Linked spiral of silence: The process of public opinion formation from the meso perspective

沉默螺旋理论讨论了社会成员参与公共话语从而促成公共舆论的条件。该理论的优势在于个人视角和社会视角之间的动态联系；然而，批评的主要观点之一是缺乏对中观视角的关注。诺埃尔-诺伊曼只关注匿名公众，而她很少考虑朋友或家人等社会环境。这是不合理的，正如在研究沉默螺旋时经常讨论的那样。这就是我们的项目开始的地方。我们关注社会环境在舆论形成过程中的作用：个人在多大程度上不仅利用大众媒体，而且利用社会环境来监测环境？社会环境如何作为社会控制的权威--类似于诺埃尔-诺伊曼所说的社会？如果社会和社会环境要求不同的东西，个人会怎么做？对意见氛围的看法和接受某一意见的意愿是如何受到影响的？为了回答这些问题，我们旨在对社会环境作为舆论形成过程中的一个有影响力的变量进行实证分析和理论整合。从理论上看，我们与社会学解释模式相一致。我们将社会环境理解为一个人所有相关社会关系的网络。因此，我们能够对同龄人群体以及相关的个人关系进行建模--线上和线下--并分析它们在舆论形成过程中的影响。另一个目标是更加专注于数字发展。例如，线上和线下对某种观点的接受意愿有什么不同？数字领域可能的匿名性如何影响人们对孤立的恐惧？数字资源如何影响我们对环境的观察和对舆论氛围的感知？从研究现状和社会学解释模型出发，构建了研究模型，并提出了研究假设。这与社会环境的作用有关，也与舆论形成的自上而下过程中的数字化发展有关，涉及对环境的观察、对孤立的恐惧、对舆论氛围的感知、对某一意见的接受意愿和意见的适应。该项目的核心是一项三波小组研究，所有因果假设都可以用它来检验。为了能够描述环境观察的各种来源，我们还打算将日记研究整合到小组研究中。我们的项目有助于更好地理解公众舆论的形成：通过沉默的螺旋--社会和数字--联系在一起。

The theory of the spiral of silence discusses the conditions under which members of a society take part in the public discourse and thus contribute to public opinion. The strength of the theory is the dynamic connection between the individual and the societal perspectives; one of the major points of criticism, though, is the lacking attention regarding the meso perspective. Noelle-Neumann exclusively concentrates on the anonymous public, whereas she rarely takes into consideration social surroundings like friends or family. Unjustifiably so, as is often discussed in research on the spiral of silence.This is where our project starts. We focus on the role of the social surroundings in the process of public opinion formation: To what extent do individuals use not only mass media but also social surroundings to monitor the environment? How do social surroundings serve as an authority of social control – similar to the society according to Noelle-Neumann? How do individuals behave if society and social surroundings demand different things? How are the perception of the climate of opinion and the willingness to admit to a certain opinion influenced? To answer these questions, we aim to empirically analyze and to theoretically integrate social surroundings as an influential variable in the process of public opinion formation. From a theoretical perspective, we tie in with the model of sociological explanation. We understand social surroundings as a net of all relevant social relationships of an individual. Thus, we are able to model peer groups as well as relevant individual relationships – online and offline – and to analyze their influence in the process of public opinion formation. Another goal is to focus more strongly on digital developments. For example, what is the difference between the online and offline willingness to admit to a certain opinion? How does a possible anonymity in the digital area affect fear of isolation? And how do digital sources influence our observation of the environment and the perception of the opinion climate? From the current state of research and the model of sociological explanation, a research model was developed and hypotheses were derived. These are related to the role of social surroundings as well as to the digital developments in the top-down process of public opinion formation regarding observation of environment, fear of isolation, perception of opinion climate, willingness to admit to a certain opinion and adaption of opinions. Core of the project is a three-wave panel study with which all causal hypotheses can be tested. To be able to describe the various sources of the observation of environment, we additionally aim to integrate a diary study into the panel study. Our project contributes to a better understanding of public opinion formation: linked by a spiral of silence – socially and digitally.