Tweeting During Presidential Debates: Effect on Candidate Evaluations and Debate Attitudes

This study examined the effects of tweeting while watching a presidential debate (live-tweeting) during the 2012 U.S. election. We examined candidate evaluations and debate attitudes for participants who did and did not tweet while watching a presidential or vice presidential debate. We found that tweeting while watching a debate was related to participants reporting more favorable attitudes about Barack Obama, paying more attention to the debate, and perceiving debates to be more important. Live-tweeting a debate was not related to enjoying the debate more. Overall, our results indicate that live-tweeting a televised political event can result in different effects than simply watching a debate and that live-tweeting debates is an activity driven by engagement with and thoughtful processing of debate content rather than primarily about fun or passing time.