Reform UK voters are the least likely to see posts from friends and family on social media and most likely to see content from brands and news organisations, a study has found.
The Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) thinktank said algorithms were fuelling isolation and division after its research analysing users’ feeds on Instagram, Facebook, X, Bluesky and TikTok found that only 13% of Reform UK voters saw content from someone they knew, compared with 23% of Green party voters.
The findings were based on a representative UK survey of 1,000 people who were asked to categorise the top four posts of their most used social media feed.
Of these top four posts, 18% came from someone a user actually knew, while 35% were from influencers, public figures or recommended content, and 29% were from adverts and brands.
The report called for a public service social media platform, led by the BBC and European public service broadcasters, and said the “social” element of social media was being stripped away.
Dr Sofia Ropek-Hewson, a senior research fellow at IPPR, said: “It’s really interesting that people with different political views have different algorithms to the extent that they see quite a different amount of personal content.
“We need to be thinking more about what commercial algorithms are feeding different political groups. So many of these platforms look increasingly like TikTok, which doesn’t actually describe itself as a social media platform.
“We don’t see what anyone else sees, and that makes it harder to build common cultures and to challenge people.”
The researchers said “sticky” design that keeps users engaged for longer was being prioritised over social connection, with TikTok-style short-form video content now dominating feeds across all apps.
Influencers and celebrities were more likely to be promoted because users spend longer watching them and were more likely to spend money engaging with their content, they said.
The report’s authors said that because social media companies have a clear commercial incentive to maximise time spent on their platforms, a public service social media platform should be developed as an alternative with more transparency and privacy.
Ropek-Hewson said: “Despite these platforms all mutating to look more like TikTok, I don’t think we have to be stuck thinking that social media means one thing. There was a lot of optimism in the early 2000s about what social media could mean and what our online social lives would look like and I think we can develop better platforms with better values underpinning them.”
The UK government has committed to tackling addictive features on social media, such as scrolling or “streaks” that encourage daily usage of apps. The prime minister recently said he was prepared to act to prevent children becoming hooked on social media at a young age.
The report also called for an amendment to the Online Safety Act to tackle “manipulative algorithmic design” and give regulators stronger powers over platform architecture, as well as requiring platforms to promote public interest content including from charities, community groups and public bodies.
“People don’t want boring feeds or purely civic or informational spaces. People like engaging, entertainment-based content, but I think that people do want a bit more control over what they see,” said Ropek-Hewson.
