American campaigns on youtube get nasty

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American politicians (and their unofficial ad creators) are a nasty bunch when it comes to campaigning online, particularly when combining personal and issue attacks in advertisements posted to YouTube, University of Melbourne research has determined.

Political communications researcher Dr Jacob Groshek, together with co-investigators Noortje de Boer and Hannah Sütfeld, analysed 144 online campaign ads produced for more than 11 candidates during the 2012 French and American presidential elections, including the Republican primaries in the US.

The study found slightly more than 60% of American ads possessed a negative tone, compared to just 7% of French ads.

http://newsroom.melbourne.edu/attackads