In his analysis of “symbolic capitalists” in We’ve Never Been Woke, sociologist Musa al-Gharbi summarizes research on who uses social media:

All said, it is a relatively small segment of the population that is “very online” with respect to social media, or that regularly consumes jouranalistic media in virtually any format (TV, online, print, podcasts) – let alone engaging with research by think tanks, nonprofits, activists, or academics. Mostly, it’s people like us. Virtually the entire political and cultural melodrama carried out in academia, policymaking spaces, media outlets, and social networking sites it carried out among symbolic capitalists. The views and priorities of most others are simply unrepresented in these spaces. And for their part, most of those who are not symbolic capitalists are not particularly interested in the highly idiosyncratic struggles we invest so much of ourselves into. (195)

This seems consistent with earlier reports I’ve seen. Social media activity is driven by a small set of users who are not representative of the American population at large.

This could be helpful to keep in mind when wondering if social media is fragmented or how widespread a trend is or whether algorithms could be driving people to different corners of the Internet. These features might be true AND social media as a whole might be driven by a small set of people who share particular positions and practices.

(Read more about the definition of symbolic capitalists here.)