How Politicians Use Public Relations Strategies to Manipulate the Political Opinions of Young People
Date of Submission
4-15-2025
Document Type
Thesis
Advisor
Dean Pagani
Keywords
politicians, young people, social media, manipulation, political party
LCSH
politicians, young adults--political activity, political parties
Abstract
With the rise of the internet and social media, politicians have begun to utilize evolving public relations (PR) strategies in the online sphere to sway the political opinions of young people who can or will one day vote. This thesis will analyze these public relations strategies and how they are intended to manipulate the people consuming the content and answer the question of how politicians use public relations strategies to manipulate the political opinions of young people. The data will be collected by monitoring the news as well as social media profiles of multiple politicians on both sides of the political spectrum and analyzing their posts to see what public relations strategies are used and why. The expected results are that politicians use the news and social media specifically to reach young people and use targeted and twisted narratives based on issues young people care about to convince young people to vote for their political party and keep them in power. If people can identify the manipulation of politicians, they are more likely to think critically about the political content they consume and not fall for biased information, which is important when deciding who will run and make decisions for everyone in our country.
Recommended Citation
O’Neil, Kylie, "How Politicians Use Public Relations Strategies to Manipulate the Political Opinions of Young People" (2025). Honors Theses. 99.
https://digitalcommons.newhaven.edu/honorstheses/99