Where the Ball Starts Rolling? An Empirical Investigation into Initial Opinion Formation on Social Media Platforms

Social media platforms expose users to an overwhelming volume of novel and often unverified information, shaping opinions that influence behavior both online and offline. The formation of initial opinions in such environments is critical, as these early impressions guide subsequent information processing, decision making, and belief systems. Drawing on cognitive psychology and information systems theories, this research examines how cognitive mechanisms and digital identity factors influence opinion formation during information consumption on social media. Across three experiments, this study advances understanding of initial opinion dynamics. Study 1 (n = 185) establishes that initial opinions begin to stabilize after a bounded volume of consistent exposure, revealing a sufficiency pattern. Study 2 (n = 246) tests whether the veracity of information influences engagement, revealing that users’ interaction with information is largely unaffected by its factual accuracy during early, low-effort processing, emphasizing the role of heuristic, schema-driven evaluation over objective truth assessment. Study 3 (n = 179) explores the impact of digital identity cues, finding that users are more likely to trust information from profiles displaying unverified titles (e.g., “Dr.”) than from verified expert influencers. Overall, the findings document how early-stage initial opinions form under bounded exposure, how these evaluations persist and shape engagement, and how digital identity cues activate evaluative schemas within contemporary social media environments. Practically, it offers critical insights for designing early-stage, identity-aware interventions to promote responsible information dissemination and foster more informed digital social media engagement.

History: Jason Thatcher, Senior Editor; Ayabakan Sezgin, Associate Editor.

Funding: This research was conducted with the financial support of Research Ireland at ADAPT, the Research Ireland Centre for AI-Driven Digital Content Technology at Trinity College Dublin [13/RC/2106_P2].

Supplemental Material: The online appendix is available at https://doi.org/10.1287/isre.2024.1589.