Going negative across platforms and time: Assessing the supply and demand of
negative campaigning

This study investigates dynamics of negative campaigning by Norwegian political
parties on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter from 2013 to 2024. Analysing 89,791
posts from nine major parties, it uses a novel content analysis approach combining
Large Language Models (LLMs) and human annotation to categorize posts as negative,
positive or neutral. The findings show an overall rise in negative campaigning across
platforms, with significant changes following leadership shifts in the right-wing populist
Progress Party (PP). The study examines engagement levels, measured by likes, for
different content types. Initially, negative content attracted more engagement on
Facebook. This trend, however, decreased over time, while Instagram saw increased
engagement with negative content during later years. Twitter users appeared to
have rather consistently favoured negative content, reflecting its reputation for
incivility. The article enhances understanding of political communication strategies in
a high-choice media environment, emphasizing the need to tailor campaign strategies
to platform-specific user dynamics.

Available open access here.

Also, this.

This coming tuesday, April 14th, sees me taking the long trek to Montréal to where I have been invited to speak at The Centre for the Study of Democratic Citizenship (CSDC). I also look forward to working on a couple of ongoing projects with Mireille Lalancette and Éric Bélanger, and to interact with graduate students working on dissertations related to political communication. … And also to revisit a certain mural.

Looks like I will be heading to Cape Town in June:

Monzer, Cristina and Larsson, Anders Olof (2026). Gendered Body Representation on Political TikTok videos: A cross-national comparison of Norway and Romania. Abstract accepted for presentation at the 76th Annual Conference of the International Communication Association (ICA). 4-8 June, Cape Town, South Africa.

Larsson, Anders Olof (2026). Asking for Action Across Platforms – A Longitudinal Study of Political Party Calls to Action across Social Media. Paper accepted for presentation at the 76th Annual Conference of the International Communication Association (ICA). 4-8 June, Cape Town, South Africa.

Bene, Márton; Illés, Gábo, Russmann, Uta; Baranowski, Pawel; Hassler, Jörg; Bos, Linda; Linaa Jensen, Jakob; Kruschinski, Simon; Larsson, Anders Olof; Pospíšil Macková, Alena and Dutceac Segesten, Anamaria (2026). Constructing Representation: Political Actors’ Representative Style on Facebook During European and National Election Campaigns. Paper accepted for presentation at the 76th Annual Conference of the International Communication Association (ICA). 4-8 June, Cape Town, South Africa.

Larsson, Anders Olof (2026). Discussant for the Polish Communication Association partner panel Emotions, Trust, and Cultural Fragmentation: Rethinking Media and Politics in Transforming Democracies in Central and Eastern Europe and Beyond chaired by Damian Guzek. To be presented at the 76th Annual Conference of the International Communication Association (ICA). 4-8 June, Cape Town, South Africa.

Mentor during Political Communication Research Escalator session held at the 76th Annual Conference of the International Communication Association (ICA). 4-8 June, Cape Town, South Africa.

… and this year I was fortunate enough to be part of the following presentations for the 75th annual ICA conference, to be held in Denver in June:

Bene, Márton; Casero-Ripollés, Andreu; Vicente Fenoll; Gërguri, Dren; Haßler, Jörg; Jackson, Dan; Kruschinski, Simon; Larsson, Anders Olof; Lilleker, Darren; Machado, Sara; Macková, Alena; Novotná, Martina and Wall, Matthew (2025). Calls to action – Engaging voters across 8 countries. Abstract accepted as part of the Digital Election Campaigning Worldwide: Campaigning on Facebook in National Elections Around the World panel to be held at the 75th Annual Conference of the International Communication Association, Denver, CO, 12-16 June.

El Mghari, Souad and Larsson, Anders Olof (2025). Platform and Gender Influences on Identity Expression: Health Opinion Leaders on Instagram and TikTok. Abstract accepted for the 75th Annual Conference of the International Communication Association, Denver, CO, 12-16 June.

Larsson, Anders Olof; Alonso-Muñoz, Laura; Bene, Márton; Boulianne, Shelley; Fenoll, Vicente; Haßler, Jörg; Lilleker, Darren; Machado, Sara; Macková, Alena; Peña-Vicuña, Percy; Rodríguez-Sánchez, Adriana (2025). Populism across two continents – Assessing the use and reception of populist communication on Facebook in 10 countries. Abstract accepted as part of the Digital Election Campaigning Worldwide: Campaigning on Facebook in National Elections Around the World panel to be held at the 75th Annual Conference of the International Communication Association, Denver, CO, 12-16 June.

Svensson, Jakob and Larsson, Anders Olof (2025). “I have seen it, have you seen me?” The logic of Engagement on Ugandan LGBT+ Organizations Digital Platforms. Full paper accepted for the 75th Annual Conference of the International Communication Association, Denver, CO, 12-16 June.

The biannual ECREA conference will take place in Ljubljana this year. The results from the peer review process just came out, and this year I have the pleasure of being involved in two presentations:

Buyens, Willem and Larsson, Anders Olof (2024). Links in the chain: Political parties’ online link sharing during campaign times in Belgium and Sweden. Abstract accepted for the 2024 ECREA conference. Ljubljana, Slovenia, 24-27 September.

Kalsnes, Bente and Larsson, Anders Olof (2024). “Anger is an Energy” – Anger, Love and the sharing of political posts on Facebook in Scandinavian elections. Abstract accepted for the 2024 ECREA conference. Ljubljana, Slovenia, 24-27 September.

… Also, there are two more presentations that I am involved in that are placed on a “waiting list” – given the apparent interest in attending the 2024 ECREA conference, my guess is those waitlisted papers will remain waitlisted. Oh well, win some, lose some.

I’m looking for a (master’s level) student to do scientific assistant work. The interested applicant can be employed to do only step 1 as described below, but there is also the possibility for a student w basic R skills (such as those that you have after the Analyse av digital kommunikasjon 1 class) to go on to work on step 2.

Step 1

Copy links to each individual post made to TikTok by a series of Scandinavian politicians. Essentially, right-clicking on each individual post, copying the URL and pasting the copied URL into a spreadsheet (Excel, google sheets…). Sort of what you are seeing below. Alternatively, some sort of automation routine could be used – like those offered by service like Axiom , Zapier, Integromat, tray.io or Exolyt – to get the URL for each individual video.

Step 2

… requires R knowledge. Specifically, the assistant would archive data from the collected TikTok URLs (as done in step 1) using the traktok R package. The assistant would also be responsible for “tidying” and organising the resulting data sets in order to make them ready for further analysis and export.

Beyond getting insights into the research process, the assistant who opts for both steps will get applied knowledge on how to use state-of-the-art data collection tools. Similarly, if the assistant is interested, s/he could for instance use the resulting data (similar to the Facebook and Instagram data sets we looked at in the Analyse av digital kommunikasjon 1 class in his/her master’s thesis). For both steps, it is important that the interested applicant is thorough, structured and organised.

If you are interested, please send me an email as soon as possible explaining (briefly): why you are interested, if you want to do step 1 or both steps and why you think you are the most suitable person for this job.

Here at the Department of Communication at Kristiania University College in Oslo, Norway, I’m looking for Ph. D. candidates to work on the Scandinavian Political Communication During the Pandemic project. Two fully funded positions are available. In short, we will use social media trace data (from CrowdTangle [Facebook and Instagram] and Twitter) to try and uncover the different ways that various governmental agencies and other political actors communicated to and with the public during the covid 19-pandemic. We might also want to expand the project to other types of data, but these sources will be our main focus.

Given the different approaches of the three Scandinavian countries, we will specifically feature a comparative angle for this project. The ad for the positions is available here. Please note that due to the comparison between the three Scandinavian countries, working knowledge of either Danish, Norwegian or Swedish is necessary. Moreover, given the nature of the project, it is necessary with experience in quantitative social scientific methods. I am thinking here primarily about basic statistics (if you’ve taken a master’s degree in media and communication studies or something similar, you’ve probably had this kind of class). Successful candidates should be able to demonstrate – for instance, via their master’s theses – their skill in using such techniques. Familiarity with software like Tableau, SPSS and/or Jamovi helps, and experience in using programming languages like R or Python is a plus.

Please drop me an email if you have any questions – the deadline for this is on September 15th, and the successful candidates should start their journey towards a Ph.D. no later than December 1st.

Attending a conference and a concert (I am visible in this picture – can you see me?)