The role of media in contexts of affective polarization: A systematic literature review

Research on affective polarization is at its peak. Causes that intensify or mitigate the affective polarization environments in the contemporary democracies, as well as their consequences, remain the subject of debate. What is the relationship between the mass media and social media and affective polarization climates? Traditional and social media are inserted into a macro structure in which circulate the bulk of the political information that can be consumed, so it is necessary an examination of their role. lhis systematic literature review addresses all articles in the Web of Science database on the subject without restrictions (N=73). After reading the articles, the main evidence, trends, consensus, and disagreements on the subject, as well as recommendations for future researchers, are presented. lhe results point to minimal and heterogeneous media effects in researchs very focused on polarizing rather than depolarizing effects. It should be noted that there is greater heterogeneity and partisan moderation in information consumption than expected.