Personalisation on Instagram - A quantitative content analysis of prominent Swedish politicians’ Instagram posts

Sammanfattning: Personalisation is a concept which is based on the idea that focus is increasingly directed at the individual politician and his or her personal characteristics. Social media, such as Instagram, has revived the concept since the possibilities for personalised political communication have increased. This study aimed to examine if personalised communication among prominent Swedish politicians on Instagram has increased during the current parliamentary term (2014-2018), if personalised communication gains more traction than other types of content on Instagram and, finally, if politicians in-corporate private aspects when conveying political messages on Instagram. To achieve this aim a quantitative content analysis of prominent Swedish politicians’ Instagram posts (n=1641) was conducted. The findings show that the proportion of personalised posts was large but it had not increased during the current parliamentary term. Furthermore, personalised content was associated with higher levels of popularity and engagement but the study could not provide evidence for this being statistically significant for all politicians at all times. Moreover, the study found that Swedish politicians increasingly are incorporating private aspects when conveying political messages and that these hybrids, as we have named them, are receiving more popularity than political messages that are strictly political.