Attitudes Toward Social Media Versus Voting Among Adolescents and Youth in a Politicized Context: Chile Before and After the 2019 Social Uprising (2018–2022)

Following Chile's October 2019 Social Uprising, social media increased as a key arena for youth political expression, leading us to investigate how adolescents (15-17) and young adults (18-21 and 22-24) transformed their attitudes toward social media as a more effective tool than voting to voice people's demands. To this end, we analyzed nationally representative data from the 9th National Youth Survey (2018-2019, pre-Uprising) and the 10th National Youth Survey (2021-2022, post-Uprising), employing bivariate tests and multiple linear regressions to assess age-group differences and sociopolitical predictors: political interest, satisfaction with democracy, and political identification. Our findings indicate that, in the post-Social Uprising period, support for social media over voting increased across all cohorts. This increase was statistically significant, with the largest rise observed among adolescents. Moreover, young people with lower political interest and weaker political identification were more likely to value social media over voting, while those more satisfied with democracy also tended to perceive social media as an effective channel for voicing people's demands. Taken together, these results underscore the transformative impact of sociopolitical crises on digital engagement patterns, particularly among less politicized youth, and highlight the importance of developmental and motivational distinctions when designing civic-education programs and online engagement strategies tailored to adolescents versus young adults.