“Everybody Around Me Is Talking About The Same News”

An Analysis Of News And Its Sources Shared In “Bolsonaristas” Whatsapp Groups In 2022 Brazilian Presidential Election

Abstract

The article analyzes the sources and news that circulated in public WhatsApp groups in support of presidential candidate Jair Bolsonaro of the Liberal Party (PL) in the 2022 elections. The justification for the choice of this application in question consists of its protagonism as a powerful communication channel for political propaganda strategies. In all, 90 groups were observed from 10/27/22 to 11/02/22, covering three days before and three days after the second round elections held on 10/30/22, reaching the number of 3,755 news links. Considering the significant amount of content, the applied methodology is quantitative and qualitative content analysis to obtain statistical and analytical data by a code book. As a result, it can be said that the main sources of information were news sites that aren’t included by the mainstream press, a preference for sharing news about elections in general and election research from different polling institutes, and the high sharing of repeated news as a way to reinforce information considered important.