Influencers as Empowering Agents? Following Political Influencers, Internal Political Efficacy and Participation among Youth

ABSTRACT Influencers, characterized by their social-media-made fame, are known for endorsing brands, but are also producing political content, which has been shown to resonate with youth. However, research on how their political messages impact young people’s political involvement is still scarce. To address this lacuna, we conducted a two-wave panel study (N W2 = 496) among youth aged 16 to 25 years to investigate links between following political influencers, young people’s internal political efficacy, and political participation. We draw from the two-step flow of communication and opinion leadership literature to explain influencers’ impact on young people’s political behavior. Moreover, we advance the theoretical argument that influencers may not only relay political news, but also render it more comprehensible for youth. Influencers may thereby raise young people’s confidence in their political self-competence, and consequently affect their level of political participation. We find that followers’ internal political efficacy is predicted by following political influencers at moderate to high levels of perceived simplification of politics by influencers. However, there is no link between internal political efficacy and political participation, which may be explained by influencers’ direct and short-term mobilizing effect on young people. Overall, our findings have important theoretical implications for contemporary understandings of opinion leadership in mediated contexts.