of both positive and negative impacts on their fellow citizens. But that agreement appears to be waning. One of the motivations for the recently published Journal of Accounting Research paper "Politically Connected Governments" was the daily experience with the subway system in New York City. The United States has two main political parties, the Republican Party and the Democratic Party. The 2020 sample allowed a wider choice of statistical controls than the results reported in Table 1, though the expanded models reported in Table 2 tended to reinforce the main takeaways from the earlier analyses. Professor Kim writes: "Our study highlights room for improvement in the stewardship over public resources at the local government level, despite recent reports that show the United States is in the bottom 10 percent of corrupt countries. But it is hardly used, thanks to the political threats and all the run-through. To affix this, a lot of regional parties originate as a result of politics. You cant eliminate politics and politicians from the current system. political health impact scales either stayed stable or increased across the four-year course of the Trump administration, and that the 2020 election was not associated with any big substantive change in this pattern. It was most recently raised . face of negative political opportunity structures and con-tinuing threats (Tarrow 2011, 161-74); they also miss op-portunities for inuence and policy change when condi-tions appear to favor them (Sawyers and Meyer 1999). An 11-country median of 44% say the increasing use of the internet has had a good impact on politics, but 28% feel that impact has been largely bad and this balance of opinion is most negative in Tunisia, Jordan and Lebanon. Around nine-in-ten Jordanians say access to mobile phones, the internet and social media has made people more informed about current events, but a similar share says this access makes them more vulnerable to being manipulated with rumors and false information. These may include grey areas that depend on context and intent. 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