Construct · 1 fields · 2 citations

algorithmic imaginary: a standalone construct

One name. One construct. A landmark on the map.

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algorithmicimaginary1 CONSTRUCTAlgorithmic imaginaryBUCHER · ORDINARY AFFECTS

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Media & communication studies

How people imagine an algorithm works, and how that imagining shapes their behavior

Taina Bucher introduced the construct in 2017 in Information, Communication & Society, defining the algorithmic imaginary as the ways people imagine, perceive, and experience algorithms (the "ordinary affects" of, for example, the Facebook News Feed) and how those imaginings shape their conduct whether or not their beliefs about the algorithm are accurate. The key move is that the imagined algorithm has real effects: users adjust what they post, how they interpret visibility, and how they feel about a platform based on a folk sense of the system, so the imaginary becomes productive of the very behavior algorithms then act on. Swart (2021) extended the idea empirically, showing how young people understand, feel about, and engage with algorithmic news selection through such everyday intuitions. The construct is distinctive because its object is not the algorithm as engineered but the algorithm as lived and felt, placing it squarely in media and communication studies rather than in computer science.[1][2]

Unit
One person's imagined sense of how an algorithm works, and its effect on their conduct
Recovery means
Not applicable
Measured by
Studied through interviews, diaries, and qualitative accounts of how users describe, feel about, and adjust their behavior around algorithmic systems

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Nearby constructs

algorithmic folk theories1 fields · 2 citationsanchor · a standalone constructsensemaking4 fields · 5 citationsjingle · one word, four constructsconstruct6 fields · 7 citationsjingle · one name, six constructs

References

  1. Bucher, T. (2017). The algorithmic imaginary: Exploring the ordinary affects of Facebook algorithms. Information, Communication & Society, 20(1), 30-44. https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118X.2016.1154086
  2. Swart, J. (2021). Experiencing algorithms: How young people understand, feel about, and engage with algorithmic news selection on social media. Social Media + Society, 7(2). https://doi.org/10.1177/20563051211008828

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