In the Election Questions 2025 series, researchers at the University of Twente explore how science can help us better understand dilemmas surrounding elections. This time, we spoke with Shenja van der Graaf, Associate Professor of Communication Science, to ask: Does our search behaviour contribute to polarisation?
The quiet power of search engines
As the elections approach, online information plays a major role in how we form our opinions. While much of the attention goes to social media, search engines such as Google, Bing, and DuckDuckGo also shape what we see.
"They seem neutral," says Van der Graaf, "but in reality they subtly guide what appears on our screens, and therefore how we think about social issues."
Social media are often criticised for creating so-called filter bubbles, where people mainly see content that fits their own views. Search engines, however, influence us in a different and more elusive way. According to Van der Graaf, polarisation in this context is not a fixed state but a process that constantly changes over time.
Not a bubble, but a mirage
Together with colleagues Alex van der Zeeuw and Roel Lutkenhaus, Van der Graaf studied how search results differ across platforms and over time. What they found was striking: patterns of digital polarisation appear and disappear.
"What we observed in November had already vanished by December," says Van der Zeeuw. "Sometimes age or region seemed to play a role, but then that effect disappeared again. Polarisation is not a bubble you can burst. It is more like a mirage: briefly visible, intangible and constantly moving."
That makes it hard to recognise, and even harder to counter. "There is no fixed dividing line between groups," adds Van der Graaf. "The digital environment itself keeps changing."
Small differences, big effects
The researchers compared countless search queries across multiple platforms and noticed significant discrepancies. In more than sixty per cent of searches, the first five results differed between Google, Bing and DuckDuckGo. In about forty per cent of cases, the difference was not in the content itself but in the order of the results shown.
That might seem minor, but it matters. "During elections, the ranking of search results can be just as influential as the content," Van der Graaf explains. "What appears at the top automatically gets more attention, and that shapes which perspectives we take seriously."
These subtle shifts have tangible consequences. "For topics such as migration or climate change, we saw that the tone could vary from one day to the next," she says. "Sometimes factual news stories dominated, other times opinion pieces or political commentary. The conversation gradually changes tone, without people consciously noticing."
As users are exposed to constantly shifting perspectives, maintaining a shared understanding of facts becomes increasingly difficult. "And that shared framework," says Van der Graaf, "is the foundation of a healthy democratic debate."
Polarisation as a process
Van der Graaf argues that we should stop thinking of polarisation as an endpoint, as if society is simply divided, and instead see it as something dynamic.
"Polarisation is not something that is," she says. "It is something that happens. It moves with the technologies we use. That makes it invisible, but not harmless."
Someone searching for election information today will not necessarily see the same results tomorrow. "Your digital environment is constantly in motion," explains Van der Graaf. "What you see depends on algorithms, time, and even your previous searches."
Because these patterns keep shifting, solutions based on the idea of static bubbles do not work. "You cannot just burst one bubble," she notes. "New, temporary combinations of information keep forming."
Learning to navigate a changing reality
So, does our search behaviour lead to polarisation? "Yes," says Van der Graaf, "but not in the way we often think. It is not a fixed divide between groups, but a constantly shifting pattern. Search engines continuously create temporary differences in what people see, and those subtle shifts influence how we think, talk and vote."
The solution, she argues, lies not in restricting technology but in strengthening what she calls digital resilience: the ability to consciously navigate the continuous flow of online information.
"It starts with awareness," says Van der Graaf. "Understanding that search results are not universal or permanent, but temporary and personal. Even with the same search term, your neighbour might see a completely different reality. We cannot stop that dynamic entirely, but we can learn to deal with it."
In the end, she concludes, the real challenge is not to burst bubbles, but to learn to live with the constant movement of our information environment.
