Viral Attention and Campaign Durability in Online Issue Advocacy

Publication Date

Spring 2026

College

College of Liberal Arts & Social Sciences

Department

Political Science, Department of

Student Level

Undergraduate

Faculty Mentor

Nathan Griffith

Presentation Type

Talk/Oral

Summary

Does online virality decrease the lasting power of popular issue campaigns? Existing research links digital attention to mobilization through platform affordances, symbolic participation, network diffusion, and organizational capacity, yet studies often rely on single-case accounts or individual-level data that limit cross-campaign comparison. This study builds a campaign-level test across hashtag-driven issue campaigns in the United States. I measure virality through the size, speed, and decay of attention spikes around trigger events. I measure lasting power through post-peak protest persistence and post-peak organizational activity over a fixed follow-up window. I then test whether sharper viral spikes predict faster decline in offline activity, and whether mobilizing content and organizational infrastructure shape that relationship.

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